General News

We last looked at OkCupid's A-List membership when it was first launched in mid August (see Story). It is 22 days later and they still have T-Shits to give out to the first 1000 membership upgrades. If OkCupid is close to meeting 1000 paid users then they are averaging roughly 40 paid members a day which IMO are not exactly stellar numbers. I also notice there are no men's sizes left and only 3 of the 4 women's colors left. This shows that there are most likely a lot more men paid users than women. I wonder what the free membership gender split is on OkCupid? Quantcast estimates it at 56% male and 44% female for last month.

To find out more about this dating service which allows you to make your own dating tests, read our OkCupid.com review.

It has been confirmed for eHarmony here in the US and Canada that they will be having a Free Communication Weekend, starting this Friday (September 4, 2009) until Monday (September 7, 2009). In Canada this will be their Labour Day Holiday long weekend.

As the name suggests, eHarmony Free Communication Weekends mean all members can review and communicate with all matches for no cost. These promotional weekends have become extremely popular for eHarmony, so expect a flurry of matches if you decide to signup. If you have been thinking about trying this internet dating service for a while now, this weekend, is the time to try! Remember, no credit card is required.

By our count this is Free Communication Weekend number 19 for eHarmony. The last one was held in July on the Independence / Canada Day weekend in July (see Story).

Read our review of eHarmony for more information on this popular online matchmaking service.

According to eHarmony's official blog, The Newlywed Game is looking for couples of all ages who may be interested in being on the show, which appears on The Game Show Network. Taping of this season of the show would happen in September and October of 2009.

This new iteration of The Newlywed Game is sponsored by eHarmony and is hosted by Carnie Wilson. The show allows couples to compete against each other by being asked questions on how well they know their spouse. This is the second season of the show with the first being aired back in April, 2009 (see Story).

For more information and for you and your spouse to be considered as contestants please email: thenewlywedgame@embassyrow.com to apply. The Game Show Network would like you to include the following information in your email:

• Names and ages (you and your spouse).
• Your City/State and phone number wwith area code.
• Email Address.
• Your Wedding Date, and a photo.
• If you met on eHarmony.

All participants of the show must be 18 years of age or older and married 2 years or less by October 9th, 2009.

For more information on the dating site, read our eHarmony review.

The Forbes website wrote an article called "The Top Online Meat Markets" which talks a bit about some current online dating statistics and lists the top ten dating sites according to unique visitors in the month of June from a tracking company called Nielsen (more famously known for tracking TV viewers). I wasn't really impressed with the title since they are referring to dating sites as meat markets. The term meat market is not meant as a compliment and it tells me the author is not very interested in the story and doesn't think much of the concept of online dating. He further expresses his point of view in this sentence:

Call it calculating, unromantic and maybe even a bit unnatural ...

For a media company whose authors are suppose to leave their opinions at the door unless the topic calls for it, I wonder how this piece got past the editor's desk.

The company which owns the Australian dating site RSVP, didn't perform very well last year. Fairfax Media's revenue for the year which ended in June, fell 27 percent to $605 million AUD when compared to the previous year. The online division of Fairfax which includes RSVP, TradeMe (auctions) and Stayz (accommodation) suffered a 8 percent fall in earnings for the last half of the year. In the several year before 2007 the online division had experienced double digit growth.

The loss of income from online job ads was the cause listed for the earnings drop in Fairfax's online division. It is not mentioned how the dating site RSVP actually performed but from reading between the lines it appears to experienced a marginal decrease in revenue as well.

For more on this news, read The Australian Business and to find out more about the most popular dating site in Australia, check out our RSVP review.

It seems that the dating site Shaadi.com is becoming fairly popular with British Asian singles. The Guardian in the UK wrote an article about the dating site and included several success stories and a few not so successful ones. No dating site is perfect and when I see a article written which includes information about what the site may be lacking or has problems with I tend to give it more weight than a story that is all positive.

Shaadi.com now claims 15 million people have signed up for their service since the website launched in 1997. Currently they have 5 million members using the site at any given time which generates about 300 million page views every month and 6,000 new profiles a day. This dating site:

is tailored to the typical criteria of traditional matchmakers, with questions about family values (traditional, moderate or liberal), profession and even complexion.

Shaadi's search engine allows members to be incredibly detailed about the type of person they wish to find or be matched with.

To find out more about this India dating and matrimonial website, read our review of Shaadi.com.