Yahoo! Personals & Partner Websites

I had to create a new Yahoo! Personals profile the other day and found out a few interesting things. In step 3 of creating a profile there are 3 privacy options in regards to making your profile searchable. The options are:

1. Make your profile searchable only on Yahoo! Personals
2. Have your profile visible on both Yahoo! Personals and partner websites.
3. Do not make my profile searchable. Only people you contact will see your profile.

Point 3 is not a bad idea but I don't see many people using it unless they are singles who are over loaded with too many messages and winks from other members. I guess, it also allows singles who may be a little unsure about internet dating and want some privacy since it lets them only initiate the conversation and profile viewing.

I was surprised at point 2. I didn't realize Yahoo! Personals had partner websites. I don't remember ever running across a dating service that has been powered by Yahoo! Personals. Here is the example they give on how your profile will look on a third party dating website. From the example it looks like they hope to partner with other sites that offer other different types of listing (jobs, apartments, etc...) or maybe news and entertainment services.

The other interesting fact about point 2 (if you read the fine print) is your profile may appear in search engine queries. I don't think Yahoo.com is doing this now (at least not when I search) but who knows what the future may hold. Of course they could be referring to other search engines and not their own. I wouldn't necessarily have a problem with my dating profile appearing on partner sites but I am not too sure about having them come up in search results. Maybe they should of included a forth point to allow for a search engine option.