So many studies, etc. focus on the number of emails, IMs, winks, etc. that women receive (versus what men receive), but it helps to look at quality, not quantity. The vast majority of emails I get are form letters or, at a bare minimum, make it fairly clear that they haven't read my profile. Why email me if you don't want to get to know *me*?

I used to spend so much time carefully crafting my initial emails to guys and my replies to their emails, and I'd rarely get a response. It can be so frustrating. That's why I'm on hiatus from online dating.

Now, try testing out the sword's other edge (forgive me if you've already done this, and I just haven't read about–I just found this blog, and it's 4.45am here):

Put up a male profile, but in that profile, bill yourself as someone who makes a 7-digit salary, has a McMansion and 2 Hummers, and use photos of the most drop-dead dreamboat movie-star guy you can find.

Then wait. The mails from women should start pouring in, per the accounts of others I've read who have tried this.

After sifting through the crap and initiating communication with someone you feel is worth your time, you go to your actual profile, and send mails from it to these same women, saying something to the effect that you have a friend (That would be the fake profile) who said he didn't think him and the woman you're writing were a match, but he thinks you should get in touch with her 'cuz you two would hit it off well.

Almost-guarnteed result for your actual profile: "Unread," "read (but no response, now or ever)," "Read/Deleted,"….you get the drift.

Conclusion, if the literally dozens of accounts I've read, and my own experiences on this utter shit site (I've been on about 6 months now) are anything to go by:

The majority of the women on this site are either shallow little ego/attention whores, or broken ex-sluts with three kids who want a sugar-daddy, or out-and-out gold-diggers, or lying sacks of fat with SEVERE issues…

My conclusion: PoF is a cesspit of garbage, who get their little ego-boosts by treating men like same.

Yes, I'm bitter…But also, much wiser now.

Although the messages I used to send from my actual POF profile weren't nearly as bad as the ones delivered to my recon profile, somehow seeing these messages must have helped me out because I've got 4 responses over the last two days, as opposed to none before that (I joined about two weeks ago).

Thanks for the good advice. Also, I think that you are doing a pretty good thing in some ways because you are helping some decent guys have a chance with the online dating as well as hopefully giving the women online some more interesting messages to read. It's not like you are teaching anyone to trick a woman into a relationship that she doesn't want. All you are doing is helping guys to know how to approach women online. The rest is up to the man/woman. Looking through some of your other posts, it seems that you have always advocated complete honesty in actual POF profiles. Keep up the good work. Most people will appreciate you for it.

Dude, you are way out of line at the end of your comment. Did you even read the post?

First, of all, I am male, not female. Nor was I doing this experiment to inflate my own ego, which I don’t think would be very effective using a fake female profile. The whole point of this was to show men the “other side” of online dating; to show a female’s perspective of the PlentyofFish Inbox. So please, read the article before you start trash talking.

Now, as far as the emails that I received to this ‘experimental’ account, I did read them ALL and to be honest most of them deserved to be made fun of. Why? Because they were lame, crude and/or unoriginal.

I do agree with you, that the first email is only to get their attention. After that, it’s mostly up to your profile to do the work. However, the key here is to actually get her attention which is a difficult thing to do when you are sending an almost identical “hey there” email as 60 other dudes.

This includes dating and approaching women. Men learn pretty quickly that there is a fixed percentage of women who will respond positively, regardless of the amount of work put in. Women are very fond of saying "well, if he just read my profile, and knew something about me, and wrote a real email special just for me, I'd probably be interested", but we all know that's bullshit. All you do is look at the picture, and if you think he's hot, you'll check the other stats to see if he meets all your requirements, typically that he's over 6 feet tall, makes six figures in a professional career, has his own house, car, etc. The content of the first email doesn't matter, and we know that. It's just to get your attention, if you respond back, then it's game on and we put some effort into it.

In days, 60 guys expressed an interest. How many of those emails did you read? How many of their profiles did you review? None, I would guess. These guys took the very real chance of risking rejection by approaching you, and you come on to your blog, AND MAKE FUN OF THEM?! Wow! You've got some kind of nerve on you. Instead of being flattered and complimented, you subject these guys to public ridicule. Instead of writing a post, awesome subject lines, you focus on the negative.

So, you've got a stuck-up, inflated sense of self worth, and you like to make fun of people who try to initiate contact with you.

Wow, what a catch. Please, if I ever send you an email, don't respond. We'll be seeing you on Craigslist Rants & Raves in about 10 years after you're past prime, bitching about how much men suck and you can't find a decent one.

Perhaps the problem isn't men. Have you ever considered the possibility that you really are a miserable cunt with a shit attitude?

http://dating.about.com/b/2009/03/09/pay-to-be-serious-at-plenty-of-fish.htm

Look at posts #7, #9 and #10:

#7 Don’t be conned. Plentyoffish.com is assigning those badges to profiles (only women that I know of so far) that didn’t ask for or pay for them. Some I talked to simply found them on their profile without being asked. Several women that I communicated with said they didn’t want them, when approached by Big Fish (presumably the site owner), and had them placed on their profile anyway. Emails to the site operators to remove them were met with silence.

It seems that PoF is trying to drum up business, particularly from males, by giving away these badges. I find that to be fraudulent as it is intended to be a filter: only those who are serious about finding someone would pay. “If you want others to know you are serious and you’ve put real effort into finding someone then you should get your serious member profile upgrade. Take a look at some of the screen shots below. Think about it, do you take people more seriously if they have paid for something?”

#9 Here is PoF’s response regarding my complaint about the women with the gold seal not having paid: “Free upgrades were awarded to random members chosen by the system that have proven to show regular activity on the site and good behavior. Users that we would consider to be Serious Members. Those that are not in agreeance with the label email us and we promptly remove the status from their profile. You can rest assured that after two weeks time, those users that do not see themselves as Serious Members are likely to have contacted customer service and downgraded their status, leaving you with a more defined idea as to who is serious about dating.”

#10 I showed PoF’s response to one of the women with the “Serious Member” who didn’t ask for it (and who has been trying to get it removed for a week) and she said “Wow what a bold faced lie.”

Interesting yes…? Hmmm…

“Free upgrades were awarded to random members chosen by the system that have proven to show regular activity on the site and good behavior.”

Sounds like Markus Frind is up to his old tricks again, now having the AI system upgrade the real female members and leaving the “fake” women AI accounts as “not serious” …