LSU students no longer have to visit Tigerland to look for “the one,” because new online dating services are popping up all around the information superhighway.
Instead of meeting new people the old fashioned way, many students now find themselves searching for love on the Internet.
National dating sites such as match.com, collegeclub.com, soulmate.com and Yahoo! Personals allow people around the country to meet others for business and pleasure.
In Baton Rouge, dating sites are few and far between. Nationally-sponsored Web sites Pre-dating.com and singlesanddating.com offer get-togethers and personal ads that can bring people together.
But many students said they were not interested in meeting people on the Internet.
Tigersingles.com, an online matchmaking service for LSU students, alumni, faculty and supporters, launched on June 29.
The online subscription service, which runs around $19.95 a month, now has 1,245 members, 65 percent of which are men, according to Britney Puryear, a public relations specialist for the Web site.
Rick Henderson, president of White Buffalo Ventures, the parent company for tigersingles.com, said the demand for online dating services led to the startup of the Web site.
“A number of people around the country now use online dating,” Henderson said. “It has become mainstream. More people are using it than ever before.”
Henderson said tigersingles.com was a good idea because many of the bigger dating services such as match.com do not offer a common ground for singles to start a relationship.
“Everyone has something in common-a love for LSU,” Henderson said.
White Buffalo Ventures also owns other specialized dating services around the country such as aggiedating.com, bulldogsingles.com and cyclingsingles.com.
Henderson said the specialized dating sites also appeal to certain geographical areas.
“Because 95 percent of the people on tigersingles.com are in the Baton Rouge area, you can go have coffee with them instead of having to get on an airplane,” Henderson said.
But not every dating service provides love at first click.
Shawn Guillory, a communications studies senior, said she has used collegeclub.com to meet different people, but has never used the service for romantic interest.
“I had a friend who met a guy, and she went to meet him in real life,” Guillory said. “He said he drove an Expedition-it was like an old ragged out one, and the picture he sent was one of his friends.”
Guillory said her friend’s experience did not go as planned because it is easy to be dishonest on the Internet.
“He said he had a lot of money–pledged a fraternity,” Guillory said. “It was all a lie.”
Arvid Cristina, a mass communication senior, said he has met others through online communities, but never has pursued a relationship with an online pal.
“I don’t think I’d ever join an online dating site,” Cristina said. “If I ever wanted to meet people, I would just go out.”
Eric Trimble, elementary education senior, said he has never checked out any Internet dating Web sites, but he supports it if it helps bring people together.
“It won’t be the new age of dating, but for some people it might work,” he said.