# Do you OkCupid? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [October 5, 2005, 9:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-okcupid/324956 "2005-10-05T21:51:50Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![OtakuLoki](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/ac8455/32.png) [@OtakuLoki](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OtakuLoki)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2005, 12:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-okcupid/324956/21 "2005-10-07T00:27:40Z")
> [@AntaresJB](#): > > I have a profile there (as _RedGuitarGrl883_) but don’t really check it all that often anymore. I take tests every once in a while and check my matches every couple of weeks but they’re all the same old guys who will never be interested so I pretty much don’t bother. But yes, I’m there. Odbodikins. I actually got ‘matched’ to you recently. (I only discovered OKCupid recently, too. So…) ---
**Author:** ![Nancarrow](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/c37758/32.png) [@Nancarrow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nancarrow)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2005, 9:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-okcupid/324956/22 "2005-10-07T09:50:06Z")
To answer the OP: yes. But too shy to message anyone. Even online! ☹ ---
**Author:** ![AntaresJB](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c2a13f/32.png) [@AntaresJB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AntaresJB)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2005, 12:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-okcupid/324956/23 "2005-10-08T00:15:07Z")
> [@OtakuLoki](#): > > Odbodikins. I actually got ‘matched’ to you recently. (I only discovered OKCupid recently, too. So…) ::blink:: Interesting… 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Gozu\_Tashoya](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/7993a0/32.png) [@Gozu\_Tashoya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gozu_Tashoya)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2005, 1:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-okcupid/324956/24 "2005-10-08T01:19:00Z")
> [@Nancarrow](#): > > To answer the OP: yes. But too shy to message anyone. Even online! ☹ Message everyone you can. The **worst** response you can get will be none at all (in which case it’s no worse than not having messaged anyone at all), and the best-case scenario, well, use your imagination. (Hint: Think dirty.) 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Beware\_of\_Doug](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/278dde/32.png) [@Beware\_of\_Doug](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beware_of_Doug)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2005, 1:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-okcupid/324956/25 "2005-10-08T01:43:50Z")
Do I understand correctly? Is there a _guy shortage_ on OKCupid? In the online dating world, that is basically unheard-of. ---
**Author:** ![ultrafilter](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/3d9bf3/32.png) [@ultrafilter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ultrafilter)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2005, 1:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-okcupid/324956/26 "2005-10-08T01:53:15Z")
> [@Beware of Doug](#): > > Do I understand correctly? Is there a _guy shortage_ on OKCupid? No, just a shortage of people over 22. ---
**Author:** ![bouv](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/bc8723/32.png) [@bouv](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bouv)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2005, 2:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-okcupid/324956/27 "2005-10-08T02:10:27Z")
I have one, but I pretty much never use it, because there are about ten women that live in my area, pretty much none of which look in any way like someone I’d date. ---
**Author:** ![Misnomer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/misnomer/32/14897_2.png) [@Misnomer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Misnomer)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2005, 3:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-okcupid/324956/28 "2005-10-08T03:18:07Z")
Well, [I](http://www.okcupid.com/profile?tuid=5955966750424163322) just spent the past 2 hours re-upping (I’d forgotten how much time it takes to get everything set up, answer a few questions, and take the basic tests!). I don’t recognize any of the guys in my search results, which is a nice change from 6 months ago. One of them caught my eye immediately … I’m going to take some more tests and answer some more questions before I write to him, so he can have a decent idea of who he’s writing back to. Or not. Game on! 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Sengkelat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e36b37/32.png) [@Sengkelat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sengkelat)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2005, 4:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-okcupid/324956/29 "2005-10-08T04:25:48Z")
I signed up with OkCupid. I’m actually rather enjoying it. And after taking a few tests, it matched me with someone who’s within my acceptable age range, cute, and (after taking a moment to count) mentions thirty different things in their profile that I share an interest in. Thirty! Some of which are weird and obscure and I wouldn’t expect anyone else to be interested in. I’m guessing she’ll never write me back, but at least I know now that there exist women who are a nigh-perfect match. ---
**Author:** ![soulmurk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b782af/32.png) [@soulmurk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/soulmurk)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2005, 6:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-okcupid/324956/30 "2005-10-08T06:28:34Z")
> [@ultrafilter](#): > > No, just a shortage of people over 22. I’m on Cupid, male, and 30. I’m probably not anyone here’s type, nor geographically feasible… but we’re out there! ---
**Author:** ![THespos](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8c91f0/32.png) [@THespos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/THespos)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2005, 11:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-okcupid/324956/31 "2005-10-08T23:14:25Z")
Not anymore. I erased my profile after getting a few fake woos, and getting shot down several times. ---
**Author:** ![Misnomer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/misnomer/32/14897_2.png) [@Misnomer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Misnomer)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2005, 4:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-okcupid/324956/32 "2005-10-10T04:52:43Z")
Earlier today I was reminded of one reason that dating sucks: insecure assholes who take their issues out on complete strangers. :rolleyes: Dude writes to me. Really long message, a little arrogant, but I check out his profile. Which is long – I mean, _long_! He wrote a damn novel. And he bragged in his message about having composed the entire profile without benefit of a spell-checker or dictionary, therefore I notice all of the typos and grammatical errors. As I sludge through the profile I realize that this guy is not my type: he is demanding and judgmental, and also _way_ too defensive about a lot of stuff right up front. So I write back, saying “thanks so much for writing, but unfortunately I don’t think we’d be a good match.” What do I get in reply? > [@](#): > > You are probably right. You don’t actually say it in your profile but I got the feeling that despite your stated desire for casual dating you are actually shopping for a husband, one to have children with etc. No shame in that, but so you know when profiles make that clearer than yours did, I usually don’t write at all. This, from a 42-year-old man. Le sigh. (And just in case you wonder whether my profile actually _does_ subliminally cry out for a husband and children (!), here’s a [link](http://www.okcupid.com/profile?tuid=5955966750424163322) to it. Judge for yourself.) ---
**Author:** ![Telperien](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/65b543/32.png) [@Telperien](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telperien)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2005, 4:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-okcupid/324956/33 "2005-10-10T04:54:53Z")
Sounds like that guy had a case of sour grapes, **Misnomer.** I generally only take the tests on OkCupid now, since I never seem to find anyone I want to communicate with who will actually answer my messages. ---
**Author:** ![kimera](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/f0a364/32.png) [@kimera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kimera)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2005, 5:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-okcupid/324956/34 "2005-10-10T17:28:43Z")
I’m on there and I’ve meet some great local friends that way. No one I’m really interested in dating, 'cept maybe for one of the three dopers who messaged me off of it. 🙂[My profile](http://www.okcupid.com/profile?tuid=3499927568037733526). ---
**Author:** ![Misnomer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/misnomer/32/14897_2.png) [@Misnomer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Misnomer)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2005, 6:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-okcupid/324956/35 "2005-10-10T18:03:33Z")
> [@Harimad-sol](#): > > Sounds like that guy had a case of sour grapes, **Misnomer.** He had sour _something_, that’s for sure. 😃 I think I might have scared away the one I’m interested in. 😉 I wrote, he wrote back, and at the end of his reply he said, “_What are you looking for in a relationship? I’m kind of looking for something relatively casual. Nothing too deep – my time is fairly limited. 🙂 However, if something deeper grew, I wouldn’t necessarily be adverse to it. It would depend on the relationship_.” That struck me as kind of a bullshit thing to say – you’re either willing to make time for a relationship or you aren’t – and I pretty much told him so. (I didn’t actually use the word “bullshit,” though. \) I acknowledged that I was kind of blunt in that regard, and said I’d like to hear from him again if I hadn’t put him off. I think he’d be cool to at least meet, but honestly I’m not going to cry in my beer if I did put him off: I’m definitely willing to make time for dating and/or a relationship, but I _don’t_ have time for crap like “I want something casual … unless it turns into something not casual.” ---
**Author:** ![OtakuLoki](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/ac8455/32.png) [@OtakuLoki](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OtakuLoki)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2005, 7:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-okcupid/324956/36 "2005-10-10T19:27:22Z")
**Misnomer** , my sympathies. People with code words or highly emotionally tilted responses to what were intended to be relatively benign comments (Granted, some of this can be justified: Some people’s definitions of what’s benign is scary.) makes dating a minefield. I’ve had similar reactions with women, so it’s not just a male thing. This one woman I’d been corresponding with asks how I feel about kids. I tell her, honestly, I thought - I don’t have much experience with them. I like them fine in social situations, and haven’t had to live with any since I was one myself, so I can’t predict how I’ll react better than that. She came back with a huge shit-fest accusing me of wanting to dump her kids (which had never previously been mentioned) in some private boarding school… I know women with children have problems finding guys but how else should someone just out of the Navy answer? ---
**Author:** ![bouv](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/bc8723/32.png) [@bouv](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bouv)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2005, 7:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-okcupid/324956/37 "2005-10-10T19:44:45Z")
Hmmm…after trying to get back into OKCupid (sicne I haven’t ben in a few months and figures maybe someone new joined) there is something that I am fed up with. Their local search system…SUCKS! Why oh why can’t it just show me ALL women in the age range I specify within the mile range I specify? It has to do some complex algorithm involving match percentage and only show me ‘relevant’ people, or something. And even then I never seem to get the same search result twice! It seems to think that since I searched once, that in the next search, it won’t include ANY of the previous matches, and just grab a couple more obscure matches. After several searches, I gathered that there was in the neighborhood of fifteen to twenty total women in my area it was showing me, but NEVER all at once, only in groups of 2-3 every time I searched. I even reset my damn search several times but it still wouldn’t just give me a big list with all the women on it. What the Hell? I know that OKCupid likes top pride itself on its matching program, but how about they give a simple option to turn it off and just list people by proximity? ---
**Author:** ![Misnomer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/misnomer/32/14897_2.png) [@Misnomer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Misnomer)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2005, 10:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-okcupid/324956/38 "2005-10-10T22:45:15Z")
> [@THespos](#): > > I erased my profile after getting a few fake woos, and getting shot down several times. I meant to reply to this earlier: one of the first things I did upon re-establishing a profile there was disable the woos. I’ve never gotten fake ones (from pay sites or something?), I just don’t like 'em. I never liked the winks at [Match.com](http://Match.com), either. (I’ve now said the magic words to make **twickster** appear in the thread and tell me that woos/winks are _perfectly legitimate_ forms of communication… ;)) > [@OtakuLoki](#): > > I know women with children have problems finding guys but how else should someone just out of the Navy answer? Maybe that you wanted to dump her kids in the _ocean_? 😉 But yeah, crazy definitely comes in both genders. > [@bouv](#): > > Their local search system…SUCKS! I totally agree, and for the same reasons that you stated. Just show me everyone in my area! ---
**Author:** ![Sengkelat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e36b37/32.png) [@Sengkelat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sengkelat)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2005, 11:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-okcupid/324956/39 "2005-10-10T23:33:43Z")
I wish OkCupid allowed a little more direct filtering. I keep getting smokers showing up in my search results. So far I’ve only found two smoke-related questions in their “improve matches” section, and on both of them I checked “Mandatory” for the non-smoking options…but I still get people who smoke “only when drinking” and such. As an asthmatic, I have a very, very strong preference for women whose habits aren’t going to kill me. The Stranger Arranger they just implemented is fairly amusing. I got paired up with someone who seems pretty cool…but she smokes! Of course, it’s not the site’s fault, this woman mentions in her profile text that she smokes, but didn’t bother to mention that in her actual blue-boxed stats. A feature I’d really like is “report this question as Lame.” There was one that asked “Do animals have souls like humans?” The available responses were Yes and No. There wasn’t a checkbox for “No, because humans don’t have souls either.” I just skipped the question, but I’d really like to meet the women who’d choose option C; they’d be my kind of gal. As far as winks/woos go, I always write actual messages. It just seems like the thing to do. But I’m not about to disable them; being an [average-looking guy](http://www.okcupid.com/profile?tuid=9218543144033329758) I’m not about to do anything to prevent women from potentially contacting me. Misnomer and OtakuLoki, just be happy you’re rid of the person now. Just imagine the annoyance if you’d gotten some amount of emotional investment before realizing that they were crazy. ---
**Author:** ![Misnomer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/misnomer/32/14897_2.png) [@Misnomer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Misnomer)\ **Post date:** [October 11, 2005, 10:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-okcupid/324956/40 "2005-10-11T22:44:04Z")
I didn’t scare that guy away, after all! Yay! Of course, there’s still plenty of time… 😉 > [@Sengkelat](#): > > The Stranger Arranger they just implemented is fairly amusing. I got paired up with someone who seems pretty cool…but she smokes! I keep getting “arranged” with guys who are 25 or younger … despite the fact that my search specifies a 30-45 age range. :dubious: > [@](#): > > A feature I’d really like is “report this question as Lame.” There was one that asked “Do animals have souls like humans?” The available responses were Yes and No. There wasn’t a checkbox for “No, because humans don’t have souls either.” I just skipped the question, but I’d really like to meet the women who’d choose option C; they’d be my kind of gal. Funny, I came across that question mere hours before seeing your post, and that was almost exactly my reaction to it – I say “almost” because I wanted an option D: “Hell, I’m not even sure if _humans_ have souls.” I skipped it, too. 🙂 > [@](#): > > Misnomer and OtakuLoki, just be happy you’re rid of the person now. Just imagine the annoyance if you’d gotten some amount of emotional investment before realizing that they were crazy. Frankly, I have more respect for people who hold back the crazy until you’ve gotten to know them a little. The ones who are crazy right up front are the ones who make me worry for the future of the species. 😉 [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-okcupid/324956.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-okcupid/324956.md?page=3)