Online Dating and Matchmaking Industry Forums

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TECH CRUNCH -- Sep 1 -- Thread.com, a startup formerly known as Frintro, has closed a $1.2M funding round led by some of Silicon Valley’s most well known investors. Included in the round are First Round Capital, Sequoia Capital, Founders Fund, fbFund, and a number of independent investors, including Ron Conway, David Sacks, Auren Hoffman, Pedro Miguel Martins, Reid Hoffman, Joe Greenstein, Saran Chari, and Shervin Pishevar. Thread.com uses Facebook Connect to look up information about your friends and friends of your friends. Depending on your connection to each match you’ll be able to see things like their current relationship status, location, interests, profile photos, and photo albums. Thread.com makes it easy to simply message a member through Facebook, but CEO Brian Phillips says that the best way to spark a relationship is that you ask your friends to introduce you.

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[FernandoArdenghi]

1) Online Dating had evolved: from "Browsing/Searching Options" to "Matching based on Self-Reported Data" and now Online Dating is evolving from "Matching based on Self-Reported Data" to "Compatibility Matching Algorithms".

2) There is a plethora of Dating Applications at Facebook, mostly for casual daters, for instant gratification.

3) Serious daters do not tolerate friends / parents / neighbours / relatives / fans or other social networking users to be involved in a private matter as building a personal relationship with future in mind because they are "interested third parties ingredients" in a process that only concerns 2 persons. (See former Online Dating site ENGAGE, complete fiasco)

4) Online dating is NOT LOCAL [for serious daters]. Online dating is always "intermediate" for serious daters: "your city and all the cities near your city up to 250 miles"




Kindest Regards.

Fernando Ardenghi.
Buenos Aires.
Argentina.
ardenghifer@gmail.com

[yorktown]

I agree with you Fernando. But you are the scholar I see out there. Any studies out there you have seen than can cement this claim?

Marc Lesnick
Conference Organizer
Internet Dating Conference

[FernandoArdenghi]

Hi Mr. Lesnick!



1) Online Dating had evolved: from "Browsing/Searching Options" to "Matching based on Self-Reported Data" and now Online Dating is evolving from "Matching based on Self-Reported Data" to "Compatibility Matching Algorithms".

come from my own experience as online dater since 1999
and
page 18 of PowerPoint Presentation (a bit old, Nov 2003 but still valid) at http://media.corporate-ir.net/media_files/irol/11/111999/presentations/IAC_Personals.pdf
It is also still valid that the U.S. market opportunity remains enormous. (page 6)

Also Dating Industry USD1.800 million business in the U.S.
Offline Proposals USD900 million + Online Dating sites USD900 million
Top_5_sites_by_revenue
.Match&Chemistry
.eHarmony
.Yahoo!Personals
.True
.PerfectMatch
are the ones offering (a kind of a proprietary) compatibility matching methods.


3) Serious daters do not tolerate friends / parents / neighbours / relatives / fans or other social networking users to be involved in a private matter as building a personal relationship with future in mind because they are "interested third parties ingredients" in a process that only concerns 2 persons. (See former Online Dating site ENGAGE, complete fiasco)
&
4) Online dating is NOT LOCAL [for serious daters]. Online dating is always "intermediate" for serious daters: "your city and all the cities near your city up to 250 miles"

come from my own experience as online dater since 1999
and also

that info is outlined at "ROMANTIC REGRESSIONS An Analysis of Behavior in Online Dating Systems"
September 2004 (old paper but has some interesting information)
http://people.ischool.berkeley.edu/~atf/fiore_thesis_final.pdf

page 14
"Furthermore, the American prioritization of career leads many people to move to distant cities for work or education, to places where they have no friends and no family. People who make moves like this must rebuild local social ties from nothing, a relatively rare situation for most people in most parts of the world.
Online personal ads, for finding dates or just friends, provide a mechanism for users to establish new connections even without an existing basis from which to expand their social circle."

page 37 Figure 2.1. and page 86 B.7 Histogram of distance between members who exchanged one or more messages.


It is also interesting to notice the new discovery uncovered by Eastwick and Finkel 2008; also Kurzban and Weeden, 2007; Todd, Penke, Fasolo, and Lenton, 2007 who found that people often report partner preferences that are not compatible with their choices in real life.

Now, finishing year 2009, Latest Research in Theories of Romantic Relationships Development outlines: compatibility is all about a high level on personality similarity between prospective mates for long term mating with commitment.

Please see full thread of Scientific Papers at:
http://mb.internetdatingconference.com/scientific-papers-t395.html


Kindest Regards.

Fernando Ardenghi.
Buenos Aires.
Argentina.
ardenghifer@gmail.com

[FernandoArdenghi]

Serious daters do not tolerate friends / parents / neighbours / relatives / fans or other social networking users to be involved in a private matter as building a personal relationship with future in mind because they are "interested third parties ingredients" in a process that only concerns 2 persons.

is also outlined at


Sprecher, Susan (2009) "Relationship Initiation and Formation on the Internet"
Marriage & Family Review, 45:1–21, 2009, VOL 45, ISS 6-7
"
...........
Family and friends introduce people to potential partners and may also provide either positive or negative reactions to a possible pairing (Sprecher, Felmlee, Orbuch, & Willetts, 2002).
We already noted that friends can be important in creating relationships through Internet social network sites such as MySpace. However, those who meet partners through commercial dating sites often do so without the assistance, or the endorsement, of their family and friends. Sometimes their social networks do not even know they are searching for a partner on an Internet dating site. Therefore relationship initiation through this Internet venue often does not benefit from social network support and assistance from which many relationships originating off-line benefit. Worse than that, family and friends may provide a negative reaction to the Internet relationship when they hear about it......................."

and


Sprecher, S., Felmlee, D., Orbuch, T. L., & Willetts, M. C. (2002). "Social networks and change in personal relationships". In A. Vangelisti, H. Reis, & M. A. Fitzpatrick (Eds.), Stability and change in relationships (pp. 257–284). Cambridge Publishers.