PLENTY OF FISH: FOR LONELY HEARTS THE WORLD OVER

When a friend told me about a wonderful woman he had met online on Plenty of Fish, I was taken aback, because I took it he was talking about a website that dealt in aquariums and such like! Call me naïve if you like, but it was only when I checked out www.plentyoffish.com that I realized that it was pone of the Internet's few absolutely free dating communities, which had members from the world over.

Online dating never sounded like a particularly good idea to me, largely because I felt there could be no comparison between a person's actual and virtual presence. Because so many people feel compelled to lie or fabricate the truth online, an actual meeting offline seemed to me more a thing to be dreaded than desired.

However, after my friend's experience with Plenty of Fish, I admit I'm a little less cynical. Having checked out the website myself, I feel one has the best chance of finding a soul mate here simply because of the variety and huge number of its members. Of course, the fact that membership is free has a lot to do with that, and I've signed on myself simply to contact some of the members whose profiles seemed really interesting.

The best thing about this is that I can make new friends because there's no pressure to form romantic attachments at all. And I found the user interfaces quite accessible as well so I had no trouble navigating the site. I also think it a clever move to include the Plenty of Fish Compatibility Predictor. "Based on decades of empirical research in psychology, the POFCP captures the five key ingredients that can determine whether or not two people have the "right" chemistry," the site claims. I plan to test it sometime soon, which means I will be able to give you an update on that. Then there's the neat Plentyoffish Relationship Needs Assessment, which "determines in great detail a person's overt and hidden needs in a relationship".

Of course, like all dating sites, www.plentyoffish.com will include the usual component of weirdoes, cheats, freaks, serial daters et al, but from my experience, with a little caution, you can avoid them fairly easily. Besides, you are free to reveal as much (or as little) about yourself as you like, so you can easily filter your friends list.

All in all, I think www.plentyoffish.com is a great site for singles to mingle. It cuts out the frills and gets to the heart of the matter, and for once, I am delighted to have discovered an online dating resource that actually has a meaningful Help section.