I'm late on a few stories but I thought I should get this one out. Lavalife is now offering Speed Dating and it is currently free to try until June 24th, 2009 (2 days left)!

Online Speed Dates at Lavalife starts 8 pm each night (local time), and you get the chance to meet 10 singles in your area and all in 30 minutes. The events are arranged by location and age group. The age groups span 10 years (i.e. 30 to 40). Your current Lavalife profile will have to be completed and you will need to fill out an additional speed dating profile. This includes a picture, (the one from your Lavalife profile can be used), 'Ask me About' phrases which includes 3 topics you enter that your speed date may want to ask you about, and your email contact information.

Once your profile is complete you click 'Sign up now' below the event of your choice and you'll be presented with a confirmation screen. Once the event is about to start you log into Lavalife and click on the speed dates tab to enter your event. Make sure you show up on time as you cannot join in once the event starts. Each speed date allows you to text chat with the other person in real time. You get 3 minutes on each speed date and at the end, you get 30 seconds to decide if you clicked with the person. At the end of the 30 to 35 minute event you will receive your click list. This list provides you with the email addresses of the members you clicked with and who have clicked you.

Once this free offer is over, speed dating events will go on sale for $4.99 each. You may also purchase 3 event passes for $3.99 each and a package of 5 events cost $2.99 each. Passes only expire if your Lavalife account has been inactive 180 consecutive days (6 months).

For more information on this dating site, read our Lavalife review.

Wow,

It just hit me that this post is number 500 for our General News topic! In all, we have over 600 posts in all topics with about 65 of them being written and submitted by some of our readers.

I also just realized that DatingSitesReviews.com in its current form turned 5, a few months ago (Opps, I missed reporting our anniversary). Our first story was written way back in December of 2003. The website actually first started in September of 2003 as a static website (with all html written in Notepad) but I soon realized I needed a dynamic content management system to make things easier to update. By December, I had found what I was looking for and had done the initial setup. Originally our website was mainly a destination for reviews and tips for dating sites and online dating in general, but by late 2005 we had stepped up or news coverage and commentary of the dating industry as a whole. There have been a lot of changes along the way for DatingSitesReviews.com with some of them being more in-depth reviews, the addition of our forums and allowing user submitted reviews and ratings.

I would like to thank all of our users and readers of this site. You make this website a success, without you DatingSitesReviews.com wouldn't have become one of the top destinations on the internet for information relating to online dating.

Many Thanks,

Tom

Starting tomorrow, Thursday, March 26 and until Sunday, March 29, 2009, eHarmony is planning a Free Communication Weekend. This means trial members of eHarmony will not only be able to review their matches for free but communicate with them as well. The Guided Communication process is included in the free weekend but FastTrack communication is not. The major difference between the two types is, FastTrack allows email communication right away, while Guided Communication has four stages of questions and answers before you can communicate with directly with email.

This is Free Communication Weekend number 16 for eHarmony. Usually these free weekends go from Friday to Monday but, eHarmony has switched things up a bit and has this free weekend starting Thursday and ending Sunday. They also usually do free communication weekends only on holidays, so the news of this one came as a bit of surprise.

Read our eHarmony review for more information on this matchmaking dating site. Remember, eHarmony is very popular because of their detailed profile and automated matching system. If you are looking for a dating site that allows you to search for your own matches, then eHarmony may not be the service for you.

We closed the 2008 Dating Sites Reviews Single's Choice Award poll yesterday (Jan. 12) with a total of 600 votes from the public. This is almost 150 more votes than last year's Single's Choice Awards which ran roughly the same amount of time. I'm glad to see user participation up this year for our most important award. We started the 2008 poll in October, for 2009 we plan to start it in September as we did for 2007. This way we hope to get the Awards Summary finished by the end of the year instead of January like this year.

We did two things different this year. First we included 10 dating sites instead of 8 as with the year before. Second, we are giving the top 3 dating sites an award, Gold for first place, Silver for second and Bronze for third. We decided to do this since there is not a huge percentage difference between first and second place and it also gives an idea to the public what other dating sites singles also consider as a good choice to join.

The Gold 2008 Singles's Choice Award recipient is Match.com. This is the second year in a row that they are the winner of this award and it is also the second award for them this year as well. Match.com also won our Editor's Top Pick - Overall Award. Of the 600 votes received, Match.com got 160 votes which is over a quarter of all the votes. Smart advertising, a good designed interface and communication tools makes this site a popular choice for singles everywhere.

The recipient of the Silver Singles's Choice Award for 2008 is eHarmony. This dating site, which is famous for its automated matching system, won the award this year for the Editor's Top Pick - Match System Award. eHarmony has 132 votes which is 22 percent of the total vote and just 4.67 percent less votes than Match.com.

Finally, the Bronze 2008 Singles's Choice Award recipient is Yahoo! Personals. This is our first award for Yahoo. They had 12.83 percent of the total vote, less than half of what Match.com received but 5 percent more than 4th place which received only 7.83 percent of the vote. With the Yahoo name behind this dating service, a well designed service and a new 6 month guarantee this year, makes this online dating site our readers 3rd choice.

This year's standings for the Single's Choice award for all dating sites in the poll are (click the dating site name to read our full review):

1. Match.com
2. eHarmony
3. Yahoo! Personals
4. SinglesNet.com
5. FriendFinder.com
6. Lavalife
7. PerfectMatch.com
8. True.com
9. Chemistry
10. Date.com

We received 30 percent more votes this year for the Single's Choice Award and we would like to thank everyone for your participation.

Just a quick update regarding the 2008 Dating Sites Reviews Choice Awards. The Single's Choice Award poll has just past the 410 vote mark with Match.com in the lead and eHarmony coming in a close second. This year we have decided to give a Gold, Silver and Bronze award to the top 3 voted dating services. The reason for this is, first and second place are only a few percentage points off. With the results being this close, singles obviously feel both dating services are worth joining.

If you haven't voted yet please do as the poll will be closed soon with the results being released soon to follow.

Related Story and Poll: 2008 Dating Sites Reviews Choice Awards

Last year we started the 2007 Dating Sites Reviews Choice Awards in late August and it was a resounding success. This year we hope to continue the momentum with the 2008 Dating Sites Reviews Choice Awards! This annual event attempts to find the best online dating site for the current year in several dating categories. Our visitors can also participate in this selection process.

First up is the poll for the Single's Choice Award. This award is our top award and is voted on by you. This year you can select from 10 of the most popular dating sites on the internet today. Please cast your vote: