Online Dating

Online dating was "the thing for teens" back in the early to mid 2000s, however with newer technology such as web cams and new dating sites such as eHarmony, Match.com, etc it has expanded. We are just gonna stick with the Teen Part for now.

Why do People Do this?

The answer to that is not a simple A/B choice. There are many reasons why people date online. In personal experience, I believe people online date because of the wide open range of people you can meet. When you're looking in your area you are only limited to the people you know around you, such as school, town, living area, church, etc. However, when you are online you have the opportunity now to meet more then 100,000 new people each day. I am not saying you can't meet a person in your own town, but you have more chance of meeting with someone you have more in common with, online.

What Options are There?

Since chat rooms have emerged and evolved over time, newer software and applications allow for people to chat and meet in so many different ways. 321Chat is one option. 321Chat has been the largest teen/adult chat room network on the net for years now. So it's safe to say there have been many hook-ups on this DigiChat Software. There are also the options of IMVU and SecondLife, which allow for users to create 3D avatars. This gives more of a personal touch to the online dating aspect. However, Skype or any other audio/video software applications have the best way of connecting to a person online. This allows for people to actually see the real person, and hear them.

Is the person I am talking to Real?

This is one of the biggest and scariest parts of online dating. Mainly via chat rooms and 3D chat rooms, such as IMVU and Secondlife. You can talk to a person for hours on end everyday, but they can still be lying to you. This may not always be on who they actually are, but certain things a person tells you online could be false. There is no real way to make certain that the person you are talking to in a chat room is the real deal. However there are a few tips.

What are the Tips?

Being on many different types of chat rooms, including 321, I have come up with a few ways to help you make sure the person you are talking to in the chat is mostly who they say they are. (Like Age and what they look like)

Ask them their age again and again. I am not saying to do this every 3 minutes, but over a longer period of time. If a person is lying about their age to relate or make a person feel safe (this usually goes for older people in teen chat rooms.) they are usually making up a different age for a different type of user. So they can easily get mixed up. So if they say 13 when you first ask, then 16 when you ask later on...that is a sign.
Ask for a personal web page. This can be like myspace, facebook, forumspring, eSpin, etc...Anything that could have a profile of them online. You should also look to see how many friends they have and if they have a custom url(Myspace). I have found out that some people make a quick, fake, and effortless myspace page just to say they have one. They also upload a fake pic...so be carefulr
Ask for a skype cam chat. I am not saying go on every chat asking for cam. It's really annoying and usually a sign of a pedofile. If you're talking a while and feel like you can be friends and they have a web cam, just ask if you can see them on cam(their face) for a min or so. You could also ask for a custom youtube video, this is rare, but can help.
These are not the only things I have found that can work, but the most effective. If you have your own tips please post.

Overview:

I'm not going to get detailed with this last part, but Online dating can be very good but can also get quite messy. So just make sure you know what you are doing and play it safe. There have been many cases where things have gone wrong from meeting someone online. I personally do not want to see anything like that happen to a user