General News

Last year was the year of adultery claims The Daily Targum. This is due to that several high profile celebrities like Tiger Woods and Jesse James got caught cheating on their wives. I would also add to this claim that dating sites like Ashley Madison which promote infidelity made this a hot topic in the media as well.

Chemistry.com's relationship expert, Dr. Helen Fisher, has said that adultery has roots not only in psychology but biology as well. Some of the psychological reasons for adultery she gives include:

• Solving a sex problem.
• Looking for more attention.
• Revenge.
• Supplement a marriage.
• More excitement.

Dr. Fisher also makes the point that there is a biological side to adultery. She states that the brain has two systems with one linked to attachment and love and one which is the sex drive. In some people these two systems are not well connected which enables people to more easily cheat without regard for their partner's feelings. Dr. Fisher research also indicates that a gene may be partially responsible for this. Researchers in Sweden have found a “cheating” gene in a study of 552 pairs of twins and their spouses. People without the gene were more likely to have a successful marriage. If people had two copies of the gene, the researchers found that the couples were more likely to have a crisis in the marriage.

To find out more information about the dating site in which Dr. Helen Fisher help design the matching system, read our review of Chemistry.

FriendFinder's Passion.com now offers a Gold and Silver membership guarantee. If you do not hook-up with someone in 3 months, you will get an additional 3 months for free.

Here are the rules for the guarantee as stated on the Passion.com dating site:

• Maintain a gold or silver account status for three months
• Log in at least once a month
• Send at least 3 emails a month
• Create at least one blog or group post each month

The rules seem pretty straight forward, since all they ask of the member is to actually use the site. If you have followed the rules and have had no success, then all you need to do to claim your 3 months is email Passion.com's customer service. This offer is valid once per customer. Please confirm the guarantee rules on Passion.com before you sign up to this dating service as they may have changed since the writing of this post.

To find out more about this dating site, read our review of Passion.com.

Executive Dating LLC seems to be in some legal trouble. Barrie Turner of British Columbia Canada is alleged to be in connection with the company which has over 200 dating sites offering executive dating services. Turner was arrested after he crossed the border to pick up mail at a U.S. post office box where customers are told to send payments.

In the last 5 years there have been more than 100 people who have filed consumer complaints about the company for fraud. They accused Executive Dating of not providing any legitimate matchmaking services that they had paid for. It is estimated that the Executive Dating sites received more than $1.2 million in revenue.

For more information check out our forum topic about the matter.

Early in March Great Hill Partners offered to take Spark Networks private by buying all of the shares they did not own for $3.10 per share (see Story). Great Hill currently owns about 25 percent of the stock so the deal would have cost them about $64 million. Spark Networks said they would consider the offer, much to the dismay of a number of share holders.

Yesterday, a Spark Networks special committee on the offer unanimously rejected the proposal from Great Hill Equity Partners. No reason was given about why they rejected the offer but they did say that they will continue to consider other alternatives.

For more on the story, read the Spark Networks press release.

TangoWire is an online dating community which has over 3,700 different websites that caters to about 70 different special interest groups (Gay, Senior, Military, etc...). TangoWire recently announced that they have added Virtual Dating to its network of dating sites. What is virtual dating? Virtual dating at TangoWire allows members to get to know each other better by listening to music, playing games and interacting though 3D avatars on "virtual" dates. This new feature goes beyond communicating by email or instant messaging since it is in a real-time interactive environment. Virtual Dates are seen as a precursor to a real world date which allows you to get to know the other person better in a fun and safe environment.

This Thursday TangoWire members will be encouraged to try out Virtual Dating for free. For more on this story, read the press release.

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

Yesterday the United Kingdom dating company EasyDate announced that it has acquired Allegran's online dating services from Associated Northcliffe Digital. This will add another 5 dating sites to EasyDate's network to a total of 12 and give them over 3 million additional members (most from the UK) to a total of 9 million. The Allegran dating website portfolio includes GirlsdateForFree.com, Loopylove.com, Quickflirt.com, DatingForParents.com and MatureDating.co.uk.

EasyDate started their international expansion in 2009 and plan to continue this year by exploring other English speaking markets like India, mainland Europe and Brazil.