“As free alternatives become even more sophisticated, paid dating Web sites will have to ask what battle they’re trying to win. For example, while Apple helped the music industry regain (some) moneymaking ability online, and print media is now doing its damnedest to follow, paid dating sites must contend with the fact that there’s no way to force people to pay money to date each other. That means, as with peak oil, that while the same big sites might scuffle over an ever-declining user base of singles, the days of paid online dating as a growth business seem numbered. So why continue to invest in them? Internet users have simply become comfortable with the idea of having online profiles more attached to their ‘real world’ identity—with far more utility than ‘just’ that of a dating site’s. So let the frantic scrambling for gasoline and girlfriends begin.”
– Paul Smalera, The Washington Post, June 27, 2010
(Yay, eHarmony Blog is now linked from and cited by a major news site, The Washington Post!)
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