WASHINGTON POST – June 4 – Erika Ettin is the founder of A Little Nudge, an online dating assistant. A Little Nudge offers three packages. For $195, Ettin pens a tailor-made profile and offers photo consultation. For a step up, customers can also get eight hand-picked matches per week, 20 ghostwritten e-mails initiating contact and unlimited dating advice for $325. For a “platinum nudge,” at $595 a month for three months, the firm will schedule dates, offer coaching and handle all pre-date communication.
Category: Outlets – Washington Post
Falling In Love Is All In Our Brains
WASHINGTON POST – Feb 13 – Basic biology may play at least as strong a role in love as do socialization, environment, fate and other factors. "Some of our very complex behaviors like love is still regulated, to some degree, by a fairly simple set of neurochemicals”, says neuroendocrinologist Tom Sherman, an associate professor at Georgetown University School of Medicine. Researchers have now identified three brain systems that are at work in mating and reproduction: lust, which is primarily mediated by the sex hormone testosterone; romantic love, which is primarily mediated by dopamine, a neurotransmitter that drives the brain’s reward and pleasure centers, and is characterized by craving and focused attention for just one person at a time. However, it remains to be seen how big a part neurochemicals and brain circuits play in love and relationships. A new study found that monkeys that inhaled oxytocin paid more attention to one another and treated one another more kindly.
by Carolyn Butler
See full article at Washington Post
Matchmaker Using Twitter to Arrange Dates
WASHINGTON POST – May 14 – Relationship coach Paul Carrick Brunson uses Twitter to arrange dates for his followers through his Modern Day Matchmaker Wednesday service. Brunson currently has 17, 286 followers, arranging a date with one lucky follower each Wednesday. Brunson believes the internet brings a strong competitive advantage to a matchmaker.
First Date: Dinner And A Movie Is So Last Decade
WASHINGTON POST – Feb 4 – ~45,000 first dates were proposed last year on HowAboutWe.com. One proposal drew an unheard-of 70 responses? A man who suggested a date to get manicures. Founded by childhood friends Aaron Schildkrout and Brian Schechter, the online dating site eschews elaborate profiles and questionnaires, asking members instead to suggest dates in the hopes that someone out there wants to go. FULL ARTICLE @ WASHINGTON POST
OKCupid Tweaks Privacy Controls
WASHINGTON POST – Jan 13 - Internet privacy is still a major obstacle for some of those who use dating sites. Last week, OKCupid launched new features giving its users more control. Sam Yagan, a spokesperson for OKCupid said the new settings address a lot of issues users have raised over the years. "Something that we have noticed for a while is that there are various people who say part of their apprehension with online dating is that elements of their personal life will be discovered," he said. In addition to members of the gay community who may want their information hidden from straight users, Yagan offered the examples of teachers wishing to hide their profiles from students or younger women who don't want to deal with advances from older men. FULL ARTICLE @ WASHINGTON POST
Facebook Not Yet A Mecca For Singles To Connect
WASHINGTON POST – Dec 5 - In theory, Facebook should be a mecca for singles looking to connect. Nick O'Neill, founder of All Facebook, a Web site that watches trends on the network, believes Facebook-based dating services are bound for the digital graveyard. Some of them will eventually become viable competitors to Match.com. The companies leading the way, he said, use Facebook to attract users while maintaining their privacy. Zoosk, for instance, lets people sign up for the service through Facebook and other networks. The company has attracted ~$40 million in venture capital and claims to have~50M registered users. AreYouInterested.com is adding ~50K users a day. FULL ARTICLE @ WASHINGTON POST
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Similar Traits Don’t Always Lead To ‘Happily Ever After’
WASHINGTON POST – Nov 21 – eHarmony.com have built businesses around the belief that people with similarities make better matches in the long run. OppositesConnect.com is betting the reverse is true. Two years ago, Dyrenforth, a professor at Hobart and William Smith Colleges, examined data that had been collected by demographers in Australia, Germany and Britain. In all, 11,625 married couples were included in the study. The traits Dyrenforth looked at were extroversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, emotional stability and openness to experience – often referred to as "The Big Five" by psychologists. She found that people with high levels of all those characteristics were more likely to be happy with life in general and with their relationships. Emotional stability seemed to be a crucial component for personal happiness. People who have spouses with high levels of agreeableness, conscientiousness and emotional stability were more likely to be happy in their relationships and with life as a whole. As for sharing common characteristics? It didn't seem to matter much. FULL ARTICLE @ WASHINGTON POST
eTourage: Group Dating
WASHINGTON POST – Sep 13 - When Stephen Bennett realized his life had become so busy that he never had time to meet new people, he decided to create eTourage, an online dating site focused on setting up group dates. On eTourage, users create a profile and recruit their single friends to be in their eTourages. Users can then search for girls or guys. After they get to know each other through the site, they can ask each other out and simultaneously ask the members of their eTourages if they'd like to go on the group date, pairing up members from the two users' eTourages. FULL ARTICLE @ WASHINGTON POST
Mark Brooks: Ignighter, Planjam and TeamDating are their competition. The concept is more appealing in Asian cultures, hence Ignighter is getting most of its traffic from Asia. (Full Disclosure: Ignighter is a prior client of Courtland Brooks).
Founder Of CouplesSpark.com Develops A ‘Marriage Ref’ For The Web
WASHINGTON POST – Aug 15 - Let's say you and your significant other have
some intractable argument you can't resolve. She wants a dog; you're
disgusted by pet hair. They can now turn to CouplesSpark.com, a new
relationship site launched by Kunmi Ayanbule. After noticing the
Internet didn't have much to offer people already in relationships, he
set about creating a new site. Ayanbule's intention was to offer a
conflict resolution feature, in addition to resources such as restaurant
recommendations and expert advice. When Jerry Seinfeld's reality show
"The Marriage Ref" debuted this spring, Ayanbule rushed to launch
CouplesSpark.com because both operated on the same concept: A group of
strangers can solve that domestic dispute better than the two of
you. Since April, 250 conflicts have been posted on CouplesSpark.com for
public viewing. In each disagreement, both sides present their case.
Visitors then vote on which mate's argument they agree with and offer
insights, advice and comments. FULL ARTICLE @ WASHINGTON POST
The Internet Is Redefining Our Relationships, Reputations
WASHINGTON POST – July 6 – The Pew Internet & American Life Project
ask 895 experts how e-mail, social networks and video conferencing
among other applications are redefining the way we think of
relationships. The most interesting part of the repor was the feedback
on how users are only beginning to address how to deal with online
reputations. Privacy and security experts say users need to be as
concerned about how their repuations online are being translated to
peers and employers. They need to tell youth that exaggerations online
are online records and can be easily taken out of context. The CEO of
Reputation Defender said it is important for users to regularly search
for themselves and see what results come up. FULL ARTICLE @ WASHINGTON POST