Eh, I read every message I get and if the guy 1: writes like a normal human being and 2: doesn’t look like a chupacabra in his thumbnail, I’ll click through to his profile and poke around. If there’s something objectionable on your profile, then I won’t write back, even if you were the one genuinely normal dude in the sea of, “WHOA, HOLY TITS BATMAN!!!” messages.
I thought you would have been fighting off suitors, both real and online. Maybe a DB filter is needed in order to condense the stream down to a manageable amount.
I’d rather have an issue with too much garbage, than one that has nothing to offer.
Over the last week, I’ve averaged about 20 messages a day (meaning I’ve received that many-- and we’re talking individual guys, not 10 messages from the same dude). This is pretty standard in my experience on OKC and I’m a normal looking chick in her late 20s.
So, yes, there’s a lot of garbage to weigh through, but I’ve met some nice guys-- some who I’ve dated for a while, some who have become friends. I’ve also had a few scumbags slip by my system, but what can ya do? My over all experience has been very good, you just have to be selective. I was simply explaining why someone may not respond even if you were the decent guy in the stack of derps.
If you’d like you could post a link to your account and have people critique it for you.
For the record, there was NerdPassions and Geek2Geek and OtakuBooty and… one other whose name eludes me. Geek2Geek had the only good site design, but it also was hideously expensive to upgrade to being a member who could send messages, so I never bothered. (Seriously, I think it was more than $20 a month!)
OKCupid has a good site design and is actually, really, truly free. So I’m digging that.
http://blog.okcupid.com/index.php/your-looks-and-online-dating/
So, unless your "cute"ness is the sort that makes you better looking than four out five men, it probably won’t get you anywhere.
You know, I’ve got a theory about this. I don’t think it’s necessarily that women are pickier than men or anything like that, but rather that women are just better picture takers. Hear me me out. When I browse OKC, I notice that a lot of the women have in focus photos, taken from flattering angles with good lighting. Whereas in general, tons of men have blurry pictures, far away pictures, pictures turned the wrong way, group pictures, super flattering angles, etc. Now, I’m in no way arguing that this is universal- there are certainly exceptions to this rule- but it’s definitely something I’ve noticed.
I know that if I can’t make out a dude’s face in a picture without turning my head upside down or if the shot is blurry, from a weird angle, and I can’t see anything. . . I’m rating him low. While that picture of you hiking or running or whatever is really cool, it probably shouldn’t be your main picture, because I can’t tell you from Adam. You might actually be the man of my dreams, but it’s darned hard to tell when I’m clicking through and rating people because OKC yelled at me and told me to.
Not by itself, but I would suggest that my appearance shouldn’t bring me down, if I’m lumped in with 80% of the male population. 
You’re going to need to be a stereotypical male. But a uniquely stereotypical male. Be the best damn cardboard cutout you can - hi-res printing on gloss-coated stock. Most importantly, don’t fall over when the wind picks up. Happy advertising!
Nah. Looks aren’t everything. The blokes I know who’ve been successful on okc range from very handsome to very much not.
I must be dog shit ugly or something - I never experienced the message flood other women talk about. I got a few but not a ton.
I wasn’t on there long, though. Married the first guy I went out with there.
ETA - I’d forgotten about that bit from the OKC blog. Perhaps I am just stunningly beautiful.
Yes. I try to phrase it in a polite “thanks anyway” kind of way. I feel as if someone who’s read my profile and written a message deserves at least as much courtesy as I’d give someone I met in person.
This is kind of what I meant when I said I respond to messages that seem real. Of the not very many messages I’m receiving more of them have been thoughtless impersonal ones.
Actually the “if we met in person” standard applies to either sort. If a man walked up to me in a bar or at a party and said without any introductions and said “D’ya like cock?” sparing his feelings would not be a priority for me I’d walk away. So those messages get deleted without a response.
What I want to know is if the messages that just say “Sex?” have ever resulted in anyone hooking up ever.
This is what fascinates me! I read Diosa’s tumbler and there are just SO. MANY. GUYS. who try a (generally more graphic) version of this. Are they just eternal optimists? Are there women who respond we’ll to those messages? I met my husband when I was eighteen, so I have precisely zero dating experience, and I always wonder how it works in the “real world”.
See the movie “Idiocracy”. We’re fucked.
I think some guys just get off on having other people read what they write. I liken it to those men who flash or call women up and talk suggestively.
So random question about OKCupid that doesn’t deserve its own thread.
The way the matching system works is that you answer a question with your answer, and then you say which of the answers you’d find acceptable in a mate. Okay. But people have some weird requirements what they wouldn’t accept their own answer and I guess sometimes that makes sense but other times it doesn’t.
For example “Would you be willing to date a smoker”?
I said yes. (I prefer not to, but it’s not a dealbreaker). They said yes. But my yes was in red, which means that they find “yes” to be an unacceptable answer, even though they themselves said yes. In other words, they’re willing to date a smoker, but they don’t want to date someone who’s willing to date a smoker.
What sense does that make?
None. I think they just didn’t get it. They actually don’t want to date a smoker and they think that’s what they are requiring of you when they make that answer unacceptable.
Yeah, I’ve run into a couple like that, SenorBeef.
I have more fun answering the questions than looking at “matches.”
Then I think about why the questions exist. One that popped up recently was “Do you own any cookbooks?” To which I answered, “yes.” Then I got to “Answers you’ll accept”
Really? In what context would either answer be unacceptable? Whoever wrote the question might have wanted a roundabout way to ask if potential dates if they like to cook. But, when is either a yes or no to that unacceptable?
Most of the questions are really dumb. I mostly mark them as ‘irrelevant’ because I don’t care.