Types (Niche)

247 iPhone owners nationwide were surveyed (I know not a very big sample pool) by Retervo to produce a snapshot profile of a typical user. Here are the highlights of what they found out:

Question: What makes a person more attractive, a college degree or cool gadgets?

• According to the survey 75 percent of iPhone owners prefer to date someone with cool gadgets.

Question: Have you texted or emailed someone to break up with them?

Self Magazine did an informal survey of its female readers about internet dating, casual sex and porn. It doesn't say how many people took the survey but let's take a look at some of the results anyways.

Question: Who is using an online dating site?

• Age 18 to 25 - 29%
• Age 26 to 35 - 52%
• Age 36 to 50 - 51%
• Age 51 and older - 68%

I'm blessed with a wide variety of friends. Straight friends, gay friends, bi friends, transgendered friends, transsexual friends. Not only are they great people, but they give me a glimpse into their worlds, especially when it comes to online dating. In this article, I want to specifically address the concerns of bisexual men in the online dating world.

Some people will argue that there's "no such thing" as bisexual men - that as soon as a man is with another man, he becomes gay and that is that. (Funny how women can be bi and that's perfectly acceptable, if not lauded!) It's a pretty narrow-minded view, but if it's yours, go ahead and click through to another article. There's nothing to see here for you.

As a bisexual man, you're dealing with narrow-minded people, both male and female. There are women who are just as weirded out by the idea of a bisexual man as men are. In fact, I have a friend who hides his bisexuality from his wife. He doesn't act on it, but he dated men before they met and continues to fantasize about men to this day. But he loves his wife and is very much attracted to her too. He keeps his bi tendencies under wraps because he'd rather not risk losing her.

One of the biggest complaints I hear from bisexual men who list their sexuality honestly on their dating profile is that they get plenty of attention from men (both gay and bi) but hardly any emails from women. This may not be a huge problem if you don't mind dating men, but if you're feeling the pull toward the fairer sex, the pickings are slim.

Oftentimes, what works to overcome this issue is posting two dating profiles - one as a gay man and one as a straight man. This works very well on free sites, but obviously will cost you double if you are on a paid site. (I've never tried it before, but I'm thinking you may even need a different credit card to register two paid profiles.)

Since gay men aren't going to be searching for straight men (usually!), your alter ego won't show up in their searches. Since straight women aren't going to be searching for gay men, they won't find your gay side. You're still bisexual, but a little more separated than usual. Is it deceptive? A little. But you are straight AND gay, so it's not entirely a lie.

Any bisexual men have additional tips on how they manage their online dating presence?

The American Association of Retired Persons or AARP, is the largest organization for people 50 years and older in the United States. AARP recently announced that they have a new love and relationships expert, Dr. Pepper Schwartz, who is a Professor of Sociology at the University of Washington and has more than 35 years of experience in researching love and relationships. Dr Schwartz is also Perfectmatch.com's relationship expert and helped oversee the design of their automated matching system.

As part of her new duties at AARP, Dr. Schwartz will be writing a weekly online column called "The Naked Truth" at the AARP website which will cover a number of topics related to relationships, love and sexuality. She will also contribute to other online resources with videos, online chatting and blogs. This content will be both for educational and instructional purposes.

To find out about the dating site Dr. Pepper Schwartz is associated with, read our review of Perfectmatch.com.

Lynne met her husband, Dave, online six years ago. They met on a dating site called LDS Mingle which is an online matchmaking service for Mormon singles. Back then online dating wasn't as popular but Lynn had exhausted all of the prearranged dates that her well meaning friends had found for her. She wasn't going to give up but she wanted to meet a man whose religious affiliation was with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Online dating was the only real choice for her. When she first connected with Dave online they found that they lived 700 miles apart. This didn't stop them from forming a relationship and they were soon calling each other every night on the phone. In a few months Dave came to visit Lynn and in just 8 hours after meeting her in person, he had proposed. They were married that summer.

For the full story on this dating success story, read the Mormon Times.

We first learned about the study to find which gender is pickier when it comes to dating in July (see Story). In an article from Live Science we learned a few more details about this speed dating study by Eli Finkel and Paul Eastwick of Northwestern University.

The studies participants were 350 college students who were divided into 15 speed dating events. Each student went on 4 minute speed dates with about 12 singles of the opposite sex. After each mini date, each student would rate:

• How much self confidence they felt.
• Romantic desire for the person on the date.
• The romantic chemistry that the participant felt existed between them.
• Would you like to see this person again?

After the data was compiled from the speed dating events, it was found that the daters who rotated around the room to each participant who was sitting, that they experienced greater romantic desire and chemistry. This means the people who went from person to person were less selective than the person sitting waiting for the next date in the rotation. The study further confirmed that this fact was true for both men and women. Finkel & Eastwick concluded that it was the act of approaching, or being approached by a person, which determined who was more likely to be more selective in determining a partner.

If speed dating is of interest to you, check out our Speed Dating Services category for all dating sites that offer online and off speed dating events near you.