Open Thread, Jun. 29 - Jul. 5, 2015

Gondolinian

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If it's worth saying, but not worth its own post (even in Discussion), then it goes here.

Notes for future OT posters:

1. Please add the 'open_thread' tag.

2. Check if there is an active Open Thread before posting a new one. (Immediately before; refresh the list-of-threads page before posting.)

3. Open Threads should be posted in Discussion, and not Main.

4. Open Threads should start on Monday, and end on Sunday.

I wouldn't recommend online dating. Stats released by various online dating sites reveal that there are usually far more men than (active) women, the women get a couple of orders of magnitude more attention than the men do, and a significant fraction of people on these sites actually never get to meet anyone there in person. There have been some recent attempts at apps/sites aimed at solving these problems but I'm not aware of any that have been particularly successful. I'd love to be proven wrong though as my information about online dating is from 1-2 years ago.

I'd have liked you to phrase the first sentence as "I wouldn't recommend online dating to men."

I mean, I'm aware that there are 10-15% women on this site, but let's not accidentally exclude them. Especially for nerdy/geeky/intellectual women, okcupid is in my experience a really great place. I got the impression that I was able to find people that were much more similar to me than anyone else I knew from my university environment - which lead to a few friendships and my longest relationship to date.

It's true that my male friends' experiences were usually less successful. It doesn't have to be your only strategy though.

0ChristianKl11y

Whether or not online dating is a good recommendation depends on whether it leads to people in the corresponding reference class having success with it. It doesn't depend on the raw numbers of men and women.

6Prismattic11y

Counter-anecdote. I am a hetero man and have been using OkCupid since July 2012. I have had almost 40 first dates, about 5 second dates, and 2 relationships from it in that time. Both the median and mean age difference of the women who have gone out with me has been about 7 years younger than me, with the youngest 15 years younger and the oldest 1 year older than me. Comparison between genders is hard, especially from the inside, but I'm confident that at least a few of these women would be rated as more attractive than I am. While most of them probably weren't as high IQ as I am, screening out people of totally incompatible intellect ahead of time is pretty easy. I'm told that I'm lucky in that I've never run into anyone really crazy or unpleasant, but of ~40 first dates, only 2 have been really awkward, and none scarily so. (Admitted other-optimizing warning: I am already in my mid-30s, possibly autism-adjacent but not actually autistic, and although my face is nothing special, I am in exceptionally good shape. On the other hand, that's partly to compensate for being a single father, so it probably balances out somewhat. I'm also on the US east coast, which has a more favorable gender balance in the population at large than, in particular, the Bay area, where many rationalists seem to congregate..)

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