After participating on JDate for a semester and looking around at other sites aimed towards Jewish people, I definitely have a greater understanding of why distinct groups of Internet users come together on community web sites. Making up only 0.2% of the world’s population, it is easy to see why there is such a strong emphasis on outreach and connecting with other Jews online. JDate's stated mission is "to strengthen the Jewish community and ensure that Jewish traditions are sustained for generations to come." I think it accomplishes this by providing a global network of hundreds of thousands of Jews where they can easily find friends and/or romance within their faith.
I have to say that my time on JDate has been very successful in that I have spoken to many different people that I would not have gotten the chance to otherwise. I have instant messaged with 22 people, been “flirted” with 10 times, favorited 11 times, emailed 8 times, messaged 46 times, and have 143 profile views!
While I wouldn’t say that I am ready to meet up in person with any of the people I have chatted with, I do appreciate the conversations we have had and enjoyed getting to know different Jews from all over the US and world.
I think it's interesting you had success in terms of actually speaking to people. Was it every kind of creepy? I don't know if that's rude haha, but having never tried any sites like this out, I've always wondered if there's an element of creepiness that's just always there.
ReplyDeleteIt was definitely creepy at times but I guess that's the nature of these kind of sites and the Internet as a whole - I mean you never actually know who's on the other end of the conversation! It was pretty weird for me at first but I got used to it by the end and just made sure to be careful about not giving away too much personal information.
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