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NY TIMES - Feb 25 - Date My School, a site which just received $500K from private investors, went live for Columbia last November and New York University in December, restricting membership to those with .edu e-mail addresses at these two institutions. Within a week, Date My School had attracted ~ 1,300 users (5% of Columbia’s student population). It now has 7,000 users.
by Hannah Miet
See full article at NY Times
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PR WEB - Feb 25 - Exclusive dating service IvyDate claims to have the world's most well-educated, sophisticated and driven singles. IvyDate.com has been founded by Harvard Business School graduates. Last spring, Philipp Triebel and Beri Meric began crafting IvyDate as the successor to their controversial DateHarvardSQ venture. The initial project provided access to a significant base of Harvard educated singles, attracting thousands of women who were asked to pay subscription fees in order to meet them. While the former Harvard site is still flourishing, the founders now have their eyes set on a new prize - IvyDate's undisputed reign of the New York and London dating scenes.
The full article was originally published at SF Gate, but is no longer available.
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NY POST - Feb 25 - A recent study of US Census data found that the income of single women in their 20s living in New York City is now 17% higher, on average, than that of their male counterparts. This income shift in the midst of an anemic economy is also shaking up dating rules in the city. So instead of the perfunctory “purse reach” at the end of a romantic meal, young women are now pulling out the plastic. Biological anthropologist Helen Fisher says it’s not surprising that New York women are less concerned about a fellow’s puny finances than they may have been in past years. “Money seems to be pretty far down on the totem pole” of relationship criteria, she says, citing the Single in America study of 5,200 US singles she just completed in partnership with Match.com. According to her findings, only 4% of men and 17% of women would “definitely not date” someone who was unemployed.
by Carrie Seim
See full article at NY Post
Mark Brooks: Etiquette says that if a woman wants to pay on a first date, she's not really interested in the guy. So, women beware. Guys can get mixed signals here. On first dates, if you want to pay, make sure to let the guy know you're interested in them, but also believe in paying for the first date. Then let the guy take you out on the next date. If he likes you, he will, if he has any money and cojones.
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BEHIND THE WALL - Feb 24 - Golden Bachelor Matchmakers is a company whose main revenue stream comes from finding female companions for wealthy men. “People misunderstand the rich guys,” said Gong Haiyan, the CEO of Jiayuan, an online dating site that occasionally hosts special events for single millionaire men. “They worry if they go out hunting girls they’d only find gold diggers.” And gold diggers seem to be everywhere. At least in China’s current pop culture, where reality TV dating shows like “If You Are the One” have attracted large numbers of viewers. When it first began airing, a female contestant, Ma Nuo, responded to an invitation by a poor young man to take a ride on his bicycle by saying, “I would rather cry in a BMW.” Her put-down generated a huge outcry among viewers, social commentators, and government officials. At a weekend marriage market in central Shanghai, where parents gather to find mates for their sons or daughters, the trait listed at the top of virtually every handwritten poster trumpeting the suitability of a single man is his income or assets.
by Adrienne Mong
The full article was originally published at Behind The Wall, but is no longer available.
See all posts on Jiayuan.com
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CONSUMER AFFAIRS - Feb 24 - Match.com faces another class action lawsuit claiming that more than 60% of the profiles on the dating site are “either inactive former users or fake or fraudulently posted by scammers and others.” The case was filed on behalf of Kristy Gamayo and other consumers in U.S. District Court in San Francisco. A similar case was filed in Dallas in January.
by Truman Lewis
The full article was originally published at Consumer Affairs, but is no longer available.
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PR WEB - Feb 24 - More than 8,000 people took part in the online survey by BeNaughty.com and ~2,000 of them clicked ‘Doing it on a Plane’ as being one of their ultimate fantasies. What was also interesting about the results was that women were less concerned about the gender of anyone joining in with a couple’s bedroom activities. With 15.5% of women happy to have another man join in and 15.07% to have a woman share their fun. Only 3.82% would be happy to have another man join in and 31.25% said yes to a threesome with two women.
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OPW - Feb 21 - Here's the top ten showstopper considerations we think you should consider when choosing a white label dating provider:
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TECHFLASH - Feb 23 - CupidsPlay is a new gaming/dating site created by former Amazon.com employees Philip Yuen. Gerald Yuen, CJ Huang and Diwakar Gupta. “The social gaming model is perfect for online dating, because it fosters collaboration and rewards players for interacting with each other for extended periods of time,” said Yuen, who previously sold his online payments company TextPayMe to Amazon. The startup has raised ~$500K from Clearstone Ventures and Amazon VP Mike George.
By John Cook
The full article was originally published at Tech Flash, but is no longer available.
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OPW - Feb 24 - GothamDatingPartners, the network of 32 niche dating sites, is for sale. Contact Aaron if you are interested. Aaron is willing to sell all of them as a package deal or individually. The price is negotiable.
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BBC - Feb 23 - "I felt I was paying for a first class-service and that is what I got: privacy, successful introductions, kindness and efficiency." So says "Susan" of the thousands of pounds she spent signing up to The County Register introduction agency. Heather Heber Percy, founder of the County Register, says people's expectations are high. Gray & Farrar, one of the most exclusive agencies, states that "only the most eligible single people are accepted" and acknowledges that "we are certainly not right for everybody". While Karen Mooney, founder of the Sara Eden agency, says: "If people have unrealistic expectations, we don't take them on. It doesn't matter how much money you throw at us, we can't wave a magic wand." Services at the County Register range in price from £2K for 12 months' membership to £10K for 18 months' membership. At some other agencies, £10K is just the starting level.
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POSTCHONICLE - Feb 22 - "People don't stray because it is easy or convenient. Most stray because they are missing something in their relationship and feel they need or deserve more than their primary partner offers. Providing a service like ours does not make someone more likely to stray any more than increasing the availability of glassware contributes to alcoholism", said Noel Biderman, founder & CEO of Ashley Madison. Watch the video on The Post Chronicle Website.
By Mitch Marconi
See full article at The Post Chronicle
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ADNEWS - Feb 22 - eHarmony has opened a review of its $7.2M media account, almost four years after launching in the Australian market. eHarmony currently works with AKA Media as its media agency, while creative is handled out of the US. In January this year, OMD was appointed as eHarmony’s media agency in the US, where it spends~ $90M in advertising annually. In Australia, ~650K singles had registered within the first two years of launch and the site boasts more than 30M members worldwide. However, in the local market, eHarmony is dwarfed by the Fairfax Media-owned RSVP.com.au, which claims to have ~1.5M singles. Other sites with significant membership include match.com.au, lavalife.com.au and spiceoflife.com.au.
By Prue Corlette
See full article at AdNews
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OPW - Feb 21 - An app called Snapper allows users to take photos from their webcam and use them in profiles on dating sites. Users can select the Snapper license they want here and then can add this coupon code OPW25 at checkout for 25% off the lifetime of their subscription. If you want the pro license enter the code into the further information field for the same discount.
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