[wtvanhest]

I just started using it after I moved to a new city. I have had some great dates, and even met some friends who introduced me to their friends so I’m certainly not complaining about the site, but I have two observations I would love to have the understanding behind.

1st, what is the purpose of the green/yellow/red dot? To me, if I see a women with a yellow or green dot I rarely if ever contact them. Also, the percentage of women with red dots is ridiculous compared with the other colors. It basically seems like a worthless indicator of anything and may even be harmful since it causes people to select the red over the yellow etc.

As a guy, if I get messages from women and they are someone I may or may not have contacted, I never respond to get my color back up to yellow. I can’t keep it there long, and have to check using a fake profile, but feel like the gamesmanship is worth it.

2nd, why say exactly when someone was online last? This encourages me to not login random times since I don’t want people seeing that I am always checking in. Even if I am bored somewhere, have nothing else to look at, I purposely don’t go to the site to let it sit. You would generate more ad revenue, at least from me if the site said, visited in last 48 hours or whatever.

FYI, for those trying the site, 2 things really surprised me. 1, the photo selection tool, I can’t remember the name, was really useful as it let me pick better photos of myself. 2, focusing on having a profile that was more about stuff I was doing was better than a profile about who I am. (that may be me specific).

[ig1]

You realize for someone to see that you're checking in all the time they'd also have to be checking in all the time and stalking your profile ?

I don't know OKCs reasoning behind it but I can think of a bunch of arguments. For example say you've messaged someone to rearrange a date and you want to make sure they've logged in since you sent it, or say you want to catch them online and want to know the best time, etc.

[wtvanhest]

I’m reacting to my thought process in viewing women’s profiles. If I visit a profile just twice I have a pretty good idea that they are checking it every day etc. If both times I visit they were online within the last 2 hours (extreme example) I know they are checking it a lot.

While that information doesn’t really matter, I noticed that I sort of laugh about it to myself and make assumptions about the person. If I am making assumptions, women are making assumptions and if the environment is as highly competitive as described, you really don’t want anything against you.

[ig1]

How often do you have a woman checking out your profile every day ?

[wtvanhest]

There is no way to know, but before I message someone I usually look at their profile, wait at least a day, then read it carefully before messaging them.

In the beginning I would just message women right away, but after a few dates that I could have avoided I decided to be more careful since there is no reason to go out with someone you know will not work.

[by the way] I saw a comment you posted a few weeks ago and liked it so I went to your old blog imranontech.com and read through a bunch of your articles. Really good stuff.

[ta12121]

1. The dot indicates the likelihood the person would respond. I would imagine it's an attempt to encourage people to try talking to others that are less than perfect, since they are more likely to respond.

2. Because if they haven't been online in 3 months I don't want to waste my time emailing them.

[wtvanhest]

1. I get that, but in practice it doesn't work that way since almost every women is red.

2. That is why it could say... "online in the last 48 hours"

[Bill_Dimm]

I haven't been on OKCupid in years, so this info may be outdated, but they used to display a green/yellow/red dot to indicate whether or not someone usually responds when you initiate contact with them. Most women have red dots because you probably won't get any response from them whatsoever if you send them a message.