OkCupid experiment - From a girl's point of view

[Ruby Slippers]

I don't consider OLD the be-all, end-all venue for dating. It's one option, and the shopping catalog-style option at that. I'm also trying to meet dating prospects the old-fashioned way.

 

You have to maintain a light-hearted spirit about dating in general, or it just gets too heavy.

 

I tell anyone before meeting that there's no pressure, we are just meeting to see if there's a mutual connection - but if not, that's fine and no point feeling bad about it.

 

I can say that the only thing that works for me is a direct, honest approach, clear communication of intention for something serious (not just casual), and consistent behavior in early communication. And of course they have to meet a baseline for attraction, and have enough common interests for it to make sense.

[Keenly]

Because I'm a visual person and its very difficult to get my personality across through text on a screen without seeming like a robot with a blue sense of humor, I want a website that combines old school video dating with the instant speed of the internet.

 

 

Your profile is a 30 second maximum video. You can only communicate through video messages. Inactive profiles are removed from searches after 30 days.

 

 

I feel like I could succeed in that environment.

 

 

A picture and a paragraph, not so much. I have personality traits that are invisible to the keyboard.

[OwMyEyeball]

I think OLD has become a bit of a "price check" for a lot of people.

 

They throw up some photos and a threadbare profile to gauge interest.

 

If they get bombarded with messages then they are safe to assume that they are highly sought after (superficially speaking). That's quite the confidence boost, which they take into their actual lives where, provided they participate in social circles - the dating pool is just as available without requiring that additional layer of pre-selection you get with OLD.

[jack20]

OLD has got to be one of the most annoying things around. People that get a lot of attention IRL get zero attention online. The problem with online is people put out their "list of criteria" for the person they want. In other words, he has to be 6' tall, has to make over $100k, has to be Caucasian or Latin/Hispanic or etc., has to has to has to. They have all these things that they are shopping for so if you are not all of their criteria you are kicked to the side. However, they meet someone in real life that doesn't have all those traits and date that person and have a great relationship. You can't have a list and expect that you will find someone with your science experiment of a person you build online. It just doesn't work that way so OLD is so unnatural that is a waste of time, especially for guys!

Edited October 28, 2014 by jack20

[SycamoreCircle]

half-naked pictures on profile

.

 

Hey, knock it if you want. But I recently posted a shirtless pic of me in a waterfall in Colombia. First, OKC notified me that it would be in my best interest to use that pic as my main profile pic. I did so and the number of hits I got daily doubled, not to mention the number of Likes and messages. Mind you I've been lifting weights most my post-adolescent life.

[jack20]

Hey, knock it if you want. But I recently posted a shirtless pic of me in a waterfall in Colombia. First, OKC notified me that it would be in my best interest to use that pic as my main profile pic. I did so and the number of hits I got daily doubled, not to mention the number of Likes and messages. Mind you I've been lifting weights most my post-adolescent life.

 

That's different and accepted because of the situation. I've read about that and women have even stated that if you have a shirt off an you are at the beach or something "related to" having a shirt off then it's fine. If you take a selfie in your house, that's when it turns into the creepy factor.

[jack20]

By the way, there was a video on YouTube where a group of people in a studio were talking about online dating and one girl said she was using OLD but never met anyone from there. She met the guy she was current boyfriend at a house party but said that if she had seen him online, she wouldn't have bothered with him.

 

Also, a friend of mine had met multiple loser guys on POF so she thought she would meet better quality on Match. I've been telling her to stop the online stuff and just meet people IRL. Do things like Meetup and you can meet people that way, even if it's not dating people in Meetup as it's usually not for that, they have friends or parties or external people that you may not meet otherwise. Even if they are people that are on Match (a lot of them are) you will meet them up front so no fake profiles, fake pictures, false persona, because you talk to them in person. She had just talked to a guy online and said he seems normal, is good looking, has his own business and is one of the few prospects that she saw on there. Well, she kept trying to meet him in person and he was "busy" constantly. I said that it's likely he isn't what he appears as he didn't Skype or anything. After 2 weeks of conversation via email and phone, she finally met him and he was much muuuuuch older looking than his photos with tons of wrinkles (looked like an uncle of hers), wrinkled old clothes, and was making sexual innuendos while they met for breakfast. Needless to say, there was zero interest and she cut that date short! She's going to get off online dating as there are no more prospects that she's seen since she browses. I told her that he was trying to keep you talking more so you would "accept" the fake him because you were "close". I also said that if you do plan on doing online dating 1. Skype with them so you can see what they look like or 2. Arrange to meet within the first conversation as in set up a date for the weekend of sometime during the week, without wasting weeks of email and phone conversation and end up wasting all that time with someone you never want to go out with.

[Ruby Slippers]

Hey, knock it if you want. But I recently posted a shirtless pic of me in a waterfall in Colombia. First, OKC notified me that it would be in my best interest to use that pic as my main profile pic. I did so and the number of hits I got daily doubled, not to mention the number of Likes and messages. Mind you I've been lifting weights most my post-adolescent life.

Well, a shirtless picture of you doing something (as opposed to flexing in the bathroom mirror) is borderline OK.

 

I'm not looking for casual, so I ignore any guy with posed shirtless pics.

 

I also get more messages when I put up pictures of me in more revealing clothes - but that's not the kind of attention I want, so I keep them tame.

[ascendotum]

I also never took it too seriously.. I think sometimes men put too much effort into making sure they go dutch or she pay her way or she drive or whatever..

and they get what they paid for, or not spending any more than a cup of coffee on her.. I have never understood that logic.

Dating is about finding out who you are compatible with and what you like and what you dislike in a mate and worrying about superficial stuff ruins the chances to find all that out... they never get to that point because it turns people off and they know they are not going to get a fun date with lots of laughs out of it..

 

I never cared about any of that.. having a fun time for a few hours is all the whole contact was about.. if it died after the first date it did.

 

I agree totally with your basic philosophy. I dated for fun, though initially I was more worked up over OLD basically because of the reasons the others guys were frustrated over it. I had to drop my standards imo, as did my friends (in their opinion), even our mates who were dating/sleeping with the bulk of the women in our social circles were complaining about dropping standards. lol. The only thing I take a little issue with is the bolded bit. That concept should be a two way street. Its not superficial because women make a big deal out of it. I agree with not making an issue over $ on a date, but then at same time many women are not prepared to do and make an issue of it do when guys don't want to pay their way or choose a cheap venue, so that's superficial from guys perspective too.

[isisisweeping]

First, the brand new meat attention does not sustain itself. It burns out and you get a lot less the longer you are on the site.

 

I didn't get quite that attention. I did not get a huge amount of messages (I did filter based on match percentage after seeing a huge correlation between the messages I wanted to receive and a high number there, and vice versa) but I got very nice messages from very cool guys. It was hard to try to deal with even that amount from me, though I understand it's less than most women.

 

I did not have any photos with makeup on or even the slightest bit revealing and put effort in my profile, which might be why I got so few but such good quality messages.

[veggirl]

I mer my bf through OLD. I had my profile up for a day and a half. If I ever were to go on OLD again I would use the same approach....didn't even bother reading my inbox, I just emailed guys I was interested in. Much easier. I def think women should take an active role in searching on OLD.

[kaylan]

There are a lot of horny guys out there liking and clicking any profile hoping for a hit...

If guys spent more time reading a girls profile rather than using cookie cutter emails and just looking at the pictures they may find their reply rate going up.

Plenty of normal guys looking for a decent girl do read profiles and send unique messages, only to be ignored. I think we need to stop making excuses for what OLD does to people.

 

OLD makes people (especially women) unrealistically picky. It makes them approach dating like a grocery store or mall.

An experiment conducted many times, always with the same results.

 

All it says to me is that if women hope to find anything meaningful and legitimate on any online dating site, they have to go seek out profiles themselves, rather than relying on the right person finding them. I'm sure there have been countless potentially great relationships that have fallen through the cracks because she had so many messages that she became jaded by the whole process.

 

 

 

Send messages ladies. You have nothing to lose.

Lol jaded?

 

More like waiting for the perfect guy to fall in her lap. Women online are beyond picky. Ive never seen so many checklists in real life.

Edited October 28, 2014 by kaylan

[Keenly]

Lol jaded?

 

More like waiting for the perfect guy to fall in her lap. Women online are beyond picky. Ive never seen so many checklists in real life.

 

 

I meant jaded in regards to quantity.

 

If I had women hitting on me left and right, you bet your ass I'd be jaded.

[Keenly]

OLD makes people (especially women) unrealistically picky.

 

 

 

Lets be perfectly real here... This right here is not a one sided occurrence.

[kaylan]

Lets be perfectly real here... This right here is not a one sided occurrence.

Did I say it was? Men can be picky online too, but women by far are pickier and have more checklists. Most guys profiles Ive seen simply ask that the girl be cool to talk to, and someone he has some attraction too.

 

I dont see many guys saying the woman needs this kind of education, over a certain height, into a specific hobby, have a beard, be a certain race, etc etc. If anything OLD has taught me how shallow women are, despite the lies society tells us about men being more picky and looks driven.

 

It gets to a point that I just say "fck it" and go back into my casual dating mode. For all the complaining I hear women make about guys only wanting sex and not looking for a good connection, it doesnt seem like a lot of chicks online really want anything substantial.

 

How many women have bland empty profiles, yet guys are always told to be interesting and write unique messages? What do I say to a chick that has nothing to say about herself? How often are dudes told to not just be on the lookout for hookups? Yet I got way more attention online when I fashioned my profile as a guy who wanted some fun and nothing too serious.

 

Now when I make it clear in my profile that Id like a great connection with a woman that might lead somewhere, its much harder. Sometimes I think its my area...sometimes I simply say most women arent into dating interracially...however, I still had more dating going on when I had up the shirtless gym photo and telling girls I wanna have fun and party.

[mysteryscape]

Ruby, you seem pretty sensible -- I remember you from before, I quite coming to loveshack for quite a while.

 

I would be interested in knowing, what do you think of the whole multidating business, especially in OLD?

[oldshirt]

You know what's funny, is every guy I did message I either didn't get a response, or the conversation died out after a couple days. From my experience on there whenever I tried to initiate, the guys didn't reciprocate.

 

I have the feeling the conversation "died out" in this manner -

 

Day two or three:

 

He said- "hey you sound like someone I'd like to get to know better. How about we meet....."

 

You- " oh now that's a little soon. I like to get to know people better first....."

 

A guy fading into the woodwork because some gal won't meet him in real life is not only justified, it's appropriate time management.

 

 

Now I'm not saying that women should drop everything to meet every tom, dick and Harry that wants to meet up, but no guy should be expected to just provide electronic entertainment for some gal for weeks and months without bridging it into the real world.

[greenman77]

Did you look at the quality of men that messaged this female profile??

 

When I activate a profile on that first couple of days I get tons of messages and likes.

 

Once I went through them one by one, that I skimmed out the married men looking for affairs, the 18 year old looking for a sex trip, the couples looking for an extra female, the females looking for a *friend*, the fat, the old and the ugly........there is maybe 1 or 2 good prospect to reply back.

 

So from the 35 messages received, this is the age chart:

 

Age: 18-22 - 14 messages

Age: 23-26 - 15 messages

Age: 27-30 - 4 messages

Age: 40+ - 2 messages

 

Most messages were very short messages like "hello, how's your day going?" or some other variation of that.

 

A few were a compliment like "You are beautiful xoxo wanna chat?".

 

A couple of messages looked like a generic message that they simply copy pasted and sent to many girls.

 

There was one which was asking for a third person for a threesome with his girlfriend.

 

No messages were witty or funny comments about stuff in the profile. Very few put any effort into the messages.

 

There was only one truly creepy message that had me google a word I had never heard of before. If you wanna have an idea of the message that person sent simply look up the word "Cuckold" on urban dictionary... That person sent multiple messages.. And was 40+ old.

[greenman77]

I have the feeling the conversation "died out" in this manner -

 

Day two or three:

 

He said- "hey you sound like someone I'd like to get to know better. How about we meet....."

 

You- " oh now that's a little soon. I like to get to know people better first....."

 

A guy fading into the woodwork because some gal won't meet him in real life is not only justified, it's appropriate time management.

 

 

Now I'm not saying that women should drop everything to meet every tom, dick and Harry that wants to meet up, but no guy should be expected to just provide electronic entertainment for some gal for weeks and months without bridging it into the real world.

 

This is why I haven't met anyone in person yet from OkCupid. People on this forum always say that after a few messages you should set something up in person but if I do that too soon I have found that the girls always think its way to early and say no. And when I don't, the conversation dies off and they stop responding.

[Divasu]

My honest opinion is, mixed feelings.

 

Granted, this was over 6 years ago and was only on for a short period of time.

 

But for the time I was on, here's the short and skinny of it:

 

Dislikes:

The inflow of messages was overwhelming

Corresponding with numerous men at the same time

Occasional blatant sex invites

 

Likes:

Sure it was fun having absorbent attention and having your ego inflated.

Lack of substance is only entertaining to a degree, ya know?

[mysteryscape]

What didn't you like about corresponding with multiple men? What would you suggest instead?

[Divasu]

What didn't you like about corresponding with multiple men? What would you suggest instead?

 

It was just too much.

 

Envision 1 person at a bar trying to have a conversation with 20 or so people all at the same time. Now add in conversations that are personal/romantic (a cloud of elements are now at play).

 

This is both challenging, and, there is a level of depersonalisation that at some point or another, effects/influences ego. Then add in a host of other factors (including your "baggage", and the other person's "baggage") and what you ultimately have is a contained tainted environment.

 

As said, there were fun elements to the entire experience so the above interpretation is merely in response to your question. As far as what I would suggest? Do what works best, for you.

[MrNate 2.0]

Thanks for sharing. But this experiment has already been done. Both fake male and female profiles. Both using attractive people. It's been done on here on LS (one by Mr Nate I believe), and covered by the media. What you did has been proved with facts and statistics. If you are attractive, you will be bombarded with mostly asinine comments, but bombarded nonetheless, making it a chore to respond to legitimate messages.

 

Moral of the story. Don't waste your time with online dating.

 

Correct! (Unless you're a way above average looking man)

 

I did create a guy, and man was he a stud.

 

6' 1"

Pretty boy model face

White mixed with latino/native american was his racial make up

He spoke english and french

He enjoyed long walks on the beach, cooking, and was a big fan of the book ' Count of the Monte Cristo'

 

Oh and he had a Bernese Mountain dog named Sheila.

 

The profile still exists (I forgot the login info but just pm me if you wanna see the link.)

 

 

I threw that profile up and had 100 messages in 48 hours as well as almost 700 profile views. It was insane. Haven't checked it in months. He could very well be in the thousands by now.

 

What I took away from that was that there would be no way an average man would crank out those kind of stats. His was equivalent to maybe an average woman, not a hot one. I'd assume a hot woman lies at the top of message/views stats.

 

If i had to rank it it seems like:

1.hot woman

2.average woman

2.hot man

4.average man

5.below average woman

6.below average man

 

As a man, it's pretty much a biological prerogative that we must chase women. Since that's the case, you generally want to give as much effort as possible. When you leave everything up to the interwebz, you essentially become a page in a catalog. Your looks are the only thing you have to showcase. In addition to accurately conveying your personality in x amount of characters. (Provided she gets to your profile in the first place.)

 

 

Your time is much better spent in the real world doing approaches. This lets you put your best foot forward. Especially when, as we all know, first impressions are everything.

 

 

 

 

Godspeed, fellas!

Edited October 29, 2014 by MrNate 2.0

[mysteryscape]

of corresponding with multiple me online, would you do something else (online)? Or just skip online altogether?

 

Personally, I find the multiple messaging uncomfortable too. It feels like I'm both playing and being played. Even though most of it leads to nothing.

[MrNate 2.0]

of corresponding with multiple me online, would you do something else (online)? Or just skip online altogether?

 

Personally, I find the multiple messaging uncomfortable too. It feels like I'm both playing and being played. Even though most of it leads to nothing.

 

Was this question for me?

 

If so, yes. I would just skip online altogether. Show women in real life the real you. Online, you just become a page in a man catalog for women to view.

 

I'm sure the results will be vastly different for you.