General News

Last year, we looked at Second Life and how the members of this virtual world were dating and even having online weddings in the virtual universe (see Story). Newsweek is taking another look at Second Life and at the couple Lillie and Hawkins. Lillie lives in California and Hawkins lives half way around the world in Wales. Both have kids and neither have a lot of money. In fact, they have only seen each other in real life a total of three times.

Their life as a couple exists almost entirely online. In Second Life, they go on dates that would be impossible in the real world. They fly over cities and land on rooftops, go scuba diving on a moment's notice. Physical intimacy is out, but they use the technology to fake it as best they can. They hold hands. They kiss. Sometimes they have virtual sex. (It's possible—though they say watching their avatars knock boots is more comic than erotic.) Outside of Second Life, they use Webcams and Skype, the online voice-video-chat system, to peer into each other's worlds, even when they're just doing daily chores. At night, they hookup headphones, so that even while they sleep, they can hear each other breathing.

They both admit that the relationship is odd, but the romance does work for them.

The day after their digital wedding, Hawkins and Lillie saw and heard each other for the first time, over the computer screen. Hawkins's voice was soft and gentle; Lillie's warm and girlish. The connection, they say, was immediate—but it was also a wake up call. They'd moved the relationship from fantasy to reality, and suddenly they had to think about what that meant.

Obviously the hardest part for them was the physical component. In the end it took them more than two years before they would meet physically and have their first real kiss. This was back in 2007, when a British TV station flew Lillie to the US for free so she could meet her Second Life husband. It was filmed as part of a documentary about virtual lives on the internet.

For the full story of Lillie's and Hawkins virtual romance, read "A Geek Love Story" on Newsweek.

Both ChristianMingle.com and BlackSingles.com have updated their original automated matching system called Ideal Matching. The new system is called COMPASS and now evaluates 100 factors of personality, relationships and compatibility. The test took me close to 25 minutes to complete and contained 16 pages of multiple choice questions. For most questions you have 5 possible answers that ranged from "Not at all like me" to "Very much like me". Once completed, your answers will be used to scientifically match you to other members with compatible outlooks and interests. You will be sent by email your most compatible matches every week.

For more information on these online dating sites, read out BlackSingles.com review and our ChristianMingle.com review.

It had been just under a year since we had updated our Wealthy Men review. We found that they still are offering 2 membership levels which are called Silver and Gold. The benefits of Gold include your profile appearing higher in the search results than Silver and all members (including free ones) can reply to your mail messages. What they did change was the membership terms. You now can only purchase a 1 month membership (which auto renews until you turn it off). The 3 month term membership is no more. This is surprising because a lot of other dating sites find this is the most popular membership term purchased. WealthyMen.com still does offer the 7 day Gold trial membership for a small price to allow you to test drive all features of the dating service.

The other thing which is now available at Wealthy Men is their 3-Month Guarantee. If for any reason, you cannot find your match in 3 months, Wealthy Men will give you an extra 3 months for free. To collect, all you need to do is email or call customer support after 3 months.

For more information, read out Wealthy Men review.

I have never understood why on a paid dating site you would have advertising for other similar dating sites. Why send your customers somewhere else if you offer a good product? Unfortunately almost all dating sites have advertising now days.

When I first started this story over a week ago, I had thought FriendFinder had removed the advertising from their network of dating sites and was going to applaud them for it. Since then, in the few days I have been double checking this fact, I have come to realize either there ad system isn't working right (the reason behind me not seeing the ads, and no, I do not run ad blocking software) or the ads are only shown during certain time of day.

A document published back in December 2008 about the FriendFinder IPO notes that they make on average $152 thousand a month in ad revenue on their sites. This is not a lot of money, especially with the amount of traffic they have (even they admit to this fact). For being such a wiz with their own advertising on other sites, I just can't understand the failure with advertising on their own sites. It is poorly placed, off center, not pleasing to the eye and not audience targeted. Frankly, when I see that annoying two color flashing banner ad on FriendFinder telling me I have won something, I just want to run. Don't they realize they are driving their potential customers away? I would bet, if they removed the ads that are not part of the FriendFinder Network from their sites, they would more than make up for it in additional membership fees.

The Lindsay Lohan's eHarmony Profile video which we reported about here, received almost 1.8 million views in 24 hours when it was posted April 13th, on Funny or Die. Since then, the video has had a total of over 2.8 million views. Her self-parody has gotten her press coverage beyond the normal gossip newspapers. ABC and The Wall Street Journal even took notice.

eHarmony is enjoying the free publicity. An eHarmony spokesperson noted:

We appreciate that Ms. Lohan recognizes eHarmony is the company that single people turn to when they are serious about finding a great long-term relationship ... Her parody of our advertising gave us a good laugh

The video is more about Lindsay Lohan poking fun of herself, than eHarmony. In her own way Lindsay is actually endorsing the dating site. By this I mean, when people watch the video they will wonder, if Lindsay thinks the dating service will work for her (with her screwed up life), then it must work for anyone!

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

I have been going over the reviews of late and updating them with any new features and pricing information we have found. Since last year, Spark Networks have updated most of their "General MArkets" and "Other Affinity Networks" dating sites (which use to be Mingle Match) to include two new features. There are also now, two paid membership levels. A Standard Membership, which includes all the usually features like Instant Messaging and the ability to send and receive emails. A Premium Membership includes all the features of a Standard Membership plus the new Spotlight and Stand-Out features.

The Spotlight feature allows you to become a featured member on the homepage of the dating site and more importantly makes you a featured profile in the search results of members who match your specific search criteria which you setup before hand. The Stand-Out feature is similar to the highlight feature found on other dating sites. Your profile summary receives a special background color and larger area in search results to help make it more noticeable.

On average a Premium Membership costs about $5 USD more per month than a standard Membership. This new membership can be found on the following dating sites:

AmericanSingles.com - Read Review (New Features called Member Spotlight and Highlighted Profile)
Asian Singles Connection - Read Review
BBW Personals Plus - Read Review
Canadian Personals - Read Review
Catholic Mingle - Read Review
Christian Mingle - Read Review
Date.ca - Read Review (New Features called Member Spotlight and Highlighted Profile)
Prime Singles - Read Review
Single Parents Mingle - Read Review
UK Singles Connection - Read Review