Speed Dating

[archerships]

The market for mates is highly inefficient. Consider the process most people go through to find a date. First, you have to find a pool of single prospective mates. How do you find someone who's eligible? Friends of friends, parties, weddings, classifieds, co-workers, clients, online matchmaking services. Second, you have to screen through the pool of prospective mates to find someone who a) shares some similar interests b) offers value in proportion to the value that you offer them c) shares similar goals and values d) makes you all hot and bothered.

A typical date costs a fairly hefty amount time and money. Let's assume that it's a standard "dinner and a movie" date. Let's assume for the sake of argument that both individuals are cheap dates, s o $10.00/person for the meal. Now add $7-9.00 for the movie plus popcorn. So assume $20.00/person, plus gas and grooming costs. Time involved? Say 2 hrs each for dinner and movie. That's 4 hrs. All to find out if a single individual is someone you w ant to see again.

That's why I like the idea of speed dating. Apparently, it's been popular for a while, but I found out about it recently when I came across the book <href=http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/asin/0066212553/qid%3d1021857481/ref%3dsr%>Speed Dating by Yaacov and Sue Deyo. Yaacov is a rabbi, so the book is targeted toward Jews, and the companion site SpeedDating.com, is for Jews only. However, several companies offer similar services for gentiles (see below).

Here's how it works:

• A group of singles--an equal number of men and women--gather at a location (cafe, hotel conference room, church classroom) that has been rented out/borrowed for the evening.
  
• The room is filled with "tables for two" and each table is numbered. When you arrive at the event, you'll receive a name-tag, a dating card (this is where you'll write the names of the people you meet), and your table assignments. Yo u write your first name and number (i.e. Alex 848) on the name-tag and dating card.
  
• At the appointed time, one man and one woman are paired up at each table, where they have 8 minutes to talk. Participants are also given suggested topics on the dati ng cards to help break the ice.
  
• At the end of 8 minutes, a staff member rings a bell and all dates come to a halt. Participants are asked to write on a form if they would be interested in seeing this person again. This entails simply checking a 'y es' or 'no' box.
  
• If both sides checked off the 'yes' box, organizers let participants know within 48 hours which matches have been made, and give each side the other's phone number.
  
• The men then get up from their seats and move to the next tab le, where another woman is waiting to meet them.
  
• After 90 minutes of SpeedDating, each participant has met 7-8 people of the opposite gender.

Costs range from $25 - $40.00. Event organizers often hold specialized events according to age ranges (25 - 35), et hnicity (Asian, black), gender (straight/gay/lesbian/bi), and religion (Jews, Christians, etc.)

Verboten Topics

• You're not supposed to talk about your work or where you live. This is supposed to eliminate judgi ng the other person on their current life circumstances.
  
• You're not supposed to ask for names, phone numbers, or a date. This eliminates the pressure and awkwardness that often accompanies the decision to exchange contact information.

Sug gested Topics

• What is the most important lesson you know about life?
• Who is your hero (anyone from history) and why?
  
• Who is the most interesting person you ever met? What made them so?
  
• If you won the $50 million lottery, what would you do (afte r you've travelled the world)?
  
• What is your most prized material possession?
  
• What single political or social issue is most important to you?
  
• Who is your role model of a good marriage?
  
• Is there such a thing as a "sou l mate?"
  
• What o ne thing would you want your date to appreciate about you?
  
• What is the key to keeping passion alive in a marriage?
  
• Do you believe in the afterlife?
  
• What was the single greatest day of your life?
  
• What you do wi sh your parents would have told you?
  

Speed Date Organizers

Hurry Date
8 Minute Dating
QuickDate

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The market for mates is highly inefficient. Consider the process most people go through to find a date. First, you have to find a pool of single prospective mates. How do you find someone who's eligible? Friends of friends, parties, weddings, classifieds, co-workers, clients, online matchmaking services. Second, you have to screen through the pool of prospective mates to find someone who a) shares some similar interests b) offers value in proportion to the value that you offer them c) shares similar goals and values d) makes you all hot and bothered.

A typical date costs a fairly hefty amount time and money. Let's assume that it's a standard "dinner and a movie" date. Let's assume for the sake of argument that both individuals are cheap dates, s o $10.00/person for the meal. Now add $7-9.00 for the movie plus popcorn. So assume $20.00/person, plus gas and grooming costs. Time involved? Say 2 hrs each for dinner and movie. That's 4 hrs. All to find out if a single individual is someone you w ant to see again.

That's why I like the idea of speed dating. Apparently, it's been popular for a while, but I found out about it recently when I came across the book <href=http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0066212553/qid%3D1021857481/ref%3Dsr% 5F11%5F0%5F1/103-6014622-0766241>Speed Dating</a> by Yaacov and Sue Deyo. Yaacov is a rabbi, so the book is targeted toward Jews, and the companion site <a href=http://www.speeddating.com>SpeedDating.com</a>, is for Jews only. However, several companies offer similar services for gentiles (see below).

<h4>Here's how it works:</h4><ul><li>A group of singles--an equal number of men and women--gather at a location (cafe, hotel conference room, church classroom) that has been rented out/borrowed for the evening.
<li >The room is filled with "tables for two" and each table is numbered. When you arrive at the event, you'll receive a name-tag, a dating card (this is where you'll write the names of the people you meet), and your table assignments. Yo u write your first name and number (i.e. Alex 848) on the name-tag and dating card.
<li>At the appointed time, one man and one woman are paired up at each table, where they have 8 minutes to talk. Participants are also given suggested topics on the dati ng cards to help break the ice.
<li>At the end of 8 minutes, a staff member rings a bell and all dates come to a halt. Participants are asked to write on a form if they would be interested in seeing this person again. This entails simply checking a 'y es' or 'no' box.
<li>If both sides checked off the 'yes' box, organizers let participants know within 48 hours which matches have been made, and give each side the other's phone number.
<li>The men then get up from their seats and move to the next tab le, where another woman is waiting to meet them.
<li>After 90 minutes of SpeedDating, each participant has met 7-8 people of the opposite gender. </ul>

Costs range from $25 - $40.00. Event organizers often hold specialized events according to age ranges (25 - 35), et hnicity (Asian, black), gender (straight/gay/lesbian/bi), and religion (Jews, Christians, etc.)


<h4>Verboten Topics</h4><ul><li>You're not supposed to talk about your work or where you live. This is supposed to eliminate judgi ng the other person on their current life circumstances.
<li>You're not supposed to ask for names, phone numbers, or a date. This eliminates the pressure and awkwardness that often accompanies the decision to exchange contact information.</ul>

<h4>Sug gested Topics</h4><ul><li>What is the most important lesson you know about life? <li>Who is your hero (anyone from history) and why?
<li>Who is the most interesting person you ever met? What made them so?
<li>If you won the $50 million lottery, what would you do (afte r you've travelled the world)?
<li>What is your most prized material possession?
<li>What single political or social issue is most important to you?
<li>Who is your role model of a good marriage?
<li>Is there such a thing as a "sou l mate?"
<li>What o ne thing would you want your date to appreciate about you?
<li>What is the key to keeping passion alive in a marriage?
<li>Do you believe in the afterlife?
<li>What was the single greatest day of your life?
<li>What you do wi sh your parents would have told you?
</ul>

<h4>Speed Date Organizers</h4>
<a href=http://www.hurrydate.com/>Hurry Date</a>
<a href=http://www.8minutedating.org/>8 Minute Dating</a>
<a href=http://www.quickdateinfo.com/index.shtml>QuickDate</a>
<a href=h ttp://www.speeddating.com> Speed Dating</a>. (Jews only)
<a href=http://www.seattlegreatdate.com/>Seattle Great Date</a> (Seattle Specific)






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Comments

[futuregirl.livejournal.com]

Yuck.

[crasch.livejournal.com]

Yuck? But to what? Care to be more specific?

[perich.livejournal.com]

Easy for you to say. You're in a relationship two relationships a three-way relationship whatever, you're living with people. Some of us have a harder time of it.

[klarfax.livejournal.com]

sounds like a good idea, but pretty high pressure

[crasch.livejournal.com]

I agree that a short conversation could be stressful. In my case though, I find introducing myself to a stranger, and risking direct rejection scarier than finding out someone didn't pick me as a match. Also, the prospect of 6-7 other matches means that if I bomb on one conversation, I still have 6-7 others in which to succeed.

[klarfax.livejournal.com]

yeah, if you look at it statistically it's great. I think the more important factor is the type of person who might do that, and I'm not sure you'd get a good group there.

[crasch.livejournal.com]

I think the more important factor is the type of person who might do that, and I'm not sure you'd get a good group there.

Yeah, I hear some of the people who attend wanna overthrow the government, or freeze their heads when they die. Real whackos...

[klarfax.livejournal.com]

heh, see what I mean!

but really at least for me the age group is an older demographic, and I just get the impression that I would be likely to consider the people going there to be too boring and yuppie.

[klarfax.livejournal.com]

but, yeah, I guess it is better than the alternatives, at least for someone in the targeted demographics

[zapevaj.livejournal.com]

No, actually, I think klar was referring to the "personality disorder" sorts.

I hear some real fun stories through my mom. There was this one guy she went on a date with who believed that the Catholic Church was made up of time-traveling aliens. No, I am not kidding, paraphrasing, nor exaggerating. And up to the point in the conversation, he had seemed perfectly normal.

That's the worst example I could think of, but the most common tend along the lines of guys being jerks (inconsiderate or just very pushy about sex) or somewhat posessive (okay, really posessive; calling her three or more times a day after one date.)

I am not saying that all people who end up in the singles scene are like this, mind you. Some are normal people that just got "dislocated" by life (divorced, widowed, moved to a new city, etc), some just hate the meat market scene, etc- but there is a sizeable minority of folks in dating/singles services who are downright socially dysfunctional.

[crasch.livejournal.com]

Wait, you mean the Catholic church isn't made up of time-traveling aliens? :>

You're right. Dating/singles services probably have their share of individuals with personality disorders. Do they have more than the general population? I don't know. In any case, at least with speed dating, you don't have to spend more than 8 minutes with them.

[zapevaj.livejournal.com]

Argh. See, one of the problems with that is that it relies purely on first impressions. Even taking things like pheromones and other unconscious responses (biological responses to things like the other person's face structure, body language, timbre of voice, etc) into consideration, I don't know that first impressions of people are that good of a measuring stick for whether or not you'll like someone later on.

What I would like to see (and maybe this has already been done) is a study where a bunch of people are brought together to meet for the first time. They record their impressions of each other. Then, they are given a project to work on- perhaps a community service thing- and as time progresses, their changing attitudes about each other are recorded. (This is sounding more and more like it's probably been done already.) Then, at the end of the project, people are asked to record what they recall their first impressions of a person having been. This will show whether it is more likely that you will forget a bad or a good first impression of someone. Then, of course, the chronological set of data will show how likely it is that first impressions will change.

I'm not much of a singles-bar person, but I've seen my mother and her 30-to-40-something friends date, and I can tell you, there are some folks with real serious personality disorders out there that aren't noticeable until the second or third date.

[visgoth.livejournal.com]

Beats the hell out of blind dating, which relies on someone else's impressions...

Besides, the decision you are making is if you want to go on a second date, not if you are going to cleave unto this person, for better or worse, 'till death do you part.

[zapevaj.livejournal.com]

Well of course you're not going to be stuck with that person, but you sure are going to be permanently unsticking yourself from someone who you might have come to like, over a longer period of knowing them. As I said before, I am -so- not a singles-scene person, so I don't have a good sense of how accurate my first impressions are of people.

Again, if I were doing that (which I'm not, so I have an excuse for being lazy and not doing this :) I'd look up some research statistics to see how accurate people's first impressions tend to be.

Though gonzolawyer has a point, in that Speed Dating probably works well to weed out obvious undesirables.

[crasch.livejournal.com]

What's a "singles scene" person? Isn't everyone, by definition, part of the singles scene until you're part of a couple (or threesome, or whatever)?

Yes, you'll have false negatives (rejecting people who you might have been compatible with) with 8 minute dating. But you can't reject someone you don't meet in the first place. With speed-dating, It would seem you would meet a much larger pool of eligible people than you would with any other method that I know.

[crasch.livejournal.com]

Yes, it does depend on first impressions. And you're right, serious personality defects often don't appear until date 2 or 3 and beyond.

However, it's important to keep in mind the alternatives. Meeting others through mutual friends is good, but your friends only have so many eligible friends. And with other methods of meeting people, you're eliminated based on an even more superficial impressions than an 8 minute conversations--a paragraph of cryptic code (classifieds), the way you look (bar scene), how you dance (club scene).

[zeitmorder.livejournal.com]

It's simplier just to have a private investigator tail your "mark" for a few days to learn their daily routine. Also, you can tell alot about a person by rummaging through their trash. ;)

[crasch.livejournal.com]

Yes, PI's work well, but at $500/day they're beyond my budget. Rummaging through trash is messy, time-consuming, and Natalie Portman's guards kept shooing me off.

[waitingforoct.livejournal.com]

I disagree with all y'all. It sounds cool. Besides, anyone you meet there obviously decided to give it a try, too.

I'll have to let my mom know about it-she's been doing the dating rounds (singles groups, friend-of-a-friend thing) for a while now, and is really frustrated with all the weekends she wastes meeting losers.

[crasch.livejournal.com]

Cool. If your Mom tries it, be sure to report back her results. I'm going to a HurrayDate meeting on Wednesday.

[frayed-knot.livejournal.com]

that was most incredibly insightful. thank you...

...i think.

[crasch.livejournal.com]

Thanks, I'm glad you liked it.

I think this is a good idea too

[gonzolawyer.livejournal.com]

Eight minutes is not enough time for anything more but a first impression. And that's what matters most.

How many times have you been on a date and decided within eight minutes whether this is someone you would like to see again? OK maybe not that frequently. But how many times did you decide within eight minutes that you definitely DON'T want to see that person again? I imagine that this latter scenario happens quite regularly.

So in 80 minutes you get to meet 10 people, and you can rule out 9 losers whom you never want to see again, and then there's that tenth person about whom you can't decide in your alloted 8 minutes. So you go on a full date with that person, and going into it you know little more other than that the person was unable to repulse you in 8 minutes. Hey, it's a starting point, don't you agree?

Then there's the whole appearance thing. I'm not just focusing on the natural beauty of an individual, but also on how they present themselves. Did they wear clothes that smell like they were pulled out of the "almost clean" pile on the floor, etc.? These are things that will make a 4 hour date a nightmare but can easily be figured out in 8 minutes.

Best of all, there is absolutely no pressure. With a one-on-one date, there is a lot more pressure not to waste the night and to try to make something good of it, even if there really is nothing worth salvaging. On the other hand, with a 10-on-10, the worst case scenario is that you are only wasting 8 minutes on a particular individual.

I married someone I met in college, and I think that our college experiences is not really that much different from the Speed Dating but for the complete lack of formality in the college scene. We were in the same large circle of friends that partied together - good parties had 100 people at them, fairly evenly split between X's and XY's. We had phone and e-mail lists so we could find out if a particular person was going to attend the party in advance if we really cared or we could call them the next day if we thought there was some chemistry.

I see two big differences though between the college scene and the Speed Dating scene, and I would bet that for most people one or both of these apply. First, the college scene demands someone make the first move, whereas Speed Dating service relieves that pressure; and it is way too easy to meet people in college whereas in the working world it might be a little more difficult to meet people. I find the first reason inexcusable: learn how to take rejection and just keep asking people out until someone says yes. But as for the second reason, hey, you gotta meet people somehow and Speed Dating sounds like a good plan to me.

Crasch, I wish you luck on Wednesday and I expect you to report back to us on how the evening went!

Re: I think this is a good idea too

[crasch.livejournal.com]

BTW, sorry I didn't say this earlier, but thanks for the encouragement.