> "I don’t think conversations start with “I don’t smoke, want 3 children, and am Catholic”. But this is basically what online dating sites do: they put a ton of information in a person’s profile, and ask other users to evaluate this data. There are certainly busy people who can’t be bothered with speaking to people, and want a dating service to run algorithms and find them someone. Maybe these people have played the dating game, and have had enough. They actively want something unnatural, and don’t mind if the computer sifts out people who aren’t their carbon copy."

I don't necessarily disagree with most of what else you say in the blog post, but if this is seriously your conception of how people use dating sites, then you are doomed to fail.

Speaking from the experience of living with various roommates who have done e-dating with the popular services, none of them have ever approached them in this mechanical way. The data helps refine the search, but they're still looking for attractive people to chat with.

And that data part is important. If you're a 20-year-old looking to have fun, you're going to want to weed out anyone who is in an age demographic that wants to have a life-long relationship. And vice versa. So not having that data is a disadvantage that you have to make up for.