We've been talking a lot about online personalities lately, and the analogy is clear - though though not expressly stated - that selling yourself to an employer is a lot like selling yourself to a mate. You need to find someone who wants the same things as you, that you want to be with, and that you can connect with. Someone who offers you enough incentives to stay with them. Someone you can really 'see' yourself with.
We all make compromises to be in a relationship the same way we make compromises for work. If your significant other doesn't like smoking, you try to quit. If your employer demands that you wear jeans only on Fridays, you start shopping for business casual clothes. When going after a mate, you strive to be their ideal match t get them. When applying for a job, you become the model employee to get it. So with all the different brands we're developing for our professional lives, doesn't it make sense that we'd develop brands for our personal lives?
And doesn't it follow that in this age of social media and 'Web 2.0' that there would be a website to cater to each of your personal brands? Of course! You can choose a job based on what you want, just like you can narrow down your search for a mate based on characteristics - before even searching on a dating site!
Everyone's seen the commercials for standard dating sites like eHarmony, Plenty of Fish and Lavalife. These are the sites that cater to 'regular' people. But there is a host of niche sites that narrow down your search right off the bat. Through Google searching on a lazy Sunday, I found four such sites.
- JDate.com is a dating site for Jewish singles.
- Beautifulpeople.com requires users to apply to the site. Applicants must upload a picture and existing members vote them in - that is, if the applicant is deemed 'beautiful' enough.
- Intelligentpeople.com requires users to pass an IQ Test before they are invited to join. (I even found a neat article about this site.)
- Rightstuffdating.com only accepts users in certain positions from certain universities. They even check your status based on the student/faculty ID number you supply.
Obviously I need to see what kind of people join these sites. Online dating is strange enough, but these niche sites? While I can't join rightstuffdating.com (I'm not a graduate student or faculty member at one of their elite and Ive League universities), I can try for beautifulpeople.com and intelligentpeople.com. I can't help but wonder what's to be found...
Shall I continue on with a sort of social experiment? Can I market one of my brands enough to get into the apparently elite world of niche online dating?
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I still can't get over these SUPER SPECIFIC and elitist dating sites but I guess it makes sense because we all have our ideals so why not go to a website like beautifulpeople so that there are people of your own attractiveness willing to date. As Dr. Greg House quipped, "Sevens marry sevens, fours marry fours." You want someone who can match your beauty and compliment it. (I would like to think I have found someone of my aestetic beauty.) Yet, you gotta wonder since looks seem to be important in every circle, if these people are so good looking what is wrong with them that they don't have a date. The same goes for intelligentpeople as you want someone that can converse on your own level and offer a stimulating challenge. Everyone is looking for someone they can relate to.
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ReplyDeleteInteresting way to spend a Sunday ... who knew such niche dating services existed? And better yet, who belongs to them?
ReplyDeleteMy first reaction to reading about these sites was a negative one.
Without trying to get too deep about it, niche dating services reminds me of the same issues I have with affirmative action, which refers to policies that take gender, race or ethnicity into account in an attempt to promote equal opportunity. In singling out or by favouring certain groups of people associated by wealth, looks, cultures, etc. for dating or work purposes, you are essentially excluding a ton of other qualified members of society in hiring/dating practices.
These dating sites are indeed fishy and I don't like what I am smelling. It's almost as if people are creating "snub clubs", snubbing those that don't fit the mold or that are different.
And as for Beautifulpeople.com, that's just plain lame. Those members are probably as superficial as they get - who'd really be looking for that quality in a lifelong mate?