dating « Find Hot People Blogs

I am/We are a

seeking a

between the ages of

and

Country

State/Province

March 15, 2012

How to Find Love on Facebook

Filed under: applications, dating, facebook, find, friends, people, profile, single, users — Tags: applications, dating, facebook, find, friends, people, profile, single, users — admin @ 5:29 pm

By Adrian Chen

No doubt Facebook has changed dating more than any communication technology since the telephone. But are you stuck poking and messaging your way to true love? Come, learn the techniques of the expert Facebook dater.

Why is Facebook at the cutting-edge of dating technology, when there are dozens of dating-specific services out there? For one thing, size: Facebook has 500 million users compared to Match.com’s 15 million. But mainly it’s about atmosphere. A dating service is a douchey single’s bar; the pressure to appeal to the opposite sex means dating site members usually craft their profiles to resemble stock characters in a crappy rom-com. But Facebook is the laid-back house party. All your friends are there. It’s casual. The music’s better.

Facebook has of course played a huge role in dating forever. But a couple recent developments have made the platform even more effective. Check them out:

The Friend Browser

A relatively new feature, the Friend Browser should be the command center of the Facebook dater, as it lets you mine the richest romantic vein of all: Friends of friends. Put the name of a friend in, and you can see a list of all their friends laid out in an attractive grid. It’s basically a buffet of highly-accessible cuties.

How To:

Load the Friend Browser at: http://www.facebook.com/find-friends/browser
Filter by your most attractive and well-connected friends to find their attractive friends.
Filter by location to make sure they’re accessible.
Find the guy/girl of your dreams, and have your mutual friend invite you both to the same fondue party.
Start planning the wedding

Targeted Ads

OK, this one is a little strange. A surprising number of people are using Facebook’s ads to launch surgical dating strikes on Facebook users. Anyone can buy an ad on Facebook complete with their beautiful face and a short blurb. Facebook’s granular targeting allows you to display your classified ad only to the significant other of your dreams. Are you yearning for the one 29 year-old guy in New York who’s into yoga, dogs, the Miami Dolphins, ancient Roman friezes and the rap group Dipset? You can create an ad targeted to that exact individual, provided he listed his eclectic interests in his profile.

Internet marketing expert Matt Simpson launched a Facebook ad campaign consisting of nine different ads: “Hi! I’m an active, aware 30-something seeking a balanced woman like you!” In five days Simpson, who seems like a perfectly nice dude, had spend about $20 and received 30 clicks and 5 “leads.” He does not elaborate on the meaning of “leads”. A marketing expert never promotes and tells.

How To:

Visit http://www.facebook.com/advertising and click “create an ad”
There’s not much room to make the case on a Facebook ad: It allows just a short title and a 135 character blurb. (You can include a link to your homepage or Facebook profile.) But a single tweet has been known to send a nerd head-over-heels.
Targeting the ad is where you’ll live or die. You can target based on almost any characteristic in a person’s profile: relationship status, interests, education, etc. Make the ad as specific or as broad as you want.

Dating Applications

Dating applications exist for Facebook. You should not use them unless you are a Midwestern divorcee whose friends are all married.

Even then, you should just use a dating website. As much as browsing normal dating sites like Match.com can inspire occasional pangs of despair, using a Facebook dating application is like looking into the black hole at the center of the galaxy of human loneliness. I just browsed two of the most popular dating applications—Are You Interested? and Zoosk—for a few minutes. The majority of members seem to be children or animals. There is another popular application called GirlsDateFree, which takes the proven real-world nightmare of a single’s bar Ladies Night into the digital age.

Dating apps also have the annoying habit of announcing to your entire social network that you have installed a dating app. A final drawback: Most Facebook dating applications are highly hetero-centric. Plus, you usually have to pay to send people messages with these applications; why wouldn’t you just look them up on Facebook?

Events

It’s easy these days to forget that you can meet people offline, as well as on Facebook. Facebook events make it easy to figure out if a party you’ve been invited to is worth attending, from a hook-up perspective. Unfortunately it’s usually the most unattractive people who bother to respond to Facebook event invites. What else do they have to do?

Messaging Random People

Facebook has over 600 million users. Why limit your dating pool to only those that you have a connection with? Get drunk and try searching for random first names. Go alphabetically: “Abigail, Adrienne, Adele.” Send a flirty message to every “Anna” and see what happens. What will probably happen is your Facebook account will get banned. But who knows.

Comments Off

February 29, 2012

Dating Tips From Jersey Shore Creator SallyAnn Salsano

Filed under: dates, dating, girlfriend, guys, love, people — Tags: dates, dating, girlfriend, guys, love, people — admin @ 7:34 am

By Melissa Noble

Before the the fall of 2009 most of us were blissfully ignorant of the bawdy, sand-encrusted lifestyle of the Jersey Shore.

Indeed, The Situation, Snooki, GTL, fist-pumping—now such pop culture staples, were all well-kept secrets, buried treasures, tucked far, far away in the crevices of Seaside Heights.

Enter SallyAnn Salsano, a former Long Island guidette turned mega producer who added a new wrinkle to reality TV when her baby, Jersey Shore, hit MTV in December of 2009. The show—entering its fourth season in August—has been touted as single-handedly making MTV relevant again by cementing a new batch of celebrities and scoring the network millions in advertising revenue. While it may seem like at 37-years-old Salsano, who owns her own company, 495 Productions, hit a winning streak early, she’s actually been pounding the TV pavement since a college internship with Sally Jesse Raphael. Before Jersey Shore she worked on The Bachelor and The Bachelorette and helped catapult yet another pint-sized ne’er do well—Tila Tequila—into stardom with the Shot At Love series.

These days, Salsano helms three other shows along with Jersey Shore. She produces MTV’s Disaster Date, where friends enact revenge on one another by setting up hilariously awful blind dates, Spike TV’s Repo Games, where car owners get a chance to win their repossessed vehicle back by answering trivia questions, and TV Guide’s newest reality show, Nail Files, about the owner of a celebrity nail salon in Los Angeles.

We sat down with the fast-talking reality TV dynamo and chatted about love, dating and how all the Jersey Shore boys are husband material underneath it all.

Season 4 of the Jersey Shore premieres next month. Is there anything juicy you can share with us about the cast in Italy?

This season is the craziest. There is more drama in this cast then any other season. You will laugh with them as much as you do at them. They’re hilarious.

I read somewhere that you relate to Snooki. Is that true and how?

I was just like her at 21. I thought I was going to hang at the Jersey Shore meet a guido, get married and have kids by the time I’m 25. So I relate to Snooki’s mentality. Needless to say that didn’t happen. I’m 37, single with no kids and no desire to settle down with a guido.

So tell us about dating guidos. Did you date a lot of them?

Yes, that would be an understatement. I led the guidette lifestyle for many years.

If you had to set your girlfriend up with one of the Jersey Shore boys, who would it be?

Ha. The funny thing is all of my girlfriends are probably crazy enough to date one of those guys. It would depend on which girlfriend to which guy, but honestly all those guys are going to end up being good husbands—they just need to find “The One.” And once they do they’re going to be completely whipped. They’re all good guys, they just have an odd way of showing it right now.

Disaster Date sets up regular people on blind dates with undercover comedic actors who purposefully embody each particular dater’s turn-offs. What seems to be some consistent themes that turn both men and women off?

Both men and women hate people who talk on their cell phones and text during a date. There’s also a lot of people who hate when you drink out of the same cup or eat off their plates. Dirty bathroom humor is also a no-no, as are people who talk about having sex within the first 45 minutes of meeting.

How do you feel about blind dates?

I’m not so much of a blind dater. I think I’m too self-conscious and would feel too weird. I wish I went through the serial dating craze. I got off on watching my friends doing online dating, and one of them met her her husband that way. I just never had the desire to do it.

What’s your biggest turn-off?

Burping at the table. Any gas. Bodily functions. That being said, all those things make great TV.

In all your experience working on dating shows, what’s a piece of takeaway love advice to give readers?

The thing about relationships and dating is that you can’t hold back. You have to jump in, otherwise at the end you would never know how things may have ended. The only way to have a relationship is by giving it your all and by being yourself. The biggest mistake you can make is doing things you don’t want to do. You get more girlfriend and boyfriend points by being honest and saying no, rather than going along with something you don’t want to do and being pissy about it later.

Nail File is about balancing a relationship and a tough schedule. How do you do it? Are you dating anyone right now?

Yes, I am. I’m dating a friend of a friend, and I wasn’t even looking. We’ve been dating a year, which for me is an eternity. You just have to make it work no matter how busy as you are. if you want to genuinely make the time, you will. But if you aren’t into it, you can always use your work as an excuse and, yes, I’ve done that before.

Comments Off

February 28, 2012

Divorced and Dating With Kids

Filed under: dating, divorce, divorced, kids, love, parents — Tags: dating, divorce, divorced, kids, love, parents — admin @ 11:32 pm

Single mom Kate Gosselin is, evidently, ready to date again. Who can fault her? The reality TV star’s divorce from her former hubby, Jon, was finalized last year, and after about a year of trying to sort things out and come to some sense of normalcy post-divorce, most of us are ready to get back into the mating game.

By the time we hit age 36, as Kate did late last month, we’re pretty hip to what dating’s about — unless somewhere along the line we procreated. Dating as a single person is one thing; dating as a divorced person with kids is quite another thing. True, Kate has eight kids, and to steal a title from an Allison Pearson novel, I don’t know how she does it. Making time to date while also working full time, attending Little League games and school plays, and schlepping kids back and forth to orthodontists-pediatricians-tutors-play dates was really challenging for me, and I only have two kids.

When I divorced several years ago, I was relatively clueless about what dating with kids would be like. I couldn’t quite shake the image of me as a carefree, wrinkle-free 20-something instead of a middle-aged divorcee with “baggage” that had names, ages, thoughts and feelings. Wit, charm and looks were obviously no longer enough to find a special someone; I would need to find a man who would not only be attracted to me, but who’d also accept if not necessarily embrace my boys and all their quirks. And, since most men my age are divorced, too, he’d most likely need me to do the same.

And that’s the big post-divorce dating shocker: Looking for love when you have kids is a package deal, and it’s often as tough as trying to open the PVC clamshell packaging just about everything comes in nowadays.

Not surprisingly, it isn’t much easier for the kids.

Dating, shacking up and remarriage has a huge impact on children, according to psychologist Constance Ahrons, author of The Good Divorce and We’re Still Family. The courtship phase isn’t one kids generally see — they wouldn’t even be here if that hadn’t happened sometime in their parents’ past. All they’ve experienced is the trauma of the breakup. Most of the children Ahrons spoke to considered their divorced parents’ dating lives pretty darn weird. Possessive when they’re younger, resentful when they’re older, kids aren’t used to dealing with their parents’ overt sexuality and they don’t particularly want to deal with it — especially in an era of FWBs, cougars and MILFs.

Kids question who they are and what’s ahead once their parents divorce, in addition to secretly hoping that they’ll get back together again, therapists say. Mostly they want to know what it means when Mom or Dad falls in love again, and many newly divorced moms and dads don’t even have that figured out for themselves. I know I didn’t.

When I threw myself back into the dating pool with all the enthusiasm of a pimply adolescent, the complications appeared immediately. Child-free men often don’t “get” kids; divorced dads come with kids, some still in diapers, some in jail; and not every man I had “chemistry” with was going to click with my Axe-scented boys. Now what?

That didn’t stop me from dating; I really did want to have love in my life again. But it did cause some stress and a lot of overthinking — when do you introduce a new love, when can he sleep over, what if your kids don’t like him, what if he doesn’t like your kids, what if your kids love him and he dumps you, what if your kids love him and you dump him, what if his kids and your kids hate each other, what if everyone loves each other but your parenting styles clash — the possibilities are endless. And exhausting.

Which causes many divorced parents to either freak out and give up on dating altogether or become careless about who and how they date. Neither scenario is OK.

And that’s where Kate Gosselin was about a year ago. “I don’t really have time” to date, she told Access Hollywood last April. “I don’t believe there is someone out there who can handle my baggage that’s too heavy to lift.”

She may be right on that; it will take a very, very special someone who’ll want to take on eight little kids and a reality TV star.

Still, single parents are entitled to a fulfilling personal life and we’re looking for it, challenges be damned! In fact more single parents are dating than their kid-free peers, according to biological anthropologist Helen Fisher, author of Why Him?, Why Her? and a Chemistry.com advisor. And the ones who aren’t don’t blame their kids, either; most single parents say they just don’t have the time to date, according to an eHarmony study.

Of course, they’d have a lot more time if they didn’t have kids.

Comments Off

February 27, 2012

Dating Site Thinks It Knows Better Than You

Filed under: algorithm, date, dating, match, online, site, users — Tags: algorithm, date, dating, match, online, site, users — admin @ 6:29 pm

By Helen A.S. Popkin

Anyone who’s been set up on a blind date with someone described as “perfect for you!” by a close friend or other sort of amateur matchmaker — only to spend an awkward couple of hours in the sixth through ninth circle of dating hell— will be instantly enraged to hear about the latest gimmick science of Match.com.

“Synapse,” an algorithm project Match.com’s been developing for the past two years, is designed to look past what you say you want in a potential mate, and suggest who you really want, the Financial Times reports:

So, if a woman says she doesn’t want to date anyone older than 26, but often looks at profiles of thirty-somethings, Match will know she is in fact open to meeting older men. Synapse also uses “triangulation”. That is, the algorithm looks at the behaviour of similar users and factors in that information, too.

It sounds a lot like those personality tests that ask you the same question 30 different ways to trick you into answering truthfully.

Sure, you don’t need an algorithm to know that what people say is very often different from what they do, but the new math seems to be working for Match.com. While it’s unknown how many actual dates Synapse helped orchestrate, users are interacting more with the top 5 date suggestions they’re asked to rate daily, according to the site.

“Secret sauce” is how Nick Paumgarten of the New Yorker described the various exercises and algorithms online dating sites tout to attract hopeful singles to their services. “All these sites they all have an approach that they abide by,” Paumgarten pointed out in an NPR interview about “Looking for Someone,” his July expose on online dating services. “But the approach is also their — sort of their selling point.”

Indeed, some of the dissatisfied Match.com customers called out by the Financial Times piece echo what you might hear on any dating site — be it eHarmony or OKCupid.

“The Match algorithm should have figured out that I don’t want a 45-year-old from New Jersey,” one thirty-something professional woman from Manhattan told the Financial Times. “Every time I log on I feel faintly insulted.”

Comments Off

February 26, 2012

A Cure For The Lonely Heart

Filed under: dating, find, looking, love, niche, online, people, websites — Tags: dating, find, looking, love, niche, online, people, websites — admin @ 2:28 pm

In a world where a wealth of new options are just a mouse click away, is it any wonder we’re getting pickier about our partners?

Online dating has become a more common practice for love-seekers in the digital age. A survey commissioned by dating website OurTime.com found that one in five people find long-term partners online, and one in six find spouses.

But in the expanding realm of niche dating, singles can drill down to the details. Are you looking for a tall vegetarian Mennonite? A science fiction aficionado who loves dogs? Chances are you can find them online.

Specialized dating websites such as JDate.com (for Jews), SeniorPeopleMeet.com, VeggieDate.org and even PiratesPassions.com — for the eye patch-wearing romantics among us — allow users to meet their match based on factors including ethnicity, age, religion and lifestyle. There’s even AshleyMadison.com, a site for cheaters.

While some might complain that would-be romantics are getting too fussy, it’s a simple matter of online economics, says University of B.C. professor and e-business expert Ron Cenfetelli.

“The key thing the Internet facilitates is specialized markets,” he said. “If you want to buy dish detergent you still go to Walmart. But if you’re looking for an oddball product, you’ll go online.”

And instead of browsing through hundreds of people’s profiles to find what you want, you can narrow your search to find a more suitable match. It’s a more efficient way to look for love — and lonely hearts are catching on.

Shared interests are key

Niche dating may sound unromantic, but details matter when it comes to love, says relationship expert Dr. Terri Orbuch.

“Following individuals and relationships over time, similarities and underlying attitudes are really what keep people together,” she said. “Especially when it comes to religion, moral values and lifestyle, they’re extremely important to many people.”

Orbuch is a psychologist and relationship expert for PeopleMedia, which operates more than 20 niche dating websites, including BlackPeopleMeet.com, RepublicanPeopleMeet.com and SingleParentMeet.com. More than 105,000 Canadians used dating websites run by PeopleMedia last year.

Orbuch says rather than narrowing down options, niche dating increases your chances.

“You can cast a wider net,” she said. “If you identify the criteria most important to you, then you can start to look for a person who also shares your music taste or your interests.”

Orbuch offers dating advice and web tutorials to seniors looking for love on OurTime.com and SeniorPeopleMeet.com.

Two such seniors are Natalie Wright, 66, and Frederick Wright, 74, who met online and married within a year. They live together in Virginia.

“There was a long time where I was only meeting people through work,” said Natalie. When she tried general dating websites, she often met men who were looking for someone younger.

Natalie went on a few dates with men she met on OurTime.com. But when she met Frederick, she found he not only fit the age bracket she was looking for, but he also shared her passion for opera and jazz.

“At first I thought he was the ugliest man in the world,” she laughs. “But we hit it off.”

People who value one quality enough to seek it online tend to have similar lifestyles and share other priorities, says VeggieDate.org founder Steve Urow.

“If someone is a vegetarian, they probably aren’t the kind of person who drives gas-guzzling cars or shops in malls,” he said.

Hiking, athletics, cooking and yoga are some of the interests users on the site have in common, along with a general interest in the environment, he said.

Urow launched VeggieDate.com in 1999, but he points out that niche dating is nothing new. GreenSingles.com began as a newsletter and mailing list in 1985, in which environmentalists sought dates via the postal service.

“It’s always been hard to meet other vegetarians. The technology is making it easier,” Urow said.

Real dates, sped up

Not all niche dating is done online.

FastLife, an Australia-based speed dating company, organizes ticketed events in Vancouver such as East Asian Dating, Tall Men Dating and Executive Dating.

Justin Parfitt, the company founder and CEO, says speed dating is more fun and efficient than its online equivalent.

“You’re instantly evaluating people and figuring out if there’s chemistry. There’s no hiding behind a fake photograph or fake profile,” he said.

Participants have just seven minutes to impress in each mini-date.

The $50 price tag, including a meal and a drink, ensures daters are serious suitors.

“One of the benefits of a live event is that people know they’re going to be evaluated in the flesh. You don’t get people saying they’re 35 when they’re actually 52.”

Parfitt, who runs speed dating events all over North America, says Vancouverites aren’t as obsessed with money or status as those in American cities.

“There’s not as much demand for a dating event for people over a certain salary,” he said. “Canadians have a problem with pigeonholing people that way.”

However, he said, residents of upscale Gastown and Yaletown have the highest “success rate” — or “hotness level” — based on how many phone numbers are exchanged at the end of the night.

“Vancouver is a lively city. There’s a lot going on,” he said. “People in a big city might not need to date online as much as someone living in Whitehorse.”

The stigma associated with speed dating and online dating a decade ago is disappearing, Parfitt said.

“Hundreds of thousands of people have done it,” he said. “They don’t do it because they can’t get a date. These modern tools are just so much more effective.”

So if you find yourself signing up for Gk2Gk.com, Cougarlife.com or StachePassions.com, don’t be ashamed.

It’s just smart shopping.

Comments Off

« Newer Posts — Older Posts »