A 2013 study reported that More than a third of marriages between 2005 and 2012 began online. By 2015 studies were reporting that 69% of singles admit to performing online background checks on a potential date. And today? I have no way of vouching for the veracity of what Statistic Brain reported in July of 2016, but according to that site:
Strange as it may seem, nineteen years ago internet dating was the exception rather than the rule. Most people seemed to view it as a fad with no chance of catching on. And it was on this day in 1998 that the film "You've Got Mail" was released. The release of the film no doubt corresponded with a steep rise in online dating - Nora Ephron was in tune with the zeitgeist, even if the story was little more than a remake of what many of us consider a much better 1940 Ernst Lubitsch movie. But it caught on, primarily because we were starting to understand that something different, even special, was happening as we went online. Part of that specialness is still preserved in the web site that Warner Brothers set up for the movie. To my mind the stories submitted by couples who had met online were by far the best part of that site. I guess my favorite is what Cheryl wrote:
We have our computers networked and we log on sometimes and still have long conversations long into the night when we have difficulty putting feelings and thoughts into words. It will always be our connection in some type of way. By the way, our computers were networked the day before our wedding and it was a symbol of our union.Today, when the distinction between online and off has been almost totally blurred, there's something special in catching a glimpse of that not too long ago time when we were becoming aware of that blurring.