Well, I gave it 3 months. If it were free, I may have stuck it out for a little longer, if for nothing else than the amusement of my friends at work, but since it was on my dime, I can no longer justify spending the cash. I mean, if I want to waste time writing clever emails that no one ever replies to, I have family members who I can write to for free…or hey, I can blog.
That would have to be my main issue with match.com – that 9 times out of 10 (or more accurately, 99.999 times out of 100) the person you’ve written to does not bother to respond. I’ve ranted about this before, so I don’t want to run over the dead horse with my Jeep, but come on guys, it’s rude. I can take it if you’re not captivated by my beauty, charm and sparkling wit, but geez, am I not even worthy of a “thanks, but no thanks”? I’ve read through the match.com Terms of Use, and nowhere in there does it say that replying to an email equates to a marriage proposal, so I really don’t get what the big deal is in acknowledging someone who took the time to let you know that they think YOU seem like a pretty great person. Or you at least look like you might be good in the sack.
Another one of my match.com pet peeves would have to be the stunning lack of originality I’ve seen in the crafting of profiles. This is not to say that I haven’t read ANY good ones at all, but those gems are few and far between. Here are just a few things I’ve read in way too many profiles in the last 3 months:
- “I’m an easy-going guy…” or “I’m a laid-back guy…” – Well, duh – who in their right mind is going to admit to being an uptight a-hole with intimacy issues?
- “My friends would say that I am (handsome, loyal, honest, trustworthy…whatever)…” – Of course your friends would say good things about you – otherwise, what the hell are you friends with them for? I wanna know what your enemies say about you.
- “I’m looking for someone who is drama-free” – Really? But I thought all guys wanted to have a high-maintenance, control freak bitch for a girlfriend. Say it ain’t so…
- “I’m always up for making new friends…” – Bullshit – if that were the case, what would’ve been the harm in replying to my email?
Alongside the “no originality” profiles, we also have the “no effort whatsoever” profiles. These are the ones where there is no photograph (c’mon guys, looks may not be everything, but I’d like to at least see that you’re not more effeminate than I am), the narrative consists of one or two sentences (I am a man. I would like to meet a woman), and none of parameters have been filled out. So basically, I know nothing about you, and you don’t seem to have any particular interest in knowing anything about me. Does this kind of profile actually appeal to any woman?
If I haven’t managed to offend everyone who’s traveled over from match.com to read this blog yet, I’m going to offer a little unsolicited advice when it comes to composing your profile:
- Be original. Don’t be over the top, looney-tunes crazy, but don’t write the same boring things that every other man on the site is writing, either.
- Write enough that the reader is able to get at least a little bit of a sense of who you are, but don’t write so much that there’s nothing left to talk about in future conversations (or that the reader has to take a bathroom break in the middle of reading your profile).
- Spell-check is your friend. Use it.
- With regards to pictures:
- Post a main photo. I know you’d like to think that Ms. Right doesn’t care what you look like, and heck, ultimately that may be true, however…with the internet being the anonymous place that it is, I need to know that I’m not corresponding with the creepy guy who lives next door with all the cats, or with my boss’ husband. We need to know what you look like.
- If you’re going to post a grainy picture of you with all of your male friends, be sure to indicate in the caption WHICH ONE IS YOU. I can’t tell you how many pictures I’ve seen where there are 6 similar-looking men with their arms around each other hamming it up for the camera, and I’ve had no earthly idea who I was supposed to be looking at. That way you can avoid having to say, “Uh, no, I’m the one in the middle,” after a lady has emailed you to say, “Are you the guy on the far right? You’re gorgeous! Let’s meet!”
- Why are you showing me a picture of the Grand Canyon (or any other exotic location) with no humans in it? What does that have to do with the matter at hand? This isn’t facebook or flikr…don’t post your vacation pictures here.
- Along those same lines, why are you showing me a picture of your (boat, car, truck, motorcycle)? Are you looking for a gold-digger?
- If you’re athletic, I understand that you want to show that by posting photos of yourself doing…athletic things. But if you’re wearing a mask or a helmet, and the picture is taken from 50 yards away so that there is no earthly way to tell that it is you – why bother posting that picture of you skiing down Mt. Kilimanjaro or kayaking down Niagara Falls? The purpose of the match.com photograph is to show what you look like. If it could be any random person, why post it?
- Last, but not least – am I the only one who gets annoyed when I see that someone has 5 pictures posted, only to find that all 5 pictures are the exact same pose where you take your own picture in the bathroom mirror? If they’re all essentially the same thing, just post one of them.
Like I said, that’s just my 2 cents after spending 3 months reading profiles. I don’t want to offend anyone who reads this and realizes that I’ve just described their profile to a T (ok, well, maybe I do just a little bit). Besides, what do I know…it’s not like my profile scored a lot of action either…lol…
~Jen