General News

On February 3rd, InterActiveCorp released their fourth quarter financial results. Overall, compared to Q4 2007 IAC saw revenue drop 7 percent to $351 million. This loss mainly was do to the media and advertising side of their business. With regards to Match.com IAC saw revenue for 2008's quarter 4 drop 3 percent to $88.1 million but, operating income after amortization increased 53 percent to $24.8 million.
For the entire 2008 year, Match.com saw operating income before amortization at $91.3 million ($75.5 million after). No mention was made about Chemistry this time in this financial report. For this reason you have to wonder if Chemistry is not doing as well as IAC wishes.

Here is the complete IAC Q4 Report For more information on the dating sites owned by IAC, read our Match.com review and are Chemistry review.

A report from Taiwan's Criminal Investigation Bureau shows that a total of 41,093 cases of fraud were reported in 2008. Of these cases a total of 54 percent were caused by personal online shopping information being stolen. 8 percent or 5,803 of the cases involved dating related scams. Of these cases:

.. 2,183 persons fell victim to online interactive dating fraud, of whom 90 percent were urban women in their 20s and 30s, with 20-somethings accounting for 51 percent and the remainder in their 30s.

The CIB further states that online dating related fraud has risen dramatically in recent years and young woman need to practice safe dating habits to better protect themselves.

For the full story read the Taiwan News.

<p>The New York Times has an article about the recession and how it has affected online dating. Nothing much new is mentioned in the article that hasn't been mentioned before in others except with a couple of exceptions.</p>

<p>We knew that PerfectMatch.com has seen a large spike in members in Q4 of 2008 but we only knew it was around 47 percent which was about half way through quarter 4 (see Story). According to the New York Times article, Perfect Match saw a 51 percent increase in members in quarter 4, when compared to the same quarter of 2007. Perfect Match growth continued into January 2009, but not quite as high at 30 percent. PerfectMatch.com CEO, Duane Dahl also noted that they experienced a similar trend in the rise of memberships for their dating site during the last economic downturn in 2001, after the internet economic bubble burst.</p>

<p>To read the complete story visit the New York Times. Registration may be required to read the article. For more information on PerfectMatch.com, read our online dating review.</p>

Here are two interesting points from an article called "Dates with destiny", which is hosted on easyJet Inflight.

• Match.com launched their United Kingdom dating site in 2001, interesting enough Marc Simoncini, the founder of Meetic (which is set to purchase Match.com's European Operations) was also launched in 2001.
• In 2004 as online dating became more popular, Match.com became the first dating site to run TV commercials.

For more information on Match.com's British dating site, read our review.

On Wednesday Avalanche (the owners of Date.com, Matchmaker.com, and Amor) announced that they will be offering virtual gifts for sale on their dating sites. Just in time for Valentine's Day, members of these dating communities can send a $1 virtual gift to help make an impression with a potential date. To send a virtual gift:

Members purchase tokens that can be converted immediately, or at a later date, into Virtual Gifts. Online gifts, which range in price and start at $1, run the gamut from romantic to flirty. Everything from roses, hearts, Cupids and boxes of chocolates to martini glasses, food, stuffed animals, and even a shiny red sports car are available for purchase. Specialty items and limited edition items will be introduced in future updates of the feature.

Branded Virtual Gifts will also be available to advertisers that are looking for innovative ways to market products to online daters. Singles do not have to be paying subscribers of the sites to purchase, send or to receive Virtual Gifts. Virtual Gifts can be purchased using all major credit cards as well as via PayPal.

Virtual Gifts are currently very popular on social networking sites. The industry is estimated to be worth $1.5 billion in 2008.

Time did a piece called Advice for the New Dating Game were they look at dating advice and who has been offering it. Some of the examples include online dating sites, psychologists, TV talk show hosts and stand-up comedians (they forgot dating blogs!). Chemistry.com was briefly mentioned in this article in regards to Dr. Helen Fisher, a biological anthropologist. She is Chemistry's chief scientific advisor and helped develop the profile questionnaire and matching system for the dating site.

I also notice a piece in the March issue of the Discover magazine called The Ascent of Darwin. In the first paragraph Dr. Helen Fisher is called a Darwinian matchmaker because of her research into the science of romantic attraction. Discover further reveals that she bases her ideas on the principles of evolutionary psychology, which is a field that is inspired by some of Charles Darwin's insights.

Look here for the full Time article and for more information on the above online dating site, read our Chemistry review.