Dating Services

eHarmony is having a free communication weekend (FCW) starting Wednesday December 30th, 2009 and ending Sunday January 3rd, 2010. This is a special holiday event and it has been extended to 5 days (most FCW are 3 days long).

What does a free communication weekend mean? It allows members from eHarmony to be able to review their matches and communicate with them for free through the 4 stage communication process. All members can be contacted and I would expect eHarmony to be extra busy during this timeframe as most singles will be on vacation for the Holidays. If you join eHarmony during the first day (Wednesday) of the FCW, who knows, maybe you will have enough time to meet your match on New Years Eve.

The last free communication event occurred mid November, just over 4 weeks ago (see [story: eHarmony-is-Free-for-the-next-5-Days Story]). This is Free Communication Weekend number 22 for eHarmony here in the US.

Check out our review of eHarmony for more information on the dating site.

Singles interested in the Australian Free Communication Weekend, read this News Story.

Singles interested in the United Kingdom Free Communication Weekend, read this News Story.

I am not surprised that Facebook is mentioned in divorce cases now days. It can be poison to marriages, as some couples I know spend more time on Facebook everyday than they do talking to each other. I had a laugh when I read that Facebook:

is nothing more than a gigantic catalogue of people you never quite slept with. Some friends, the occasional sibling, but mostly a huge, interactive menu of sexual roads less traveled.

I don't know a single person who has not used Facebook to look up a long lost flame or the one that got away. I am not saying that it is a bad thing but when people in relationships are on Facebook looking through pictures and talking to people from the old High School and/or University days, instead of spending quality time with their partner, you have to start to wonder.

Some people also see Facebook as nothing more than a dating site. Just like on a dating site, most people on Facebook reveal themselves selectively, according to what they think will show them in the best light. On dating sites you know this type of behavior happens, but with Facebook it has the appearance of being an open book, when it really is not.

For more on this story, read the Telegraph. If you are interested in a real dating experience on Facebook, you should check out our Zoosk review.

I found that missing press release I mentioned in a previous post about the new Spark.com dating site (see Story).

A quick read through doesn't really reveal any additional information. It does confirm what we assumed in the previous post that Spark is made up of the members from AmericanSingles.com and Date.ca. Spark Networks hope that the new clean and easy to navigate interface of Spark.com will give it a more global appeal. The release also mentions the new features of Spark.com (when compared to the old dating sites). These features are the free Color Code Personality Test, the Keyword Search and the "Who's Searching for You?" feature. While these features are new at Spark, they can be found on another Spark Networks brand of dating sites called Mingle Match.

To find out more about this dating site and the new features listed here, you can check out our review of Spark.com.

Television and film actress Ashley Madison Myrick (no she is not a Porn Star, that was a mistake by Fox) most famous role was becoming James Woods' boyfriend for a while. Recently she has filed a lawsuit against online dating site Ashley Madison for the “humiliation’ she has endured over having the same name as the site which promotes having an affair. Apparently she wants the site to change its name and to take her picture off of a related site, AshleyMadisonbio.com.

According to a $1 million counter-suit filed by AshleyMadison.com against the actress, the website has had the name “Ashley Madison” trademarked since 2002. The actress Ashley Madison Myrick only started going by the name Ashley Madison 3 years later in 2005. AshleyMadison.com also claims that they do not own the website AshleyMadisonbio.com and have no control over it (whoever does own it, has taken it down anyways).

The infidelity dating site is suing Ashley Madison for using their trademark to “inappropriately garner goodwill” to support her acting career.

More on this story can be found at Fox News.

I received a bit of surprise this morning when I read the following email from a reader:

Hello....

I was wanting to join AmericanSingles.com but cannot get to the site no matter how I try......

through your website or any other way. I keep getting sent to the Spark.com dating site.

It is like they have high jacked their website address. Can you tell me what is going on?

Thank You

First of all, don't worry the AmericanSingles.com domain did not get high jacked. It looks like a number of the Spark Network dating sites, including AmericanSingles.com and Date.ca, got rebranded and combined into a new dating site called Spark.com.

Zoosk let us know a few holiday trends that they experience on their Facebook Dating Application last year. The busiest week for online dating activity was the week before Christmas. The second was the first week of January. Christmas Eve was the busiest day of the year for Zoosk. Throughout the year, on average Mondays are the most popular day to visit a dating site.

In a recent online survey conducted by Zoosk, 63 percent of Zoosk members are looking for long-term relationship. 33 percent of respondents are just looking for a holiday party date and 4 percent will not date this holiday as they find it too stressful. 19 percent of men from this survey also stated that they would invite a women on a first date to their office holiday party, while with women, only 10 percent said they would do this. In total, 39 percent of singles would prefer at least 3 dates before considering taking someone to their office party.

For more on this subject, read the Zoosk press release. To find out more about Facebook dating, check out our review of Zoosk.