Internet Dating: Everyone's still shallow

[Raging Turtle]

I'm pretty sure someone posted another okcupid blog a while back but I couldn't find it with search, so:

Your Looks and Your Inbox

It's a writeup about the differences between how men and women rate each other online (at least on okcupid), and who they actually send messages to.   Nothing groundbreaking, but I thought it was interesting how men seemed to be less judgemental on overall looks while still (mostly) only sending messages to the highest rated women, while women rated most men's looks as below average but still sent them messages anyway.

The comments range from well thought out to deeply, deeply bitter.

[lamaros]

I find these statistics, thought mostly useless, oddly compelling.

[MahrinSkel]

Saw something similar to this, although it was done from outside the service so they didn't have as much data, it involved photoshopping the pics to either reduce or enhance asymmetry, the more symmetric versions got ridiculously higher response rates than the un-shopped pictures, which did significantly better than the ones where the assymetry was slightly enhanced.

So, now you know: When setting up online profiles, it's not about lighting, filters, or pictures taken 15 years ago.  Just move your facial features around until your face is symmetrical and matches the Golden Ratio, and you're good.  Best part is that your victims won't be able to explain why you don't quite look like your photo, if they even notice (if they look at it enough before actually seeing your real face, they may mentally filter out the discrepancies, especially if the first few face-to-face meetings involve poor lighting).

--Dave

[Strazos]

Black passports work too, or so I am told.

[Draegan]

I met the woman I love on OKCupid.  Not sure how that correlates to this thread though.

[K9]

Saw something similar to this, although it was done from outside the service so they didn't have as much data, it involved photoshopping the pics to either reduce or enhance asymmetry, the more symmetric versions got ridiculously higher response rates than the un-shopped pictures, which did significantly better than the ones where the assymetry was slightly enhanced.

So, now you know: When setting up online profiles, it's not about lighting, filters, or pictures taken 15 years ago.  Just move your facial features around until your face is symmetrical and matches the Golden Ratio, and you're good.  Best part is that your victims won't be able to explain why you don't quite look like your photo, if they even notice (if they look at it enough before actually seeing your real face, they may mentally filter out the discrepancies, especially if the first few face-to-face meetings involve poor lighting).

--Dave

As I recall the most attractive faces were the ones that closest approximated symmetry without actually reaching it. Truly symmetrical faces fall into uncanny valley.

[Slyfeind]

I love the replies. Apparently everybody rates people on personality, and everybody else is shallow for implying otherwise. Awesome!

[stray]

I rate people on looks, I admit.. But then I filter personalities afterwards. ;) I figure that's the norm, but I'll just speak for myself.

[lac]

Hah, political correct mating my ass.
As a leftist youth I left the ideals of a consumption crazed society behind me and shagged many a fine mind.
I mounted the quivering heap, I braved bushes Bear Grylls wouldn't survive and I lived through encounters with amorphic beings who's expressions contorted into shapes only described in the realm of bad science fiction.
I lived it, survived it and wouldn't recommend it to anyone.
Shag a hottie. And if you can't, for the love of god, just have a wank.

[stray]

That's quite the beautiful tribute to ugly chicks.

[MahrinSkel]

As I recall the most attractive faces were the ones that closest approximated symmetry without actually reaching it. Truly symmetrical faces fall into uncanny valley.

Which is why "Beauty Mark" moles were such a critical piece of the sex appeal of Marilyn Monroe, Liz Taylor, Cindy Crawford, and Halle Berry: It gave their otherwise mathematically perfect faces that hint of asymmetry that suggested they were actually attainable.

--Dave

[Signe]

As I recall the most attractive faces were the ones that closest approximated symmetry without actually reaching it. Truly symmetrical faces fall into uncanny valley.

Which is why "Beauty Mark" moles were such a critical piece of the sex appeal of Marilyn Monroe, Liz Taylor, Cindy Crawford, and Halle Berry: It gave their otherwise mathematically perfect faces that hint of asymmetry that suggested they were actually attainable.

--Dave

Don't forget Lemmy!

[Endie]

Don't forget Lemmy!

Sheer brilliance, Signe.

[Azazel]

okay, I laughed out loud at that one!

[Triforcer]

What does Bowser's son have to do with this?  His world was shitty anyway. 

[sigil]

I met the woman I love on OKCupid.  Not sure how that correlates to this thread though.

It means you were god damned lucky.

[stark]

I met my wife on OkCupid, I guess I'm God damned lucky too.

[gryeyes]

Lucky is when that marriage results in a life time of happiness. Not finding a random person to marry on the interweb.

[Grimwell]

Oh gryeyes, aren't you all cynical and jaded.

These days, people should be happy if they find someone who is worth a good six months. Most folks self obsessed, cocksure, and jackasses on the internet.

[bhodi]

Oh gryeyes, aren't you all cynical and jaded.

These days, people should be happy if they find someone who is worth a good six months. Most folks [are] self obsessed, cocksure, and jackasses on the internet.

FIFY

[Grimwell]

Proof that quality mods can be found on the Internet. :)

[LK]

I'd settle for six weeks or six days at this point.

[Nebu]

Anyone able to find a significant other that they are happy with beyond the first few months (aka Honeymoon period) is  fortunate.  It doesn't matter where or how you met them.  I see some merit to online dating, personally.  As we keep closing ourselves off with technology, we're finding fewer and fewer social venues to meet like-minded individuals.  I had a friend once tell me to try online dating saying that I would never meet someone between my office and my lab.  Ok, noone that I wouldn't risk losing my job for! 

[Endie]

I met my wife at school.  We started going out when I was at university.  We've been going out, engaged then married for a total of 19 years now and we've been happy throughout.  So there is hope :)

It helps that she is phenomenally patient.

[Ingmar]

I know rather a lot of people who met via online dating and are doing really well together. Anecdotally, it appears to me to work better than regular dating for finding viable long term relationships.

[Endie]

I know rather a lot of people who met via online dating and are doing really well together. Anecdotally, it appears to me to work better than regular dating for finding viable long term relationships.

How to put this without seeming cruel?

If you're at the stage of advertising for love on the web you're perhaps more likely to be aware that you can't go throwing it away on a whim.

[dusematic]

I know rather a lot of people who met via online dating and are doing really well together. Anecdotally, it appears to me to work better than regular dating for finding viable long term relationships.

How to put this without seeming cruel?

If you're at the stage of advertising for love on the web you're perhaps more likely to be aware that you can't go throwing it away on a whim.

I disagree.  It's just an exercise in efficiency, especially if you're relatively busy.  You can scan hundreds of people in minutes, and then approach the one's you find interesting.  Dating is just a numbers game, and going out to bars to meet someone can be fun, but is otherwise like digging trenches with a trowel versus an excavator.

[Nebu]

It also allows people to meet others outside of their normal social circles.  I tend to think of online dating as a really large cocktail party that you wouldn't otherwise attend. 

To be honest, I think that women have a lot more reason to be apprehensive about this than men.  Guys are predatory and prone to lying about their intentions and marital status. 

[Lantyssa]

I don't know about dating services, per se, however I have seen plenty of people who were friends online and started dating later.

[Ingmar]

I know rather a lot of people who met via online dating and are doing really well together. Anecdotally, it appears to me to work better than regular dating for finding viable long term relationships.

How to put this without seeming cruel?

If you're at the stage of advertising for love on the web you're perhaps more likely to be aware that you can't go throwing it away on a whim.

Well, it wouldn't be cruel to me, as that's not how my relationship started (see Lantyssa's comment instead). Are you saying people are pickier/more careful when they're desperate (assuming that's what you left out in order to avoid cruelty)? I'm not sure that makes sense.

[tazelbain]

Ugly people try harder to make a relationship work?

[Ingmar]

Ugly people try harder to make a relationship work?

Hmmm, I wonder. I'm not sure there's a correlation between "ugly" and "likely to use dating service", though. Again, sample size small enough to certainly be irrelevant, but the people I know who've used them (or I should say, the ones who've admitted to it anyway) are generally from the normal-to-good-looking end of the spectrum.

[Endie]

I didn't mean ugly as such.  Just that people who have found that they're not natural at conventional means of procuring a partner might not be quite so quick to lose their temper and break up over stupid/little shit.  Maybe because of a lack of self-confidence, maybe because of old-fashioned humility, maybe through not having their excitement about a relationship dulled by repetition, I dunno...

And sometimes, yeah, what tazelbain said.

[Selby]

I'm not sure there's a correlation between "ugly" and "likely to use dating service", though.

I'm ugly and I never used a dating service ;-)

I have no idea how to trust anyone for internet dating.  I wouldn't even know how to trust dating in the real world!

[Merusk]

It also allows people to meet others outside of their normal social circles.  I tend to think of online dating as a really large cocktail party that you wouldn't otherwise attend. 

This has always been the advantage I've seen.   I wouldn't want to marry anyone I went to school with, or those in firms I've worked for.  Women architects.. no thx. 

Online game players? Nah, I'm trying to kick the habit, not reinforce the bad habits/ lifestyle it produces.

Other than that it's down to picking up random strangers in bars and shopping venues, based primarily on looks and finding out later how shallow, vapid, uninteresting or uninvolved in things you like they are.  That or trusting friends to hook you up with who THEY think you'll get along with.

I don't know what kind of x-mas gifts you all have gotten from friends, but the choices I've seen all lead me to believe that it'd be a bad end there.

Whereas online dating, you've filled out surveys, appraised yourself, mentioned your interests and are match with a variety who are similar in persona and interests.  Only seems to have upsides to me.

But then, based on prior conversations here I wouldn't have stuck around two weeks in relationships with most of y'all's S.O.