So far...so good

I registered on Match.com (a site that I have previously patronized with which I am comfortable) and enabled my profile. Almost immediately I received four 'winks', but I do not respond to those. For the uninitiated, 'winks' (or smiles, as they are sometimes called on other dating sites) are things that you receive when someone who sees your profile wants to say HI. However as it takes virtually no effort to send a wink, I do not take them seriously or respond to them. If a man is serious about wanting to get to know me, he will send me an email.

Another problem I have with winks is that more often than not they are sent by someone who is not a paid member. Many sites have it set up so that in order to communicate you must pay a membership fee. Those who pay the fee are generally much more serious than those who do not (read: "browsers'). It is important to weed out the browsers, or timewasters, so you can focus more on the serious people. An excellent example of this happened to me when I tried my luck on eHarmony a couple of years ago when I was previously eDating. I was a paid member for three months and was able to count on one hand the emails I received in that time. The site was full of 'dead profiles' and unpaid members that couldn't communicate with me because they had not paid the membership fee!