A warm welcome to the second video blog in the latest series dealing with Online Dating.
By now, you know that I’m generally a good-natured guy. So I figure that I’ve built enough “emotional capital” with you that I can indulge myself in a good, old-fashioned rant or two now and then.
With that in mind, what better place to turn than eHarmony. (or is that, “eHarm-Me”?)
OK, well…enough of an intro. I’m already getting carried away. I’ll let the video do the talking.
But did I mention that eHarmony actually rejects over 20% of it’s applicants without explanation…after they’ve spent over an hour completing the questionnaire? To me that’s gotta feel kind of like losing a hard-earned Word document to the “blue screen of death” before hitting “save”.
Wait…I have to throw in that if you are a guy under 5’7″ they’ve already predetermined that you’ll get rejected, since–after all–you’re “unmatchable” (read about it here, on eHarmony’s own server under “The Chemistry Factor” section.
Okay, okay. It’s time for the video. Really this time…
So what are your experiences with eHarmony? Are yours different than mine? Share your point of view by leaving a comment.
At 5’7″, I guess I made the cut (FYI, 5’6″ does indeed get rejected, as noted here).
I was set up with women 2000 miles away who were the exact opposite of what my preferences stated (including smoking habits and spiritual beliefs). In fact, my “potential soulmates” were literally all over the map–literally and figuratively.
So after systematically rejecting my allotment of ten per day (?) for the first few days in a row, I asked customer service about all of this.
The response? “Well,” they said matter-of-factly, “why didn’t you just limit your responses to your own metro area?”
Go figure. When you actually fall for their plaintive exhortation to “not limit your geography…this is your soulmate we’re talking about here!”, what happens? They lead with Sacramento, California and Nampa, Idaho when they actually had “the girl next door” in their back pocket all along. Great.
As it turned out, my “soulmates” in San Antonio didn’t cut it either. The one that was interesting I had already met…on Match.com!
OK, then.
Lest I be branded a “Match.com apologist” by the masses, I’ll give you my “rant” on them next time around! It’s all in good fun.
Be Good,
Scot
Real conversation that I had:
A: “Online dating? A friend of mine met a guy on eHarmony, and now they’re married!”
Joe: “No thanks, if I’m paying money, I’d rather choose who I can contact myself.”
A: “They have a staff of Ph.D psychologists to do the matching!”
Joe: “And none of those psychologists have so much as met me.”
On a side note, “A” is devoutly Christian, and I’ve heard that eHarmony is very biased against non-Christians…I’m Christian and 6’0″, but still found enough to dislike. LOL
Seems like you’re getting a little worked up over what other people do with their own time. I love your podcast though.
Seems like internet matching sites definitely hurt pickup artists who are good at creating attraction with alot of women but aren’t necessarily compatible with that many women in terms of long term relationships.
So, less pump and dumps. Long term relationships are much more dependent on demographics (age, race, income, religion) than flings, so it’s not really the worst thing in the world if someone tries to find their life partner by matching interests as opposed to who is able to AMOG or DMV in a bar the best.
Maybe they screwed up with you, but hey. I prefer statistical evidence over anecdotal evidence.
Well, to address comments by both of you guys, I found that e-harmony was matching me to women with diametrically opposite world views. This seems incongruent with their claims that they are helping their customer to find a “soulmate”.
John: As ironic as it sounds, I suppose that getting involved with what people do with their own time is pretty much my job description these days. LOL
While I agree with your sentiments that eHarmony is a misguided approach for pickup artist types, I’m unsure what prompted that thought.
I distance myself from PUA stuff (or any other “get laid quick” schemes) as clearly as I can, and very much advocate that guys who really want great women in their lives (and eventually the single greatest one long-term) should have options for getting better with women than PUA training.
But you bring up great points worth some elaboration.
The lack of statistical evidence on how eHarmony matches people is actually something I’d LOVE to comment on, but that info isn’t made public–kind of like how Google hides their algorythm’s details. This is actually another troublesome facet of eHarmony. Nobody really knows how they are being matched or why. The concept of opposites attracting vs. those who are similar is only one example of how the potential “grey areas” abound.
I do know that they DO NOT segregate matches along racial lines, nor do they “legislate attraction”, in their own words. Yet, they do indeed disallow lots of people, and it isn’t always because they failed the background check.
Essentially, it all once again comes down to their having decided what is “statistically significant” based on their own findings. An eHarmony customer can expect to find potential partners that vary considerably in height, weight, body build and/or personal habits and interests. Yet, eHarmony has also decided that people who are farther apart in age than about five years are “incompatible”. So a 50 year old guy on eHarmony will get matches between 45-55 years of age, and therefore told that any preference for women about 38-40 (for example) isn’t reasonable, yet he could be paired with women who are out of shape physically, 2000 miles away geographically and whose smoking habits are quite different. Where does the line get drawn…and why?
Ultimately, pickup artists should by no means be the only ones capable of attracting the opposite sex effectively. And being able to do so doesn’t at all brand someone as being morally bereft and/or incapable of healthy long-term relationships.
Bottom line, there are certainly options besides eHarmony or a bar. (Match.com comes to mind.)
It’s all about having total control over one’s own wildly successful dating life and making solid decisions on one’s own terms. The only alternative is “settling”. And that’s a non-option, as I see it. But granted, I get called to task on that one from time to time also, incredulously. I can’t force anyone to deserve what they want.
Thanks to both of you guys for your thought-provoking comments. Keep ’em coming!
Scot
Enjoyed the rant…
But, really. If you run into a woman on eHarmony, and you’re not interested in her… Why is it so hard to hit the “close” button? (And, unlike match.com, you’ll NEVER see her again!)
Really. Give us a little credit. The bars, eHarmony, match.com, the grocery store, or whatever… they’re all just ways to meet other people. And, believe it or not, I’ve met some pretty decent folks on the service. (And so have my readers.)
Hello Scott, thanks for posting.
Different opinions are what make blogs great, right? Perhaps ironically, it’s appearing to be the case that the more controversial the opinion, the more people read…LOL
Your points are well-taken.
As far as hitting the “close” button, it is easy…once or twice. It’s just closing it ten times a day for a few days that starts to weigh heavy. It’s also those that remained open for days and days–until she finally agreed to show you the pics–that can prove frustrating.
As far as many ways to meet people, I’ve taken my share of hits for being on Match.com–at least until people meet my wife (or past g/fs for that matter).
For what it’s worth, I will say this: I probably would still take eHarmony over meeting women at bars.
Fair enough?
That’s weird… the link says eharmony doesn’t set women up with shorter men… I’m 5’7″ and said so in my profile, and I get matches as short as 5’4″ sometimes!