Category: Outlets – Sydney Morning Herald

RSVP To Merge With Oasis Active

Posted on June 25, 2014

Rsvp oasisactive logosSYDNEY MORNING HERALD – June 24 – RSVP, the online dating site owned by Fairfax Media, is poised to sign a merger agreement with rival Oasis Active, which is backed by Ten Network Holdings. RSVP is wholly owned by Fairfax, while Ten controls ~40% of Oasis, sharing the registry with other investors including co-founders David Heysen and Daniel Haigh, as well as former Star City, Engin and Solution 6 boss Neil Gamble. The merged entity would be worth ~$90M, with Fairfax to retain ~50% holding. Ten will control ~20% with Mr Heysen and Mr Haigh also retaining stakes.

by Sarah Thompson, Jake Mitchell & Gretchen Friemann
See full article at Sydney Morning Herald

Oasis Active Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder, Dave Heysen, said: “Oasis has always admired the RSVP brand in Australia and look forward to working with a business that has been one of the major players in the Australian market for more than 15 years. Together we can ensure that we continue to develop our products to cater for a wider range of the Australian singles market as well as collectively develop ways to best leverage rapidly changing technology.”

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This post also appears on InternetDatingInvestments.

eHarmony’s Average Online Dater

Posted on September 11, 2013

Online dating australiaSYDNEY MORNING HERALD – Sep 11 – According to eHarmony, the average Australian online dater has never been married, is in their early-to-mid thirties and works as a teacher. The second and third most popular professions are nursing and retail for females, truck-driving or in a trade for males. The numbers and professions on RSVP paint a slightly different picture. The most popular profession is healthcare followed by education, science and then trades and services. The most popular age group is 25 to 34-year-olds, followed by 35 to 44.

by Sarah Berry
The full article was originally published at Sydney Morning Herald, but is no longer available.

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There’s No Love Lost For Online Date Frauds

Posted on December 6, 2011

Scammers1SYDNEY MORNING HERALD – Dec 6 - 1600 Australians reported losing $17M in the online search for romance this year, up from $15M last year. The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission is asking the online dating and romance industry to comment on draft guidelines for cleaning up the industry. A group of industry representatives has been working on draft guidelines since July. The ACCC would like dating agencies to provide clients with warnings about scams, and verify online profiles to ''detect and disrupt the activities of those seeking to engage in fraud''. It also wants dating agencies to set up internal complaint handling procedures. The ACCC expects to launch new guidelines early in the new year.

by Lucy Battersby
See full article at Sydney Morning Herald

Social Networking Apps Bring The Close Closer

Posted on November 25, 2011

Girl with cellSYDNEY MORNING HERALD – Nov 25 – Blendr enables users to check their smartphones and then text other users a few metres away. If they hit it off, they can meet up for a date within minutes. Blendr is the heterosexual version of Grindr, which has more than 2M gay users in 192 countries. Joel Simkhai, who founded Grindr and Blendr, says the main difference between the two apps is that the straight version is less focused on casual sex. Other geosocial networking apps, such as OkCupid Locals and HowAboutWe are popular.

by Rachel Wells
See full article at Sydney Morning Herald

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Government To Censor iTunes App Store

Posted on March 9, 2011

Itunes_logo SYDNEY MORNING HERALD – Mar 9 - Australians will soon be able to complain about mobile game apps they take offence to and get them removed from app stores such as Apple's iTunes if they're deemed "refused classification". And if mobile game apps are classified anything above MA15+ and the government doesn't introduce an R18+ games classification (which it plans to vote on in July), then any game app rated over MA15+ will also be refused classification. What is unclear, however, is how the Classification Board will classify apps that aren't necessarily games like Grindr.

by Ben Grubb
See full article at Sydney Morning Herald

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This post also appears on SocialNetworkingWatch.

Perfect Matchmakers Tap A Rich Seam Of Lonely Hearts

Posted on March 7, 2011

Trudy gilbert elite introductions SYDNEY MORNING HERALD – Mar 6 – Trudy Gilbert is Sydney's own millionaire matchmaker, responsible for marrying off famous faces, executives of blue-chip companies and the social elite. Her company, Elite Introductions, is an exclusive dating service where membership is a cool $4995 per year and applications for membership have grown 25% in the past three months. More than 90% of her members want to go on a second date with the person they are matched with. She has had eight marriages, one baby and says 7 out of 10 members are in long-term relationships.

by Rachel Olding
See full article at Sydney Morning Herald

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Asia: Falling Fertility Rates And Shrinking Populations

Posted on January 17, 2011

Asian babies SYDNEY MORNING HERALD – Jan 15 – Taiwan's fertility rate, the average number of children born to its women in their lifetime, fell to 0.91 last year, far below the rate of 2.1 needed to sustain population size. Hong Kong has one of the lowest fertility rates in the world, and faces a population decline from 7M to about 6M by mid-century. Japan's population shrank by a record 123K people last year. From a peak of 128M in 2006, the Japanese population will shrink to under 100M by mid-century, by which time its over-65s will have grown from 25% of population to ~40%. Registered marriages last year were the fewest since 1954. In mainland China, population is still growing and will peak about 2030 at ~1.39 billion – 1.46 billion. Australians and Americans are keeping their end up in baby production, with fertility rates close to two children per woman, and high immigration rates. By mid-century we are likely to see 36M people in Australia (from the present 22.5M) and 439M in the US (from 310M). FULL ARTICLE @ SYDNEY MORNING HERALD

Daterate.com.au: Anonymous Feedback On Dates

Posted on October 11, 2010

Dateratecomau logo SYDNEY MORNING HERALD – Oct 11 - Daterate.com.au works by collecting anonymous feedback from men or women who go on dates and often don't get their calls, emails or texts returned, said Gabe Hollombe, one of the creators of the site. All a man or woman needed to do was to give their date a unique number that they could then use to fill out an anonymous survey form online. Hollombe said the site hoped to make money by charging for the unlocking of feedback or by getting targeted advertising. A similar site exists at daterate.net. FULL ARTICLE @ SYDNEY MORNING HERALD

Australian Dating Site Created Fake Profiles

Posted on July 22, 2010

Redhotpie logo SMH.COM.AU – July 22 – Jetplace, the operator of dating website Red Hot Pie, has been ordered by the federal court to disclose to its users that it operated 1,371 of its own profiles on the website. Jetplace has been ordered to publish a corrective notice when each user of the website who registered between December 2004 and November 26, 2008 next logs on, and to send a copy of the notice to the email address of each user. Users can also apply for refunds if they can demonstrate that they were misled by the conduct into paying for membership of the website. FULL ARTICLE @ SMH.COM. AU

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One In Four Adults Have Used Internet To Find A Mate

Posted on April 19, 2010

Rsvp logo SYDNEY MORNING HERALD – Apr 17 – A Nielsen poll found one in four adults have used the internet to find a partner and another 38% are considering using online dating. Of those who had used online dating, 33.6% reported a short-term relationship, 16.2% said they had a long-term relationship, 8.9% said they had married or were in a defacto relationship, and 2.7% had children. RSVP.com.au (owned by Fairfax Media, the publisher of the Herald) commissioned Nielsen to conduct the first comprehensive survey of online dating habits. The most popular dating sites among those polled were RSVP (54%), Adult Match Maker (21%), eHarmony (20%) and Oasis Active (19%). FULL ARTICLE @ SYDNEY MORNING HERALD

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