Sun Signs Everything Under The Sun!
Dating Over The Years
Dating is a tradition that goes back to the days when Adam was a lad. Through the ages, it has gotten more sophisticated from calling cards in Victorian England to the telephone, through to instant messaging, video-messaging, and emailing. Now of course we have a myriad of mobile dating apps with real-time connectivity!
Yes, it certainly appears to be the case that the processing of dating has sped up over time. When you think back to a couple of hundred years ago, a letter was sent by postal mail and had to be received, thoughtfully replied to, and then sent back via the same slow postal service.
So let’s look at the 7 core ways in which technology has changed dating:
Modern Dating & Technology
#1. Speed Of Dating
Technology has sped up the process of dating between boyfriends and girlfriends. A letter or note previously would have taken a day or so to several weeks to get to an intended lover. Now it only takes a few days or minutes.
#2. Multiple Formats
Now instead of one medium for sending love or dating communications, there are numerous. These include texts, instant messaging, email, video messaging, voice mail, forums, or of course more organized dating agencies that are rather like employment agencies!
#3. Informality
Technology with its spontaneous and casual nature has transformed dating into a more informal process. People feel more comfortable asking anyone out and there is less of a fuss made about making communication with a potential date.
#4. Volume
Technology has made the prospect of meeting more dates within the same time period a seamless process. Whether this is a good thing or not remains to be seen. It is still amazing with singles who go online how, many lament how hard it is to meet real, genuine dates on the multiple online sites.
This mirrors the same lament single people had of going out night after night to single’s bars and failing to meet the “right one”. Perhaps we might take stock here and do a reality check and remind ourselves that more quantity does not necessarily mean more quality. Sometimes less is more.
With all these dating sites too, although they provide the single girl or boy with a lot of dating opportunities and very diverse options, they don’t guarantee the person will find their match any easier. For anyone who has ever been on these dating websites, it seems half the time spent is updating one’s “cool” profile.
Other dating members expect a constant barrage and update of photos, of status updates. There is barely any time left over for real conversations online, perhaps enough time to say “Can you send me more pictures of you?”:-)
#5. Superficiality
Technology gadgets in the dating arena were initially welcomed with open arms. However, with the high-tech dating features many have encouraged the growth of the superficial dating arena.
People post ideal versions of themselves, almost like perfected avatars, some even post fake photos of other people on their profile. Then others take the whole online dating process very casually. There is all this candy out there and they intend to try it all. In the meantime, the genuine dating types who are honest about their looks, their achievements in life, and their humaneness, tend to lose out.
Often looking at a dating site reminds one of a list of candidates going for a job! Sometimes one feels after reading a dozen or so profiles they have read them all. There is so much repetition. Women say certain things about themselves, men say other standard marketing lines.
There are hundreds of global smartphone dating apps. Yet if you go to the profiles, they all follow a script, they say what they think others want to hear. It’s not any more genuine than it has ever been, just writing to a potential date or meeting in a cafe for that first date:-)
So while technology has been great for allowing people to connect with more people it has also resulted in more superficiality in the process and in the participants.
#6. Time investment
Ironically although technology moves the dating process along more quickly, the tools enabling this can be so time-consuming! First, you have to set up a profile like you do for Facebook or LinkedIn except for selling your personal features and attributes. Then you have to select what you are looking for. You have to tread that fine line between not appearing a boring loser and not appearing an egotist. Yet there is a contradiction.
Look at any dating site and you will see the best examples of over-marketing outside Madison Avenue! So ironically while the process of dating has sped up, the time you spend trawling through potential administration bureaucracy and selecting suitable profiles from thousands, even millions of members is quite consuming and emotionally exhausting! Everyone seems to have such a long unrealistic wish list. Whatever happened to just meeting a date over a coffee and seeing if you clicked?
#7. Expectation
Technology with all it has to offer and the increased number of potential dates has brought exceptionally unrealistically high expectations for all the dating players.
The glossy sites promise we will meet that ideal mate, that sexy partner, that dream lover, that future wife or husband. The sheer number of options makes online daters think this increases their odds.
The fact remains that you are just as likely to meet that special someone down at the cafe, or the supermarket, doing your laundry in your oldest tracksuit pants as you are on any glossy online dating site. One last thing, no matter at what stage you are in life, never give up on love, on meeting that special soul mate or love of your life:-)
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