filed in Sex and Dating
Has the Social Network Made Dating Easier?
Last night, I saw an advance screening of The Social Network, the gripping, must-see (and see again) movie about the origins of Facebook. (You can bet on the fast-paced, brilliant screenplay by Aaron Sorkin to win an Oscar.) Social networking isn’t a new idea. On this exact day, 350 years ago, a British entrepreneur established the “Office of Addresses and Encounters,” which was a rudimentary Craigslist, with information on jobs, real estate and even potential marriage suitors. But does it work? Have dating sites improved YOUR love life?
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I am a dating site success story (getting married to a jdate match in January), so I guess that it did improve my love life.
I was on jdate off and on for four years. Online dating is rough and there are a lot of duds. People definitely engage in bizarre and inappropriate behavior. Perhaps they think they can get away with it because of the relative anonymity. I was once having a phone conversation with someone who contacted me online. It wasn’t a fabulous conversation, but it wasn’t atrocious. Around seven minutes in, he said, “gotta go” and hung up. Never heard from him again. Some other guy who lived a few blocks from me suggested, even though I was hesitant because it was after 9 and drizzling out, that we meet up right then at a bakery a few blocks away. I arrived and he immediately said, “it’s late — we should go home.” Around 4 months later, he contacted me again, with no mention of his freaky departure.
But, I liked online dating because it got me to go on dates. I always found that in the “real” world I’d meet men, and I never knew if we had a romantic connection or a friendly connection, and if we hung out, I often didn’t know if it was a date or a friend-thing, and then I’d get so worried that he didn’t consider it a date, so I would act un-date like, so as not to appear desperate, and then, obviously, it stopped being a date. I guess I was never much of a flirt, and so the initial connection was hard for me. Online dating helped mitigate the confusion: we were clearly on a date. Knowing that, I was able to relax.
Kind of.
I once had an interesting conversation with a guy who said he liked jdate because when he was out with his friends, he could just enjoy himself without thinking about meeting women. I thought that was interesting although it struck me as a bit passive. He was a bit of a jerk – told me that the first thing he looked for on a profile was body type! I told him I looked for grammar mistakes.
I don’t know. I was on match for about a year and I went on lots of dates and met some interesting people. But its really lots of work and I think most people are horrible at describing themselves. And there were many boring dates and even some that got nasty. I was yelled at over the phone for trying to reschedule a date and told she deserved some one better.
I’m not against online dating but I feel like the time investment vs. the return were too low for me.
Just my two cents.
Well I’ve never done online dating and fortunately for me, I haven’t needed to. I somehow have managed to meet people the traditional way. Through friend introductions, at art openings, at the grocery store, etc. I have gone and looked at online dating sites and must admit that the process makes me anxious and have heard more painful stories than success stories. Hopefully, I won’t have to resort to online dating moving forward since I am currently single. Hopefully, I’ll meet someone when I go for my morning coffee when I’m ready to date again. Or maybe I’ll meet someone when I go see “The Social Network” over the weekend.
Absolutely not.