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Online Dating Attracts More Students
July 07, 2009 6:38 AM
ABC News On Campus reporter Michelle San Miguel blogs:
Although many industries are downsizing during the recession, the online dating industry appears ready to thrive.
Online dating and personals are estimated to increase from $900 million in 2007 to $1.9 billion in 2012, according to JupiterResearch. And online dating is becoming more widely used by college students.
Michael Rotkin, CEO and founder of University LoveConnection.com, says that since the recession began, he has seen traffic to his Web site increase five to tenfold. Rotkin said the Web site, which is designed for college students, has more than 50,000 college student users.
Rotkin does not charge students to use the online dating service and believes that’s one of the reasons the number of users has increased. “You can actually get to know a lot about the person before you actually go on a date so then you know whether you have stuff in common or not,” Rotkin said. If users don’t have much in common, they can decide to forgo a date and save money they would have otherwise spent.
Even those who didn’t use online dating sites while in college are turning to it after they graduate. Lotfi Sariahmed, a 2008 Syracuse University graduate, created an online profile in January. Although he hopes to meet someone on the site, he admits that he still feels awkward using it.
“There’s a stigma attached to dating sites because if you’re doing that it means you’re socially maladjusted or something’s wrong with you in some way,” Sariahmed said.
Meena Haque agrees there is a certain perception about using such sites. Haque, a Syracuse University senior, said other college students might still choose to use it because “they’re just not satisfied with their constituency on campus and maybe they want to branch out and look for a diverse group of people.”
For students who are shy, Rotkin said, online dating could be a better approach than a face-to-face bar scene. “I think it’s great that somebody can just go on and meet another student and leave them a message and say ‘hey, let’s meet on campus tomorrow. When do you have class?’ It’s very convenient and they’re in their own environment too.”
Online dating sites are just one of the ways young adults are looking for love on the Web. Social networking sites like MySpace and Facebook provide another alternative for students to find a romantic connection.
Joe Tracy, publisher of Online Dating Magazine, doesn’t believe social networking sites and online dating services provide the same function. “If someone is on an online dating site, they are clearly looking for someone to date. If someone is on a social networking site, it’s not necessarily because they are looking for someone to date. It’s because they want to stay connected with friends and make new ones.”
While not all college students turn to the Internet to find love, Haque is not ruling it out as a future option. “Who knows? Maybe I might be some 35, 40-year-old woman still single, twiddling my thumbs creating a page on match.com. You never know what the future holds for you.”
July 7, 2009 | Permalink | Share | User Comments (1)
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Thanks for the great reading, University dating . I will pass
this on to our ira clients to read.
Posted by: Jerry | Oct 29, 2009 1:03:07 PM
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