I’m not sure that’s confirmation bias. Whenever you edit your profile other people see the new edit on their home page. You put up a sign over a button saying “Don’t push button” and, well, they’re going to want to push it.
I just clicked over to that OkStupid site, with the actual emails women receive from OkCupid guys, and it occurs to me that the online dating model is completely hopeless. No man could possibly make himself heard above all that noise. With the volume of emails women get just for putting up a profile, and the percentage of them that are completely crazy, expecting to even get a reply seems purely wishful thinking to me. The success rate of finding relationships from online dating must be one in a thousand. Yeah, we’ve all heard of people meeting the loves of their lives online, but there are about a billion profiles up there. You might as well spend all your cash on powerball tickets. To the people who use these services, can you honestly say there’s something worthwhile about it, other than a convenient way to kill some time?
I’m going to assume you’re mainly asking this question to men, because of course there’s something worthwhile about it for women. It’s a virtual buffet line- they’ve each got dozens of men messaging them that they can pick and choose from. As we’ve seen from this very thread those men are going to be willing to jump through hoop after hoop in order to potentially earn their temporary interest.
Online dating has yielded two relationships for me. A funny thing, though, is that both of the girls I started seeing regularly messaged me first. Few of the girls I message on my own respond and those that do tend to only respond a few times before clamming up. One of them had seemed like the perfect match until her entire profile disappeared (I mentioned her quite a few pages ago in this thread). So now all I do is log in once a day, do some profile pruning (mostly so that my edits pop up on other peoples’ homepages) and log out. Sometimes there’s a message waiting for me (if so, great), most of the time there isn’t. That’s how I’m approaching online dating now. I went in with low expectations, just wanting to get laid after a bad breakup. Mission accomplished. So yes, it’s been worthwhile.
And I’m just a guy of average appearance. I imagine that someone more attractive will have even more success.
Hope that answers your question.
This was on Match.
An example just happened to me. I made an edit to my profile right after posting this: “Please, don’t message me just to ask “what’s up?” Say something of substance. It’ll increase your chances of receiving something of substance in return.”
A message I just received:
“This message has substance…
I promise…
What’s u…I MEAN…Yo.”
Everyone’s a fucking comedian.
Edit:
Oh.
So far my online dating hasn’t worked out for me at all. I did have one woman that we had emailed a few times and then I asked her out and she agreed, then she just kind of disappeared. I waited until the holidays were over and said I was still interested, but nothing yet.
I do have a dating question that doesn’t relate to online but this seems like the place. My great aunt is in an assisted living home. There’s a woman that works there that’s about my age and pretty cute. My aunt said that she asked who I was the last time I was there. Then she said she could set me up with her if I wanted. I don’t think my aunt was joking, but she probably misunderstood what the woman had said. I was thinking on talking to the woman the next time I see my aunt and saying something along the lines of “I hope my aunt didn’t try and set us up.” I just don’t know how that would go over. Any thoughts or ideas?
Do you want her to set you up or don’t you? If you do, let her do it and see what happens. But saying to her “I hope my aunt didn’t try to set us up” seems like a great way to push her away since it tells her pretty clearly that you’re not interested.
Hey, that’s still better than I’m doing in real life.
I was going to say I would ask her in a joking way. My aunt is starting to get dementia so I don’t know if she’ll even remember talking to the woman or not. It was a way to actually start talking to her and give me a reason to do so. I’ve always had problems talking to women, at least women I don’t know and would want to ask out.
I’m right there in the same boat and would probably do the exact same thing. As an outsider looking in (easier said then done and all that), ISTM that saying “I hope she didn’t try to set us up” is a good way of saying “I’m not interested”. Maybe reword it a bit. How about “My aunt just told me she tried to set us up. Did she say something to you?” (Flirty tone of voice, not accusatory, no one’s in trouble here) and see where that goes. Even though your aunt says the nurse started the whole thing, you can take some pressure off the whole thing by blaming your aunt for starting the whole thing and acting like you had no idea the nurse initiated the conversation with your aunt.
Does that make sense?
WOW do I get tired of hearing this. Women under 35 and of average (or less) weight may get inundated with messages, but the rest of us do not.
I heartily agree with Joey P: change it to “I think my aunt is trying to set us up,” with a conspiratorial smile and a “those wacky old people” tone. Even saying “I hope you don’t mind” would be better than “I hope she didn’t try to set us up.”
Women under 35 and of average weight (or less) describes most women using online dating services.
See this is why I need to bounce ideas off of someone, otherwise I get a mouthful of foot. Then again my aunt could be really losing it as she thinks my ex wife joined the Kellogg cult. I have no idea where that came from.
That’s what we’re here for. Sometimes even just asking your question ‘out loud’ is all that it takes. There was one question that I spent twenty minutes getting all typed out and then looked at it from the POV of the reader realized my response would be “No, you’d sound like an arrogant douche bag/god’s gift to women if you said that to a girl” Deleted the question, didn’t send the message.
True, but no one has been talking about “most” women – it’s been women, period. I’m a woman over 35 and of higher-than-average weight who uses online dating services, and sometimes I just get tired of all of the conversation being about everyone else (women like me get enough of that in real life and on said dating services) and feel the need to remind y’all that there are others out there. Is all I’m sayin’. 
I only have a free OKCupid profile, so I the only thing it has cost me is a bit of time I probably otherwise would have spent playing Kingdom of Loathing or reading online forums. Although I have had exactly zero dates from it, I don’t think that it’s out of the question, and I’ve enjoyed several of the message exchanges.
Also, it’s been quite encouraging to find out that there are actually women in Texas who are atheist/agnostic (and not just in Austin), and perhaps I have a better shot at a relationship with the girls I see at the bookstore/supermarket/work than previous experience would have suggested.
I’ve gone from active participant in this thread to lurker, but I just popped back to say: hell yes, it can work. In the past 11 months eHarmony has provided me with dozens of dates, lots of sex, and 2 long term meaningful true love relationships (obviously, the first one didn’t quite work out).
YMMV, obviously.
It works better for some people than others. A lot of people meet through work - not necessarily co-workers, but the whole professional network thing - but for certain professions, it’s not as likely or feasible. A lot of people who use online dating include categories like elementary school teachers, prison guards, nurses, EMTs, firefighters, etc. who for various but hopefully obvious reasons don’t interact with a lot of dating candidates.
I’d like some feedback on my messaging style. I’ve sent out a ton, 40 or so, in the last month and not even a nibble. This is how I normally write, though each one will of course be tailored to that person.
This woman had said she’d done a half Ironman at the very top of her profile. Since I’m a swimmer as well I thought I would bring it up even though it says it in my profile.
I pretty much do the same in most of my emails, a couple of questions and say where we have similar interests. I also spell check everything, don’t use smilies and try and write as best as I can. So far most people check out my profile but that’s it. I would have thought at least a couple would write back. Actually a couple have but said not interested, which is at least something.
I would replace “Have a good rest of the week” with “Hope to hear from you” When I hear “Have a good weekend” or something along those lines, it sounds, to me, like the she’s saying “I really don’t care if I hear back from you” because in my opinion “Have a nice day/week/holiday” is another way (in IRL conversation) of saying “bye.” It’s very closed ended. Remember, you’re trying to say “hi” not “bye” in these messages. So, I’d rather see, “Hope to hear back from you” or just a simple “-Ed” and leave it at that.