Category: TRUE.com

2 Dating Sites Sued Over Soldier’s Photo In Ads

Posted on February 29, 2012

Court hammerASSOCIATED PRESS – Feb 29 – The picture of a handsome, uniformed soldier accompanying online ads that proclaim "Military Man Searching for Love" is an Army lieutenant who was killed in Iraq in 2007, according to a lawsuit filed by his parents against PlentyofFish.com and True.com. In December, a friend recognized Peter Burks in an ad on PlentyofFish.com, clicked on it and was directed to True.com. PlentyofFish Media spokesman Paul Bloudoff said hundreds of thousands of third parties advertise via his company's site every month, and that it cannot control nor know about the content of those ads. The ad has been blocked from the company's network, he said. "We dealt with this matter a month ago," Bloudoff said in an email. True.com President Ruben Buell said he will be researching this diligently. He said True.com buys ads that run on other dating sites but does not know what happened in this situation.

The full article was originally published at Associated Press, but is no longer available.

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True.com Applauds Match.com For Implementing Sex Offender Screening

Posted on April 28, 2011

True logo PR NEWSWIRE – Apr 27 – TRUE.com applauds Match.com for stating its plans to put in place sex offender screening features that TRUE has employed for years. TRUE.com president Ruben Buell said: "TRUE has been protecting its members by screening for sex offenders, murderers, burglars, people accused of extreme domestic violence, and other felons for years. We certainly congratulate Match.com for seeing these features are necessary." TRUE routinely rejects ~5% of its applicants – denying access to ~300Kpeople in the 8 years they have been in the online dating space.

The full article was originally published at PR Newswire, but is no longer available.

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Gender Based Price Discounts Are Against The Law

Posted on January 3, 2011

True logo SIERRA SUN – Jan 3 - True.com was very successful but had a disproportionately high percentage of male patrons. So True.com offered free services to women who joined. Steven Surrey visited True.com but after discovering the discrepancy in its pricing policy, he did not subscribe and sued the company claiming the differential pricing for services for women violated both the Unruh Act and the Gender Tax Repeal Act. The trial court ruled for True.com. Surrey appealed. The Unruh Act is an anti-discrimination statute. “All persons … no matter what their sex, race, color, etc. are entitled to the full and equal services in all business establishments. The Gender Tax Repeal Act provides that “No business establishment may discriminate, with respect to the price charged for services, against a person because of the person's gender.” I.e., gender based price discounts are against the law. The question before the Court of Appeal was whether Surrey was denied his rights and entitled to sue — given that he never subscribed for or utilized the True.com services.

The full article was originally published at Sierra Sun, but is no longer available.

Mark Brooks: Dating sites should not offer different pricing for women. But they can always offer free memberships to women directly after they sign up as part of 'free membership sweepstakes.'

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Do Matchmaking Sites Identify Psychopaths?

Posted on November 22, 2010

Psychopathy OPW – Nov 22 – The Economist ran an article about Psychopaths, and I got to wondering… Do matchmaking sites test for psychopathy? When a man is interested in a woman he needs to demonstrate two things. 1. He's interested in her. 2. He's safe. Dating sites have a hard time communicating #2. No problem with #1, but #2 is more elusive. TRUE runs a background check to see if paying members are felons or sex offenders. But, does anyone run a test to check for psychopathy I wonder? It turns out, psychopaths aren't so easy to identify. They usually know exactly what they should do in ethical/social situations, but they don't. In the Economist article, Dr Ermer and Dr Kiehl of the University of New Mexico use something called the Wason test to identify prisoners who are psychopaths. The test poses questions in the form of a social contract. i.e. 'if you borrow the car, you have to fill the tank.' Psychopaths fail this test at higher rates than regular people. This card test is disarming and entertaining enough to be integrated into personality profiles, I think. What do you think? – Mark Brooks

FULL ARTICLE @ THE ECONOMIST

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7 Cities, 9 Flights, 2 Week North American Tour

Posted on November 11, 2010

Plane OPW – Nov 10 – I started my tour by jetting off to London to keynote at the White Label Dating / Global Personals annual partner conference. It was fascinating getting the inside-track on the company, attending their two day conference. They've had a tough year beating off scammers, and then elevating their conversion factors to new highs. They've done some especially innovative work turning their customer service department into a profit center. Next, Toronto, to meet with Justin and Annabelle of Fastlife.com. I paid Noel at Avid Life Media. The Toronto IDEA soiree went very well. In L.A. a visit with Spark Networks, and then eHarmony to meet the CEO and tour the eHarmony Labs. Absolutely fascinating!  Its so nice to see some true primary research coming from an internet matchmaking company. I ran a little IDEA soiree in L.A. A quick trip to Palm Springs next, to pay Conciant a visit. They have an interesting offering in the works for idating companies. San Francisco next, to visit Zoosk. I first met Jeff at iDate Miami 2004. He was one of the best speakers the conference has ever had the pleasure of hosting. In Dallas, Mandy is driving Match.com to new heights. $106 million last quarter. I caught up with Trish from TRUE. It will be a nice acquisition target in a year or so. – Mark Brooks

Read an extended post on Seasonal Paradise.

The Science Of Online Dating

Posted on April 12, 2010

Eharmony labs logo TIMES ONLINE – Apr 11 - Relationship science is an increasingly respectable field of academic study. Dr Gian Gonzaga and his team at the eHarmony Labs promises to match its customers using its patented 29 dimensions of compatibility, including sexual passion, anger management, appearance, intellect, obstreperousness, spirituality and emotional health. Other dating sites also employ complex algorithms based on psychometric testing, such as PerfectMatch, Chemistry, Plentyoffish, True, Parship and Matchaffinity. They all like to dismiss each other’s compatibility models. Plentyoffish, for example, thinks people should be matched on their differences. The exception is OKCupid, which is strongly against psychometric testing because, according to Sam Yagan, one of the Harvard mathematicians who founded it, “eHarmony’s patronising belief is that they know what’s best and you need help. We believe you know what you’re looking for and put the power in the user’s hands”. The industry analyst Mark Brooks sees psychological testing as an important part of their increasing credibility and market growth. “Internet dating services will get amazing,” he says. “The science will develop.” Brooks believes personality profiling is the future of matchmaking, and agrees with the eHarmony line: “People don’t know what they want. They need help.” FULL ARTICLE @ TIMES ONLINE

See all posts on PerfectMatch         See all posts on True
See all posts on Chemistry.com      See all posts on eHarmony
See all posts on Plentyoffish           See all posts on Parship
See all posts on MatchAffinity         See all posts on OkCupid

Internet Dating Industry Weekly News Feb 9th, 2010

Posted on February 2, 2010

This is the news for January 20th through February 1st, 2010. Here is the news we covered:

  • Real Simple Magazing ranks top dating sites
  • Avid Life Media pushing for an IPO
  • Match.com launches MatchAffinity
  • iovation shows strong sucess in 2009
  • 2010 iDate Awards results

Plentyoffish vs Match vs eHarmony vs TRUE

Posted on January 23, 2010

OPW – Jan 23 – Real Simple magazine ranked four of the most popular internet dating sites. Plentyoffish is huge and free but has distorted images. Match is simple to navigate, allows keyword search, and has smartphone apps but has poor screening techniques. TRUE offers background checks but has tacky ads. eHarmony does the matching for members but is more expensive.

Real simple magazine spreadsheet
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True.com Agrees To Settle Class Action

Posted on September 24, 2009

True logoPR NEWSWIRE – Sep 23 – True.com has agreed to settle a class action lawsuit that was brought against it by a former subscriber who alleged that True had unlawfully charged fees to his credit card after he cancelled his subscription. True denies all of the allegations, and has agreed to settle the case. As part of the settlement, True has agreed to pay $1.5M into a settlement fund over a period from February 2009 through March 2010.

The full article was originally published at PR Newswire, but is no longer available.

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Online Dating And Deception

Posted on April 10, 2009

True logo WASHINGTON POST — Apr 10 — Joe Tracy, editor of Online Dating Magazine, says people often misrepresent themselves in dating profiles. Men lie about age, height and income; women are most likely to stretch the truth about weight, physical appearance and age. TRUE was one of the first dating sites to try to combat the problem. Subscribers are required to attest that they are unmarried and have no record of felonies. FULL ARTICLE @ WASHINGTON POST

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