Wanted: Love, online

There has been a significant uprise in the numbers on online dating polls recently in Canada as stated by Online Dating magazine.

The online dating game

The trend has been fast and furious in USA with the economic downturn but it seems the trend has caught up with the Canadians. With couples paying in excess of $100 for online matchmaking at websites such as Lavalife or uDate.com, still feel it is worth the effort as they do not have to face disappointment in real life.

In 1998 Meg Ryan and Tom Hanks represented the online dating notion to the world in  “You’ve got mail” through a series of emails she exchanges with Hank,  before meeting him in person. But as the online dating world became more sophisticated so did the portrayal in the movies. ” Because I said so” (2007)  showed the audiences how creating online dating profiles was the order of day as the mother of the protagonist launches her daughter in the virtual world.

“The traffic on the site is up by over 80% this year.” says Markus Frind CEO of Plenty of Fish, the free online dating website, first of its kind in Canada.

Melanie and Nick ( last names not mentioned due to the couple’s request for anonymity) met through an online dating service three years ago and are now getting married this August. The couple was never very motivated to meet someone online but when a friend who worked for the dating site reassured Melanie,  it is safe to join she jumped on the band wagon.

” I thought there would be weirdos and freaks on the dating website. But it wasn’t so as I met Nick. So perfect, ” says Melanie about her online dating experience.

It was not very soon that she will meet the man of her dreams. They took to online chatting and email exchanges through the dating website.

Like Melanie and Nick many couples have written their success stories on the website Plentyofffish.com. Similarly Match.com published their statistics to declare that 56 million “first emails” were sent the first half of 2009.  First emails in the online dating lingo is the first contact with a person of interest.

If the web is your domain you may get lucky in finding love- online.