there's likely a deeply rooted social and demographical reason for the skewed ratio, which is probably impossible to change. in the western society women till age 30 are usually the ones who choose their partner and not men - hence there's less of a need to join a dating site. interestingly this switches somewhere around 35-40, after which men are in a better position (ironically in part because men have a shorter life expectancy).
> The problem, as always, is there will always, always be more men seeking women.
i don't think this is the case, exactly. after talking to people about it, the issue seems to be that men are just more aggressive about it, which turns away a significant segment of women. the women are out there, some just don't like putting up with the crap they get on dating sites.
the issue seems to be that men are just more aggressive about it
If that's the case, then it would be interesting if a site like OKCupid had a limit on the number of emails per day a straight guy could send to a straight woman. Say, only one every few days. That would require male users to think very carefully about who they email.
It's an arbitrary thing, but it would be interesting to see how the dynamic changes.
agreed. i've always thought that an interesting idea to try would be to create a (mostly) zero sum dating system where you have to respond to people in order to initiate conversations with others.
it de-incentivizes sending rapid-fire copy/pasted messages as well as completely ignoring messages. levels things out a bit.
That kind of reminds me of Slashdot's Karma system. I think it would work, I think the concept would have to be weighted towards dating, but not 100% a dating site. Something that's as much about being social as it is finding a partner. So maybe encourage people to email people they find interested on a "just-friends" basis.
Maybe instead of marking your profile with your intentions, you mark each individual email, ie, "New Friends", "Short-Term Dating", "Activity Partner".
OKCupid is actually an amazing website. The problem, as always, is there will always, always be more men seeking women.
I'd like to see what would happen if a dating site somehow tried to keep the ratio of men to women more appealing to both sexes.
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