Press Release Summary = Europeans will never do as much online dating as Americans, even as their internet use ramps up to trans-Atlantic levels.
Press Release Body = Europeans will never do as much online dating as Americans, even as their internet use ramps up to trans-Atlantic levels. This is the conclusion of Jupiter Research analyst Nate Elliot on the publication of his Valentine\'s report, \"Online Dating in Europe: 2006\". And the reason? US dating sites find it easy to get \"economies of scale\", though not as you would expect from the consolidation of corporate departments like finance and HR, but from the consolidation of people who want a date. This theory has come from the same land that gave us both Fordism and online dating, a juxtaposition that will not be lost on European daters, particularly in southern countries infamous for starting a \"slow movement\" in reaction to the obsessive clock-watching of the Yank system of production (Ford), cooking (McDonalds), eating (drive-thru) and everything else (is there a drive-thru dating service yet?). It is quite clearly nonsense. Indeed, some will say that online dating will always be more popular in the US because left pondian girls are less discriminating or simply desperate. But we will hear this out. So boys in Berlin will use local websites and girls in Gravesend will stick to their own as well. But neither of their sites will be particularly attractive because they will have too few people on, which means a small selection of potential dates. European sites will, therefore, never reach critical mass. So far, so good. But Jupiter\'s analysis has been built like a house of cards on the shaky foundations provided by some market share estimates and interviews with experts wheeled out by the dating sites themselves. Sociology, or \"human mores\", has informed Elliot\'s thinking, but he refuses to detail how. So the British and Germans account for 55 per cent of European online dating (excluding central and eastern countries). With the French, they total 70 per cent. It would be interesting to know whether the French component consists mainly of uptight Celts and Normans in the north. Otherwise, these trends are easy to understand. The Germans have inherited a filthy Saxon culture and no more need be said about them. British reserve, combined with an unhealthy cultural infringement from the US can only lead to more production line romance. European spending on online dating is growing faster than in the US, says Elliot. But at $494m, the Yank dating business is almost double that on the other side of the Atlantic and will always be bigger. Is it something in their jeans? Sadly, Elliot won\'t be drawn on Americans\' promiscuity: \"I don\'t have any data on that.\"
2012
