Critique of Black People Meet

After spending day after day checking my BLACK PEOPLE MEET site for mail I've come to a few conclusions about the site. I keep thinking maybe tomorrow the responses I get on BPM will turn around (Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again expecting a different result -- Einstein). The subscription initially costs $39 plus $8.95 per month. That's about $140/year x 40 profilers = $5,600 a year (not 67.000 as I had typed earlier-lol). They have way more than 40 subscribers. What a business! I should go into this one.

I was inspired by the disappointing results and this fact about the income they generate to create a list that spells out how blackpeoplemeet.com REALLY works for most consumers o the product. I posted this list as my greeting on my profile as well. LOL!

1. NO FLIRTS PLEASE: Men and women visit profiles that say "no flirts" (short hand notes with icons that say "I like your profile" or "I'm interested" or "You're cute") and still ignore the profiler's request and wonder why they get no response and no dates.
   
2. WHO'S VIEWED ME? A Who's Viewed Me? link lets you see the pics and profiles of others who visit your profile. From that you can tell who replies and who doesn't but knowing all that doesn't make a difference in your rate of return even if you reach out after they visit and don't reply. So what's the point? To keep us busy.
   
3. HAVEN'T I SEEN YOU BEFORE: If you stay on the site and pay your membership for more than a year you'll see the same faces looking over time but still get no real response.
4. EARNING FROM LONGING (or misery loves company): Black People Meet (as well as Black Yahoo Personals and BlackSingles.com or other subscription dating services) depends on making money from our lack of commitment and we keep coming back because the state of our longing continues. This is why most consumers of these dating service don't demand the demonstrate and display their success rates before registeration.
   
5. COMMITMENT: It is said you can tell what you are committed to by looking at where you spend your time and money and the results you have as a function of those actions. Perhaps the site should be called Black People Don't Meet.
6. SOUNDTRACK: It should be the Isley Brothers "Who's that Lady? esp. when they sing the part that says "Look, but don't touch, baby, nah, nah, nah, don't touch!"
7. FEAR: Black people are afraid in person and online so the tip of the iceberg (lack of connections on blackpeoplemeet.com) reflects the mountain of fear and unfillment that many black singles experience in everyday life.
   

I wonder if Black Yahoo Personals and BlackSingles.com works this way too? Anyone know?

I assert this experience might be a measure of the state of black relationships or better yet the state of our commitment to being related. I'd love to hear about your online experiences. I'd rather hear about those who have actual experience (on the court) rather than critiques about those who use these sites but have not (peanut gallery; from the stands).

Online Dating or is it Really Online Waiting

What is it about these online dating games? I've been on http://blackplanet.com and http://blacksingles.com and now http://blackpeoplemeet.com. Long ago I did http://match.com but there was so little selection among black men, my preference. Each one there are always plenty of men to choose from but very little connecting just for the fun of it. We are all spending our money to meet people. The companies are making a killing of our lack of commitment to having what we came for. When we will really get that we are really not committed to being in relationship, experiencing intimacy, dating and marrying. But we love looking like we are committed.

COMMITMENT: (1) the act of binding yourself (intellectually or emotionally) to a course of action; (2) an engagement by contract involving financial obligation; "his business commitments to him to London; (3) a message that makes a pledge.

I see how I waffle between aspiring commitment, acknowledged commitment and experienced commitment. I am committed to definition #2, the financial obligation because I've paid about $100 a year for online dating. Others pay as much as $300 or more a year with these sites. More often than not all I have as a result of that commitment is online waiting. Think about it this way. When I do a perfect match search on blackpeoplemeet.com it comes up with about 200 people for me. 200 peoples times $100/year = $2000 made off of people's unfulfilled commitment. You know there's thousands of people on this one site and they probably facilitate LatinPeopleMeet.com and JewishPeopleMeet.com etc. They are gaining off our our unfulfilled commitment. But I stay because I haven't found an alternative is what I justify in my head. But in reality, I like so many others are just afraid to go out and meet people. Join a club or organization is what I am looking at next. I want to meet people in the flesh not sit at home wondering and waiting for the perfect match online.

They say you know how you can tell what you're committed to? Just look at what you have in that area and that's what you've been committed to in the past. Once you see that and accept that IS what you have been committed to, you can choose to really look at what you've been doing and who you've been being that had that be the result of your commitments.

POSTSCRIPT: Had a little mixer for reloading my meetup group Friday night at Frank's Lounge in Brooklyn (May 31). One sister who grew up in Fort Greene commented "when did Frank's become a hoodrat hangout." We made the best of it. Had some Cuban dinner, examined what our core values were as an exercise. Had 9 people rsvp - 6 women, 3 men. 4 sisters showed up; you can expect about 40-50% turnout from your rsvps. We had a good time AND we missed having the masculine energy around. I'm returning to my strategy that each sex must invite a person of the opposite sex to maintain gender parity at future events.