Online Dating

Ha, I noticed on the Online Dating Insider (a blog for people who work in the Dating Industry) that David has an article on Date.com's new Blog Widgets. These Blog Widgets are actually quizzes. The available quizzes include "How addicted are you to Online Dating?" and a "Hot or Not Calculator". Once you take a quiz they will give you the code to put on a blog if you have one. Dave only scored a 45% and he thought that was low since he spends a large amount of time using online dating sites. I took the test as well and I scored a 45%! I spend a fair bit of time using online dating sites but only from the point of reviewing the dating service and checking in from time to time to see any new features and what has changed. So in this regard, some of the questions I answered pertaining to how often I change my profile and photo, would have lowered my overall score.

You can see our Date.com Review here for more information on this dating service.

According to a recent Financial Post article, Ashley Madison, the dating service that caters to people who want extramarital affairs is banned from placing ads on the Microsoft Network (MSN). MSN Canada states the reason for the ban is because this web service is designed to facilitate deception.

While I don't agree morally with the Ashley Madison dating site concept, I'm on the fence about this ban. On one side MSN is a business and they have the right to decide who can and who cannot advertise with them. On the other hand, say all of the big 3 search engines (Google, Yahoo, MSN) took the same stance on who can advertise. This would hurt your legitimate business. It is a form of censorship in a way and IMO the big 3 search engines are basically an essential service of the internet.

The New Jersey Assembly Committee has passed the next measure that would require dating services to tell residents of New Jersey whether criminal background checks are done.

Most singles dating online are honest but it's that 1% everyone worries about. Background checks don't tell the whole story and probably give online daters a false sense of security. A fair number of states have considered a bill similar to this but, one state has yet to pass it. The biggest problem with these type of checks is that most singles who have a criminal background would just give a false name to circumvent this type of security measure. A dating site would have to confirm that a member is actually who he or she says he or she is before an actual background check can be done. Confirming ones identity for websites is a whole other problem.

More information about this bill is located at the NewsCenter 16 website.

TechCrunch have posted a rumor from what they call a reliable source that the FriendFinder Network of sites has been acquired for $1 Billion. In an update to this rumor the buyer is reported to be Penthouse Media Group. The FriendFinder Network of dating sites includes AdultFriendFInder, Passion, Senior FriendFinder and over 15 other different types of dating services. The article further reports that rumored revenues for the Network is over $300 million a year which makes this acquisition worth about 3 years of revenue.

Is this a good deal for Penthouse? Could be, the FriendFinder dating sites have always done well financially and they don't seem to be slowing down. At a cost of 3 years worth of revenue seems a little on the low end to me but most likely there is more too this deal than we know about (if it actually is true!).

Seattlepi.com did a piece on a facial recognition from ActiveSymbols called Eyealike. This technology is able to gather the properties of a face from a picture. Such facial traits would include hair color, location and spacing of eyes, and skin tone. Company President Greg Heuss hopes this technology would be used for online dating to allow singles to search for a match by just a picture alone. He also sees applications in homeland security and video copyright protection.

While I find this type of technology neat I feel its use is very limited in online dating. It's much easier and faster to get the member to fill out the physical attributes of his or her profile than to try and get them to upload a photo that meet the necessary requirements for the software to be able to gather the information. This technology works best when the photo is something like a passport photo, which is fine for the software but usually is not very flattering for someone trying to find a date.

Try out a beta version of Eyealike and find your Dream Date or Celeb Match.

Spark Networks just released their third quarter financial results. Spark Networks owns AmericanSingles.com (there flagship dating service), Date.ca (for Canadians), JDate.com (Jewish Dating) and a fair number other specific niche oriented dating services. With most of their dating services membership numbers holding steady, JDate.com saw an increase in paid members by 3% for a total of 74,078. This shows well for the service in this increasingly more competitive niche market. Overall Spark Networks have a healthy bottom line and will continue to be one of the driving forces in internet dating.

For more information on the dating services which Spark Networks owns, see our reviews of AmericanSingles.com, JDate.com, and Date.ca.