General News

Early last month we learned that Easydate planned to list on AIM. Well, the company which launched in 2005 and brought us the UK dating site Cupid.com (see [story: Cupid.com-Reviews Cupid Review]), listed 3 days ago on London's junior stock market and raised about £9.8 million. It cost Easydate about £1 million to list and they expect yearly maintenance fees to be around £100,000.

William Dobbie (CEO) held a 49% stake in Easydate while Maxym Polyakov (COO) held 41% when it was privately owned. Now Mr Dobbie and Mr Polyakov will own 32.45% and 27.17% respectively. Shares opened at 60p which gave Easydate a market capitalisation of about £45 million. Currently the stock sits at 68.50p.

In 2009 Easydate earned just over £9.6 million giving them a before tax revenue of £2 million. Sales next year are expected to be double to £19 million. Each month Easydate is adding 200,000 new members. They employ a staff of 140 people with most working on the technical side of the business and online marketing in the Ukraine.

For more on this story, read the Telegraph.

The Canada’s Privacy Commissioner, Jennifer Stoddart, has launched an investigation into an online dating site. While this is a Canadian probe it does not mean it is a Canadian owned and operated dating site, it could be a dating site that offers services in Canada. This is the first time the Privacy Commissioner has investigated a dating service, but they have investigated social networking sites before. Facebook was investigated last year (see Story) and was found to be in violation of Canadian privacy laws.

The unnamed dating site is being investigated on how it handles members profile information once the membership has been deactivated. This was the same reason Facebook was under investigation. A complaint filed 6 months ago prompted the investigation of the dating site. The privacy issue was not resolved through mediation with the company and the Privacy's Commissioners office, so an official investigation was started. More news about this case will be released soon.

eHarmony has teamed up with 80's band REO Speedwagon and launched a contest that allows couples who found each other on eHarmony to showcase their love by submitting a video of them singing one of REO Speedwagon's songs. Submitted videos will be voted on by the general public to determine the best one. There will be a prize package for 10 of REO Speedwagon's concert dates on their "Love on the Run" tour which the winners will receive a pair of tickets for the show and dinner backstage served by members of REO Speedwagon.

When contestants submit their video (on the eHarmony Youtube channel) you need to tag the video for the concert date you wish to attend. Videos can be sung or lip-synched and eHarmony encourages you to be as creative as possible (as long as it is rated PG).

For more on the contest including the full terms and what concert dates the contest is for, read the Official eHarmony Blog and for more details on this dating site you can read our eHarmony.com review.

Increase use of smartphones and the mobile internet has created growth in the mobile dating market. In the United States there currently are 51 million smartphone subscribers. This market is growing fast not only in the United States but Europe as well. In a little over a year mobile phone app use and surfing the internet on mobile phones has increased over 110 percent.

Texting or SMS is a popular function of all mobile phones. This business was worth $80 billion in the United States in 2009 and is expected to increase to $126 billion by 2014. This is one area of the mobile phone market that the dating industry could tap into.

For more on the story visit Online Personals Watch.

There is a Free Communication Weekend (FCW) coming up this holiday weekend. From Friday July 2nd, 2010 and right till the end of Monday, July 5th, 2010 eHarmony here in North America (United States and Canada) will be allowing all members to communicate for free. For Canada, July 1st is the country's birthday (Canada Day) and in the United States, July 4th is Independence Day. With 2 holiday weekends this FCW will sure be busy. Remember free members get to experience most features of a paid membership and all without needing a Credit Card. Features not included in this promotion are profile pictures and Fasttracking the guided communication process.

The last free event was held on Memorial Day Weekend about 5 weeks ago (see Story). This Free Communication Weekend will be eHarmony's 26th.

For more information on this popular dating site, read our eHarmony.com review.

The official China Daily has reported that new rules have been added to the Internal Affairs Regulation on what Chinese soldiers in the People's Liberation Army can and cannot do online. This means 2.3 million soldiers will now not be able to blog, hunt for another job and make friends online. They also will not be allowed to use online dating sites. These new rules took effect June 15, 2010.

The reason for these new rules is to prevent sensitive military information and a soldier's personal information from being leaked online.

For more on the story read Reuters.