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Online dating or Internet dating is a personal introductory system whereby individuals can find and contact each other over the Internet to arrange a date, usually with the objective of developing a personal, romantic, or sexual relationship. Online dating services usually provide unmoderated matchmaking over the Internet, through the use of personal computers or cell phones. Users of an online dating service would usually provide personal information, to enable them to search the service provider's database for other individuals. Members use criteria other members set, such as age range, gender and location. Online dating sites use market metaphors to match people. Match Metaphors are conceptual frameworks that allow individuals to make sense of new concepts by drawing upon familiar experiences and frame-works. This metaphor of the marketplace – a place where people go to “shop” for potential romantic partners and to “sell” themselves in hopes of creating a successful romantic relationship – is highlighted by the layout and functionality of online dating websites. The marketplace metaphor may also resonate with participants’ conceptual orientation towards the process of finding a romantic partner. Most sites allow members to upload photos or videos of themselves and browse the photos and videos of others. Sites may offer additional services, such as webcasts, online chat, telephone chat (VOIP), and message boards. Some sites provide free registration, but may offer services which require a monthly fee. Other sites depend on advertising for their revenue. Some sites such as ''OkCupid.com'', ''POF.com'' and ''Badoo.com'' are free and offer additional paid services in a freemium revenue model. Some sites are broad-based, with members coming from a variety of backgrounds looking for different types of relationships. Other sites are more specific, based on the type of members, interests, location, or relationship desired. A 2005 study of data collected by the Pew Internet & American Life Project found that individuals are more likely to use an online dating service if they use the internet for a greater amount of tasks and less likely to use such a service if they are trusting of others. == Trends == At the end of November 2004, there were 844 lifestyle and dating sites, a 38% increase since the start of the year, according to Hitwise Inc. However, market share was increasingly growing by several large commercial services, including ''Personals.AOL.com'', ''Personals.Yahoo.com'', ''Match.com'', and ''eHarmony.com''. By 2007, many prominent studies show that Baby Boomer interest in online dating have soared. The United States generated $957 million in revenue in 2008 from online dating services Recently, it has become common for online dating websites to provide webcam chats between members. As online dating's population becomes larger, sites with specific demographics are becoming more popular as a way to narrow the pool of potential matches. Successful niche sites pair people by race, sexual orientation or religion. The 20 most popular dating sites in 2006 as ranked by Hitwise include ''jDate.com'' (for Jewish singles), ''ChristianMingle.com'', ''ChristianCafe.com'', ''ManHunt.net'' (same sex introductions), ''LoveFromIndia.ini'', ''BlackChristianPeopleMeet.com'', ''Amigos.com'' (for Latino singles), ''AsianPeopleMeet.com'', and ''Shaadi.com'' (for Indian singles).〔 In March 2008, the top 5 overall sites held 7% less market share than they did one year ago while the top sites from the top five major niche dating categories made considerable gains.〔(【引用サイトリンク】 title=Niche Dating Sites Grow Steadily As Mainstream Ones Flail )〕 One of the "hottest trends in online dating" is the babyboomers on the top dating sites. Around 30% of America's 80 million babyboomers are single.〔(【引用サイトリンク】 title=The hottest trends in online dating )〕 Since 2003, several free dating sites, operating on ad based-revenue rather than monthly subscriptions, have appeared and become increasingly popular. Several newer sites such as ''OkCupid.com'' are beginning to offer more full featured dating services for free, and are starting to compete with staples in the free dating site world such as ''POF.com''. Due to the level of competition between free dating sites, as well as the overall drop in traffic to and revenue for dating sites generally, some sites are branching out into self-service advertising. This represents a break from traditional externally sourced ads and is just one of the ways that the revenue models of free dating sites are evolving. Especially popular in Eastern Europe, some sites offer full access to messaging and profiles, but provide additional services for pay, such as bumping profiles up to the top of the list, removing advertisements, making paying users' profiles appear several times in different places in the search results, and giving paying users a more advanced search engine to work with (in one example, free users may only search for persons of specified age, gender, orientation, and city, while subscribers may search for any and all parameters listed in profiles, such as height, weight, interests, etc.). Also, this model generally allows users to switch between free and paying status at will and without having to do anything, simply providing advanced features for a set period of time whenever the according payment is received. Ease of payment is also generally higher, with such sites accepting a variety of online currencies, letting users charge the payment to their cellular phones, etc. Such sites earn revenue from a mix of advertising and sale of additional options. Online daters may have more liberal social attitudes compared to the general population in the United States. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Online dating service」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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