Techno-Romance Is Alive And Well In Our Post-Dating World

The innovative terms Jessica Massa uses may be confusing and unfamiliar, but her view of love in the 21st century is simple: traditional dating is over and, while many of us are not yet ready to embrace formalized online dating, "almost all of us are romantically engaging with potential paramours online via the least stigmatized social media outlet out there - Facebook."

Facebook, Massa writes in "You're Online Dating and You Don't Even Know It!," is based on the idea of platonic friendship, but the social networking site is really "one big online party, rife with flirtations, mixed signals, behavioral assumptions and outright Jersey Shore-style creeping." In fact, Facebook has become such an integral part of everyday modern life that most of us can't help treating it like the world's largest free online dating site.

And why shouldn't we embrace it? Massa compares Facebook's functionality to the functionality typical of popular online dating sites, and concludes that many of Facebook's most recognizable and utilized features are actually dating site features in disguise.

The most obvious comparison is the message. Sending personalized messages that are witty, intelligent, and intriguing is the first step towards success on online dating sites, and it's no different on Facebook. If you're interested in initiating communication with someone, review their profile and create a unique message that telegraphs your interest by referencing specific details from their profile and asking questions about things that genuinely pique your curiosity.

You're probably also familiar with the idea of "the poke," though you're more likely to have seen other versions of it, such as the ubiquitous "Flirt," "Wink," or "Smile" features that appear on countless online dating sites. A poke is a low-key, low-risk way to bring yourself to someone's attention, but in the long run it achieves very little. Sending instant communication to someone by pressing a button says "I don't really have anything interesting to say to you" or "I don't actually care enough about you to take the time to write an individualized message." And if you're really unlucky, Massa writes, a poke says "'Let's face it, I'm a little creepy and I want to holler at you and am one of the last people to use the poke feature as a meaningful tool.'" Fight the temptation to poke if you're sincerely interested in taking the relationship to the next level.

How else does Facebook mimic the practices of online and traditional dating? Stick around for Part II of this series, where we'll continue our chat about Massa's post-dating world with a discussion of some of Facebook's other functionality, like the friend request, the wall post, and the new Facebook Place feature.

Read the original article here.