Monday, June 26, 2006

Online dating

So, I’ve never done it, but lots of people do. The geek in me wonders about creating algorithms for love. A decade ago, when I was at Wired Digital, the creators of SecretAdmirer.com stopped by for a visit. Their idea was you could send someone an anonymous email telling her she had a secret admirer; if she guessed it was you and entered your email address -- ping! -- we would have a match. I liked the idea but my colleagues with MBAs did not, so we never got to do business with them.

Since then, of course, social networking and personals services have exploded into one of the major features of the online world. I know people who put up profiles and use dating services all the time. This seems like a pretty efficient way to conduct "casual dating," one of those terms that confuses me, but seems to have grown in popularity along with the web. I'm fairly certain it includes sex, NSA.

Given the topics I write about, Google's AdSense engine sometimes chooses ads for my site about how to mend a broken heart, meet new people, etc. In case you don't know how it works, AdSense crawls my blog, identifies keywords, and matches advertisers to those keywords. Those are what those little blue links at the top of this page represent.

Back to online dating. As I said, I haven't tried that, but I did post to a site asking for female readers who might help me mend my broken heart by reading my blog. This is different from dating, of course, but how could I date anyone new when my heart still totally belongs to another? It wouldn't be fair to any of us.

Besides, I have no doubt that any woman reading this blog carefully would run in the opposite direction before proposing to start a relationship with the likes of me. I quite clearly qualify as "damaged goods," as I have been told.

5 comments:

yasser said...

Hmm... Maybe the only way to get out of this is exactly online dating

MishMash said...

Hey there..

cruised by your blog via CL..

I've done online dating a few times (and I mean that as in less than 5).. and it's really quite interesting.. of course, you have to go in knowing that the other partner is more interesting that what you've known so far, online, and try to find more things about them.. most times you end up seeing absolutely nothing you have in common with the other person, and you never see them again. At this point, they don't know where you live, and you don't them. So it's a win-win situation.

I've also noticed that your blog gets updated on average once every 2-3 days.. that must be something you do by habit? Because I have yet to figure out how people do things like, update their blog every day or two. I can't. I'm starting to think that I might have A.D.D., just by how short of an attention span I have.. oh there it goes again.

Well.. hope your search for online dates appear fruitful.

David Weir said...

Thanks, Yasser and Michelle.

Michelle, I write every day. If it feels right, I post to my blog. If I'm not sure, I save it as a draft, and maybe release it later -- or toss it into the trash. Many days, I write 2-3 new pieces. Like any habit, writing can become addictive...

David Weir said...

Thanks, Shea. Actually I just had to replace my entire computer! Also, I liked your latest post to your blog. Keep writing!

David Weir said...

April Weir? Where does your family come from?