Dates

Literally, dating means the act of going out on dates. In Western societies, a 
date is an occasion when one socializes with a potential lover or spouse: it 
is a pre-scheduled, usually exclusive meeting of two people with mutual 
interest in one another, to communicate with and to understand each other 
better through joint participation in one or more social activities during 
time away from work or school. In this sense, the purpose of a date is for the 
people dating to become acquainted with each other and decide whether they 
want to have a relationship.

During dates, people often explore each other's personalities, to discover 
whether or not they would be compatible together in a relationship. Usually, 
if the two individuals discover that they have poor or low compatibility, it 
signals the end of the relationship. Personal information often sought on 
dates include:

Attitudes 

Character and integrity 

Direction and stages of personal growth 

Expectations 

Family, class, cultural and social background 

Gaps between age and distance 

Habits 

Health 

Interests 

Maturity 

Personal philosophy 

Political views 

Preferences 

Priorities 

Religious views 

Views on sex, marriage and child-bearing 

Ways of communication 

Wealth and income 

For dates, a person usually tries to display his or her best qualities, and be 
on his or her best behavior, or do whatever they think is needed to attract 
the other person, like dress up and use Perfume or cologne.

While a date is going out to do something together (like having dinner and 
then visiting the theatre, or having a picnic at a park or on the beach), 
courting may continue to take place between dates, such as meeting online 
(also known as virtual dating), chatting on-line, conversing over the phone, 
writing each other letters, and sending each other flowers, poems, songs, and 
gifts, for instance.

Commercial dating services

Though most people meet their dates at social organizations, in their daily 
life, or are introduced through friends or relatives, commercial dating 
agencies emerged strongly, but discreetly, in the Western world after World 
War II, mostly catering for the 25–44 age group. Newspaper and magazine 
personal ads also became common.

In the last five years, mate-finding and courtship have seen changes due to 
online dating services. Telecommunications and computer technologies have 
developed rapidly since around 1995, allowing daters the use of home 
telephones with answering machines – mobile phones – and web-based systems to 
find prospective partners. "Pre-dates" can take place by telephone or online 
via instant messaging, e-mail, or even video communication. A disadvantage is 
that, with no initial personal interview by a traditional dating agency head, 
Internet daters are free to exaggerate or lie about their characteristics.

While the growing popularity of the Internet took some time, now one in five 
singles is said to look for love on the Web, which has led to a dramatic shift 
in dating patterns. Research in the United Kingdom suggests that as of 2004 
there were around 150 agencies there, and the market was growing at around 20 
percent a year due to, first, the very low entry barriers to setting up a 
dating site, and secondly, the rising number of single people. However, even 
academic researchers find it impossible to find precise figures about crucial 
statistics, such as the ratio of active daters to the large number of inactive 
members whom the agency will often wrongly claim as potential partners, and 
the overall ratio of men to women in an agency's membership. Academic research 
on traditional pre-Internet agencies suggests that most agencies have far more 
men than women in their membership.

Traditionally, in many societies (including Western societies), men were 
expected to fill the role of the pursuer. However, the anonymity of the 
Internet (as well as other factors) has allowed women to take on that role 
online. A recent study indicated that "women pay to contact men as often as 
the reverse, which is quite different from behavior in telephone-based dating 
system[s]" (from Wired magazine).

The trend of singles making a Web connection continues to increase, as the 
percentage of North American singles who have tried Internet dating has grown 
from two percent in 1999 to over ten percent today (from Canadian Business, 
February 2002). More than half of online consumers (53%) know someone who has 
started a friendship or relationship online, and three-quarters of 18-to-24-
year-old online consumers (74%) say they do. There is also some academic 
evidence that the 18–25 age group has significantly taken up online dating. 
This growing trend is reflected in the surging popularity of online 
communities such as Friendster, Facebook, MySpace, and Nexopia sites which are 
not directly geared toward dating, but many users nonetheless use to find 
potential dates or research a new acquaintance to check for availability and 
compatibility.

There is still plenty of room for traditional matchmakers to thrive, however, 
and only time will tell which industry wins out in the end.