Tips for Singles Interested in Free Online Dating

Here is some advice when considering free online dating sites.

Free online dating is a cheap and efficient way of meeting singles in today's world. The average amount of money that is spent on one real life date is about fifty dollars. To some that is just plain crazy, that is why free online dating is so popular. There are numerous sites that do not charge for their dating services and some that do. Today we'll discuss what to look out for when searching for the perfect free dating site.

When searching for a free dating site you might come across the big name dating sites that say their services are free when in reality they're not. Double check if these sites are really free in their About Us section of their site, here you will usually get the nitty gritty. This way you will not waste your time in filling out a profile and then get charged for using a simple feature like email. When reading the About Us section do not be fooled by their clever slogans like paying for quality online dating will result in quality experiences. This is so beyond the truth it's insane, like mentioned before there are plenty of other completely free online dating sites that have the same features or even more than these wallet pinching thieves! The moral of this first rule is this: Why join a dating site that lies to you right in the beginning?

Look out for the number of ads placed within the dating site. If you click on a free online dating site and then you see your screen become flooded with flashing ads, Get Out! These dating sites usually have all sorts of viruses and bugs that could very well harm your computer. Another example of inappropriate ad placement is this, if you decide to join a free online dating site and you're required to click on an advertisement before moving on to the next step, Get Out! No dating site should make you their slave and make them get richer and richer by annoying you with ads to click. You should enjoy your free online dating experience, you shouldn't get hassled for it.

If you do decide to join a free online dating site make sure that your privacy is kept. Meaning this, usually when you fill out a dating profile you're asked for your email address. After you finish completing your profile make sure you can remove your email address from the dating site's mailing list. If you cannot delete it this is normally a bad sign. Dating sites that require your email address and will not let you delete it often email you fake messages stating that someone is interested in you or something along those lines just to keep you coming back. Sometimes these dating sites sell your email address to other sites that will send you even more ridiculous emails. Again, you of all people should enjoy free online dating.

So these are the first three things to look out for when considering free online dating. Don't be discouraged when reading these tips, there are plenty of trustworthy dating sites on the web. Just be smart and know what to watch out for when filling in your personal information.

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By April Wu

Hadley Freeman: Real Romantics Look to the Past

Anyone gone speed dating lately? I highly recommend you do, if only for the fascinating visual experience. Oh come now, no need to feel ashamed anymore.

Anyone gone speed dating lately? I highly recommend you do, if only for the fascinating visual experience. Oh come now, no need to feel ashamed anymore. According to a report by Telecom Express, one in five single Britons now uses dating services and they pay out over £43m a year in the hope that a stranger or machine can help them find their happily ever afters.

Speed dating is rarely sold on this merit, but the events have a wonderfully elegant choreography. Everyone moves collectively in a clockwise direction every few minutes: suddenly those country house reels seen in television adaptations of Jane Austen don't seem so anachronistic. And this might explain their success.

In Austen's time such structured farragos were necessary because they provided an acceptable context in which men and women were allowed to do more than engage in parlour talk about Lady de Burgh's new garden arrangement. So it is, on the surface, puzzling to see people submit themselves to orchestrated manoeuvres in this era of "sex texting".

These days we can have a pretty good look around for ourselves at what's on offer. But maybe this social freedom has become a bit overwhelming. We prefer romance to be pursued within a reassuring structure in which someone else is in charge.

There are two, apparently contradictory, reasons why many people find the rise of dating services depressing. On the one hand, the thought of people being so desperate for a partner that they'll go to a town hall on a wet Wednesday evening and chat to 30 people for five minutes each seems pathetic. On the other, a mindset based on probably too many romantic comedies, cries out that true love cannot be forced.

Many theories have been posited as to why, in the 21st century, finding love is still such a fraught business. We are caught at an awkward time - after feminism's sexual liberation but before we have established new expectations about our romantic lives. We are no longer obliged to find a spouse before the age of 30. Plenty of us will have more than one long-term partner during our lives. And most of us understand that Richard Curtis's view of human relations is not necessarily a realistic one.

Social structures have shifted, and in the absence of knowing how to incorporate our search for love within this, we have harked back to older, more controlled, methods newly trussed up in modern coating.

Or maybe Pride and Prejudice's Mrs Bennett was right and many of us - still - just want a little guiding push.

© Guardian News & Media 2008
Published: 4/14/2004