I don’t quite get the idea that you have less of a chance of a spark with someone you meet online. It’s no different than meeting someone elsewhere. Except when you are meet someone at a bar, work, meeting grocery store you have no idea what there status is, if they want to date, if they find you remotely attractive, if they like cats. If its a stranger your only recourse is to try to strike up a conversation with someone out of the blue. Someone who might think you are a creep just for approaching them. Unless you are Channing Tatum. At least when you meet someone through a site you know they have seen your picture and weren’t repulsed, they are single and want to date. So you get to skip a bunch of steps which are just a waste of time. Everything else is up to you. It only takes one.
This. Never done it myself, because my one foray into the field, over a decade ago, had E-Harmony sending ‘OMG YOU HEATHEN’ notices for months after I filled out their questionnaire. 
Friends at the time also got the same reaction, so we figured online dating was for Christian folk.
Recently married someone I met online 8 years ago, but organically: through video games, as the gods intended.
My problem is that in my experience it’s been an inexplicably horrible way to meet new people. I always assume that the women get so many messages they don’t feel they need to put any effort into communicating with any one guy. That sounds like negative and nasty outlook, but the alternative is that they’re genuinely trying and are just awful.
It always reminds me of a line from Parks and Recreation “Was that your first time talking to other people? Because it came off that way”.
I really don’t get it, although I don’t think it’s worth trying to get either.
As a woman, I found the opposite - rather than guys putting the effort into any one woman, they used the shotgun approach and would send a generic approach to lots of different woman at once, to try and get an answer.
Trust me, you can tell
Except that online dating sites are a pool of exceptionally bad people, plus really, there’s no way to tell if you’re going to connect through a computer screen. It might seem as if you’ll get along because the profile is humorous and well-written, their photos look cute, they share your (lack of religion), but then when it’s time to go out, they’re boring as all fuck with zero chemistry. It’s not that there’s anything inherent to online dating that bars chemistry, it’s just that you can’t tell and end up going on a thousand bad dates. A lot of quantity with terribly quality. I may go on less dates when meeting people the good ol’ fashioned way through meatspace, but they’re better dates all of the time. I’ve never gone on a date with a real person I’ve met face to face and experienced a chemistry vacuum, because if there were no spark, I wouldn’t have agreed to go out with him in the first place.
This is a big part of the issue, and it’s a self-feeding cycle. Guys are generally conditioned to be the initiator and, just like in a normal meeting, will probably need to take multiple attempts to get any interest. But now he has a lot easier access to a lot more women. So he can either try to specifically target ones he’s really interested in, or basically have a form response and send it to everyone he’s even remotely interested in then sift through the ones that give him any sort of response. Sadly, it’s a lot easier to just do the shotgun approach, so it’s also completely understandable that a woman getting a dozen notes a day, almost all of them unspecific forms can’t put a lot of energy into each one because, if it’s not specific, why should she think he’s particularly interested if he’s not willing to put in enough effort to write something specifically to her, then either he’s not all that interested or he’s doing the shotgun approach and she has no idea how interested he may or may not be.
I tried the more specific approach, by trying to pick out two or three things specific to her that had piqued my interest, but the problem is that it’s frustrating to know that I’d probably have had a lot more success and less frustration with the shotgun approach, but it felt disingenuous enough to me that I wasn’t willing to do it. It seems like the internet dating equivalent of a cheesy pickup line.
But you can’t blame either men or women for this problem. Men shouldn’t be expected to put in that much more effort knowing that most of the emails they send out probably won’t even get a response, muchless a rejection. And women shouldn’t be expected to respond to the shotgun approach with something more either. It’d be nice if we could get to a point where, in online dating, both men and women would initiate if they were interested, put in at least a little bit of effort, and expect at least a rejection, but that’s a full cultural change.
I’m in the “it’s just another way to meet people” camp: when you meet someone online you don’t know if the chemistry will be right, and when you meet someone offline you don’t know if anything else will be right.
(The above is a little simplified, of course, but IME that’s basically what it comes down to.)
What a nice guy! I might have booted.
Meh, so I guess people who spend a lot of time hanging out on the internet might find online dating to be a better idea than the average person. I hear all these glowing stories about web dating here, yet everyone I know except one who has tried online dating has called it a miserable failure. I quit OK Cupid because the dating pool was so terrible, my friend quit OKC after 6 months, her sister who recently moved here gave up after a week. I know a guy who’s been on OKC and Match for well over a year and they’ve both been failures. I have no idea why he hasn’t given up yet, but every single date he’s described to me has either been with a woman who wasn’t attractive in person, or one who seemed like a match online, but there was no connection when they met. I know one person who met his gf online, but he’s the kind of guy who spends way too much time on the internet, so go figure.
Yes, I know, these anecdotes aren’t data, but it is true that most people are still meeting their partners offline, and I *only *hear great reviews of online dating sites on the internet. I know a lot of people who have tried online dating, but aside from this message board, success stories have been more or less non-existent. Everyone I know (except one guy) has reported that it sucks a whole lot.
But mileage varies and all of that.
:dubious:
So, you and three people you know had bad experiences with the one online dating site you tried, and you try to CYA with “I know these anecdotes aren’t data” but everything you say is completely dismissive and full of broad (and negative) assumptions. :rolleyes:
Why can’t you acknowledge that online dating works for some people, and that it doesn’t make any of those people internet addicts or opposed to/incapable of meeting people offline or “exceptionally bad people”? Dating can happen all kinds of ways: I don’t get the need to look down your nose/be so arrogant about any particular method simply because it didn’t work for you and three other people.
(You know what, though? It worked for 25% of the people you know who tried it. Which is a pretty good number when it comes to any dating. All dating “sucks a whole lot.”)
Seriously, if OKC didn’t work for you that’s a perfectly valid data point, but enough with the “I guess it works for people who are lesser than me” attitude.
Okay, when did I say I’ve only met three people for whom online dating has failed? Those are just three examples I gave in a post, and you’ve somehow concluded that those are the only people I’ve ever met with those experiences. A lot of people I know have tried the net thing, including both of my sisters, and maybe a little over half the single people I know under 40. Anyway, not even the point. My point was I’ve found people on online forums such as this one seem to have had better experiences with online dating than people I talk to in meatspace, which I would reckon makes sense that people who spend a lot of time online would have a more favorable opinion of online dating than people who don’t. It was nothing for you to get all butthurt about. I have no idea why your boyshorts have gotten into such a twist about this. Go take a nap and calm down, Jesus Christ.
I knew it!
I don’t know about you, but for me it goes beyond just “not for me”. I’m mildly curious how my experience can be so negative and others are positive.
For example, I’m not the type to socialize online. However, if I’m dating someone I met offline, we might chat on facebook regularly when we’re not able to talk on the phone. And that’s great fun, feels very much like being together, albeit not quite as good.
So it’s not that I’m unable to enjoy online socialization. It’s just that the pool of women I found online were really awful. I don’t need to denigrate other people’s success, but I find it very hard to mesh with my own experience or with most of my personal friends.
That might be true, but IME it’s very often only one of a couple (who met through a dating website) who are big net users, like me and my GF. And I do know a lot of happy couples who met through dating sites - it’s getting surprisingly common.
I’m definitely not going to get butthurt - I mean, it sounds like our experiences are simply different, which does happen even when theirs no obvious explanation for why they should be. But when you say that “online dating sites are a pool of exceptionally bad people” it’s not terribly surprising if some people who are in that pool find that a little offensive. I mean, you just insulted me too, I’m just loved-up and happy so I don’t care. 
Right, ditto that. I mean, I’m on this website fer cryin’ out loud, so I’m not ascared of the internet, but using it for dating has been pretty terrible universally for me and nearly everyone I’ve ever known in real life, yet there are so many success stories here. I know it works for some people obviously, but has been a resounding failure for folks I know outside of this place.
Well I’ve also insulted myself and a great deal of my friends. I’ve tried online dating, and something like half of my friends either have in the past, or are still trying. I don’t think any of us magically became terrible people the minute we created online dating profiles.
My biggest beef with online dating isn’t even the pool of people. I find the entire setup itself to be a horrible way to meet anyone with whom you’ll find a genuine connection, but enough about that. Glad some folks have made it work.
I’ll tell you why online dating doesn’t work for some people, like myself. It’s because I don’t look very appealing in a personal ad. I’ve never been able to write a profile that makes me sound attractive, and I photograph terribly.
On the other hand, to some people I can be very attractive in real life. My personality is there to be seen. It’s on display, so to speak.
It hasn’t worked for me either. I’ve had nothing but bad experiences. However, I realize everyone is not me, so it might work for some people.
That’s why i got into online dating. My experience:
eHarmony: Nobody would give me the time of day
Match.com: 1 short conversation right after I joined
Chemistry.com(Match.com affiliated site):talking to a lady now. i’ll let you know how it goes.
Well, I met my wife on match.com, so it worked out well for me. 
I have to say, it was a lot of fun for me. I’m not a looker or a player or anything like that, but it was pretty easy to find dates, the women I met were all interesting, intelligent, and successful. Nothing but rave reviews from me when it comes to online dating.
There is definitely a large number of men who just message everyone. I clearly state I have no interest in men who send me a sentence or two while giving me no idea who they really are and what they’re about, I’m not interested in white men (I say it nicely), and will not be talking on the phone or meeting up that particular night or anything.
So what do I get? A bunch of messages from white guys saying, “Sup call me [number]”. Fortunately that’s very easy to weed out.