The Meet Group

Looking for the best online dating site? There are many out there, but how do you know which sites are the ones most people are checking out? After all, you want a lot of choice when it comes to searching for love.

According to website Mashable.com, Yahoo has revealed the top 10 dating sites that people have searched for using their search engine. And surprisingly, OkCupid topped the list (with even more searches than standards like Match.com or eHarmony).

Another surprise? Men seem to be more interested in online dating, or at least, searching for sites and checking them out.

Here's the complete list:

OkCupid. This site tops the list, and maybe because their demographic skews younger and it's a little more engaging with members than some of the classic dating sites. Most of the searches were conducted by men (68%).

Match. This website is almost synonymous with online dating. It's been around a while, and is still going strong. Again, the majority of searches (73%) came from men.

MeetMe. A more casual site for dating and friendship, MeetMe is gaining marketshare when it comes to online dating. Or at least, people seem to be searching for the site. A hefty 67% of men (primarily from Arkansas, Kentucky and West Virginia) searched for it according to Yahoo.

Zoosk. This popular website touts is algorithms which allow members to "date smarter." Again, more than 70% of its searches came from men.

eHarmony. The go-to destination for those looking for committed relationships, eHarmony has remained near the top of the pack for a long time. Surprisingly, more men (54%) than women were searching for this website.

PlentyofFish. This dating site has a bit of a reputation, but that hasn't stopped people from checking it out. Formerly known for its "intimate encounters" section, POF has recently undergone an image change to focus on matching people with relationship potential.

JDate. The most popular site for those who are more religiously inclined, JDate has become the go-to source for Jewish singles. Not surprisingly, the most searches came from New Jersey, New York, and Florida, all with more concentrated Jewish populations.

Skout. Mobile apps also figured prominently into searches. Skout is a networking app that focuses on meeting people rather than having specific agendas for dating and relationships. Most of the searches for this site came from men (68%) residing in Texas, California, and Florida.

Christian Mingle. A popular religious-based dating site, Christian Mingle focuses on dating, friendships, and relationships. This is the only site that had more females searching for it, primarily from Texas, California and Pennsylvania.

Tinder. This mobile app was made popular by college students, a sort of "hot or not" version of online dating. With its easy-to-use and convenient set-up, the app has taken off among singles who like to see who's close by and wanting to meet a little more spontaneously.

Online dating: it's great, except when it isn't.

The latest cautionary tale involves Skout, a social networking app designed to link up adults with other users nearby. Skout got its start as a Foursquare-like location check-in service, but didn't hit its stride until it transformed into a location-based flirting app. The company now attracts millions of new users a month and received $22 million in financing from Andreessen Horowitz, a leading venture capital firm in Silicon Valley, earlier this year.

After discovering that minors had gained access to the app, Skout created a service designed specifically for 13- to 17-year olds. Safeguards were put in place, but they may not have been safe enough.

3 men have now been accused of raping children they met through the location-based app. In each case, the men reportedly posed as teenagers in the Skout forum for underage users. In one case, a 15-year-old girl from Ohio said she was raped by a 37-year-old man. In the second, a 24-year-old man is accused of raping a 12-year-old girl in California. In the final case, a 21-year-old man in Wisconsin has been accused of sexually assaulting a 13-year-old boy.

Skout's founder, Christian Wiklund, responded in an interview, saying, "I'm disgusted by what's happened here. One case is too many. When you have three, it looks like a pattern. This is my worst fear." He has decided to suspend the service for minors, who made up a significant portion of Skout's member base, while he works with security experts to put better safeguards in place.

"We're seeing more of these cases," said Lt. Craig Carter of the Escondido Police Department in California. "Parents need to be aware that their kids could be on these Web sites." Many social networking services forbid minors from using them, or separate minors from adult users, but it's nearly impossible to control who ultimately uses the service.

Wiklund has contact law enforcement officials involved in all 3 cases and offered to aid in their investigations. The company has also suspended the app for teenagers and banned all devices registered with the app that belong to minors. Skout is also working with a task force of experts to improve security, age verification, and other company practices.

"I thought we were doing a lot, but obviously we have to do better," says Scott Weiss, an investment partner with Andreessen Horowitz. "This is a five-alarm fire. The entire company is re-evaluating everything it's doing."

If you haven't heard of Skout yet, you probably will soon. The dating app has raised $22 million dollars and is poised to make a huge splash in 2012, but CEO Christian Wikilund doesn't plan to stop at dating. Skout is adding 40,000 to 50,000 new users on the app every single day and if Wikilund has his way, it will eventually become a global network on the scale of Facebook or Twitter.

In an interview with Business Insider, Wikilund described the history of Skout and his vision for the app's future. Skout got its start in 2007, before Facebook had a mobile product and location-based services were just starting to become popular. As a location-based mobile social network, Skout immediately stood out from its competitors. Skout was the first dating app for the iPhone at the time of its launch, and has since evolved into a more general service to meet new people and flirt.

"The mission for the company is to build a global network for meeting new people," Wikilund told Business Insider. "A year ago we had 30 million messages a month, last month we had 425 million messages. We were signing up a year ago 100,000 per month. Now we're signing up 40-50k users per day. Everything has been growing, basically due to a good product."

Skout's impressive growth has taken it through Hong Kong, New York, Japan, Berlin, LA, South Korea, and more. Wikilund attributes the success to Skout's ability to be whatever you want it to be. Looking to meet new friends? Skout can handle it. Looking to meet a lover? Skout can do it. Looking for long-term love? Skout can help with that, too. "Right now," said Wikilund, "50 percent of adults on a national level are single, but 80 percent of our users are single." Flirting is definitely on the Skout menu.

Using Skout is free for all basic functionality, but extra fun requires an extra fee. Users can pay to see who checked them out or to promote their profiles, but the vast majority of activities on the app come with a price tag of $0.

If all goes according to plan, 2012 will be a big year for Skout. The company plans to continue developing the product and spreading the word, and has plans to continue their growth on both the national and international stages. A major launch is also scheduled for this summer.

While the iPhone changed the way we consume content, the iPad is about to change the way we date. According to a TIME Magazine article released this month, Skout.com will soon be releasing the first online dating app designed specifically for the iPad.

Some of the biggest benefits that developers see with the new iPad are the iPhone interactivity combined with the larger screen size. The larger screen size is what's prompted Skout.com developers to design a location-based app that will allow users to search the area around them for fellow Skout users while chatting and browsing profiles.

Skout isn't the only site stepping up to the iPad. Gelato, a new online dating site launched in 2009, is redesigning its entire site based on the iPad. Gelato includes live streams of members' social media accounts in their profiles if members choose to add them and CEO and founder Steve Odom sums the iPad up with, "It's big, it's beautiful, and it's perfect for dating sites."

As online dating sites are highly interactive, it's no wonder that we're already hearing the stampede as they rush to tailor apps and websites exclusively for the iPad. The large touch screen allows a high level of hands-on during the profile building and viewing process and the article predicts we may even see eye-tracking software that accompanies these apps in the future. Does that mean the potential for love at first sight with the iPad? While an eye-catching device, it definitely appears the cliché may become a reality down the line.

Bottom line? It's about interactivity. If online dating site developers can access the tech-savvy iPad crowd then the sky's the limit. Online dating lives in a bit of a crunch due to the iPhone's size, but the iPad puts big, bold pictures in front of the user and the touch screen adds to a more personalized experience.

Want to read more about what's on the horizon with the iPad and online dating? You can read the original TIME Magazine article here.

The Skout dating application for the iPhone has reached version 2.0 and not only did it get some new features it also got a design makeover. New features include virtual gifts, a game called "Look at Me" which allows you to bid for attention of other members and a Wink-Bomb. The bomb allows members using Skout to reach hundreds of singles in your proximity all at once with location based dating and the GPS in your phone. With the app you can then find out who has been looking at your profile and think you're hot. With this information in hand you can then contact these people to meet up somewhere close by.

If you are interested in trying out Skout for your iPhone here are a few more interesting stats about the dating service.

• Skout was the first iPhone Dating Application
• Skout members send on average 100 messages in 1 month.
• Currently over 750,000 people have used Skout's location based dating option.
• A Skout iPad dating application is currently being developed.

Here is a sneak peek video of the dating app in action:

For a few more details read the press release. Here is our list of other dating sites which offer their services on mobile phones.

Skout, a mobile phone dating service, recently did a survey of 1000 of its users. The survey participants had an even number of men and women in their 20s. Here are some of the results of the survey:

• 51% have met another single in the real world that they first contacted on their phone.
• 69% of all surveyed are comfortable in meeting up with someone they met online.
• 40% use the Skout service while out at restaurants, bars and clubs.
• 35% have used Skout at work.
• During the holidays 29% would prioritize spending time with their family while 71% would prefer going out on at least one date or hook-up.

It also looks like 20 percent of those surveyed on Skout have a significant other, with half knowing about their partners activities on these social dating sites. I don't know if this is a good statistic to advertise since it means one fifth of all Skout members are cheaters.

For more on the story, read The Washington Post. You can also find other dating sites which offer a mobile phone service here.