In the Media
Media inquiries: info@omnidate.com
LOS ANGELES TIMES
Finding the Right Online Dating Service (Feb/10)
Julie Spira, a cyber dating expert, talks about virtual dating and OmniDate. According to Julie, "virtual daters should get real pictures of their suitors before getting too serious."
DISCOVERY SCIENCE
Discovery Channel's "PopSci: The Future Of..." (Sep/09)
The segment on Discovery Science featured OmniDate in their special on the future of sex and relationships.
EXAMINER
How to Find a Good Dating Website (Sep/09)
"And for those of you who would prefer to meet the guy or girl of your dreams without leaving your house, there are virtual dating sites like OmniDate.com, where you choose your own 'avatar' (an online version of yourself) and have it go on the date for you."
NY DAILY NEWS
Too Much of a Good Thing? Study Finds Online Daters Choose Wrong People Due to 'Cognitive Overload' (Jul/09)
"Yet there is hope -- at least in the online dating world. A new start-up company, called OmniDate, offers users the chance to interact with 3-D avatars in a virtual world, revealing information about themselves that may only come out through conversation. 'As people chat, their characters respond naturally, providing a realistic dating experience,' said OmniDate's president Igor Kotlyar. At least for women, the idea seems to be catching on: women currently make up 60% of the site's registration."
MIT TECHNOLOGY REVIEW
Data Overload on Dating Sites (Jul/09)
"Norton goes further, suggesting that prospective dates should not be searched for 'as though they were shoes online.' Simple demographic variables such as height and religion have poor relevance to whether a romantic pairing will be successful, he says. Better predictors of relationship success are concepts such as humor and rapport. Unfortunately, these are highly subjective--one person's joke can be another's bad taste.
A startup called Omnidate hopes to profit from technologies that help users gather and evaluate this kind of subjective information. The company's solution is an add-on for existing dating sites that allows users to interact as avatars in a 3-D virtual space. Rather than waste time with pages of matches with meaningless information, users can evaluate qualities that are only revealed during a meeting."
BLOG TALK RADIO
Ask the Cyber-Dating Expert (Jun/09)
Julie Spira, best-selling author and Cyber-Dating Expert, welcomes her guest, Ravit Abelman, co-founder of OmniDate. Would you like to know about kissing on a virtual date? Click below to listen to an abridged version of the broadcast.
DISCOVERY CHANNEL NEWS
Virtual Dating Helps Couples Test Waters (Feb/09)
"The virtual dating experience, even one as business-minded as my own, is surprisingly intimate, which helps explain the relative success of virtual dating compared with the major dating sites. Last year a study by researchers at Harvard and Duke showed that couples who go on virtual dates before a face-to-face date are two times more likely to say that they would go on a second date with a person."
INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILY
Sites May Offer Virtual First Dates (Feb/09)
"Major dating services soon may give users the option of going on an online fling with a potential sweetheart ... A recent study found that couples who go on a virtual date where they chat online before meeting face to face are twice as likely to schedule another date. Experts see it as a step beyond just e-mailing before meeting up."
GEEK.COM
OmniDate to Replace Real First Date With Virtual One (Feb/09)
"This has the potential to be quite popular because of the security it offers both parties. ... Taking the step from chatting to someone you like to actually meeting them is always going to be a scary one and rightly everyone is cautious. This new service won’t solve that problem, but it should build a bit more confidence before deciding to meet in person. Allowing websites to embed the virtual dating into their pages should also create some interesting new relationships. The people who visit a site are already going to be interested in similar subjects, so it could easily push the number of OmniDate users up and form some new relationships that may otherwise have never happened."
VIRTUAL WORLD NEWS
OmniDate Working on Virtual Dating With Real World Ties (Feb/09)
"OmniDate tailors its experience to date-prone environments, like bars, cafes, and restaurants. It also offers a variety of games and social activities to break the ice. It lets users chat with their avatars, use basic emotes (smiling, holding hands, or blowing a kiss), and meet up for virtual dates. That limits it when compared to the variety of interactions available in full worlds for adults like Second Life or Kaneva, but it may appeal to more mainstream users. It's big upcoming feature, though, is a new service to create avatars based on user-submitted photos, creating a distinct tie back to the real world that seems to reassure lots of users."
TIMES OF INDIA
Virtual Dating to Re-define Love (Feb/09)
"One can ask a potential single for a virtual date whenever he or she logs in. After the person agrees, the two avatars are transported to a random setting, such as a bar (as in my date), a cafe or on a beach. Then the couples can play games to break the ice, choose what music to listen to, and write messages that pop up as text boxes. If a person likes what he or she is hearing, they can press a button and briefly hold the other avatar’s hand, touch their face, or blow a kiss. And in just five minutes a 'kiss' function appears, pressing which one avatar can hold the other to plant a gentle smooch on mutual consent."
MSNBC
Virtual Dating (Feb/09)
"OmniDate has users create avatars, go to a virtual bar, cafe or beach. Researchers at Harvard and Duke showed that couples who go on virtual dates before a face-to-face date are two times more likely to say that they would go on a second date with a person."
CIO
Online Dating: The Technology Behind the Attraction (Feb/09)
"Perhaps the most innovative communication method is virtual dates in a 3-D world. One company, OmniDate, offers an avatar-based virtual dating system that acts as a kind of front end to existing online dating sites and is developing a new version for rollout later this spring that will use photo-realistic avatars."
COMPUTERWORLD
Online Dating: Avatars Tackle the First Date For You (Feb/09)
"First-date jitters got you down? Use OmniDate to build an online dating avatar that will stand in your stead. ... the technology is 'extremely woman-friendly,' especially when compared with webcams and other technologies that may pose a danger. 'Women have a hard time getting to know a guy. And for women, there are issues that come into play like safety and security,' says Ravit Abelman."
PC WORLD
Awkward First Date? Send Your Avatar Instead (Feb/09)
"OmniDate is hoping the idea will catch on in a big way. The firm is working on a new service, to be ready in the next few months, that features photo-realistic avatars - that is, online characters that look like you, or at least like your best photo."
RED HERRING MAGAZINE
OmniDate Wins Top 100 Global Award (Jan/09)
Red Herring Magazine has named OmniDate a winner of the "Red Herring Global 100" award, a prestigious list honoring this year’s most promising private technology ventures around the world.