Meeting online

[knight]

What do you think of the idea of meeting someone you've only known in online. Whether you would be comfortable or nervous to see them first time or do you feel comfortable in meeting an already known person in online. How do you react to this.

[Merana]

Well, one should keep in mind that there are all kinds of dishonest people on those dating sites, that's for sure. I would advice to meet at a public place and only when you have gotten to know the person well. Verifying some info about them (address, job) wouldn't hurt, either.

[liza123]

What do you think of the idea of meeting someone you've only known in online. Whether you would be comfortable or nervous to see them first time or do you feel comfortable in meeting an already known person in online. How do you react to this.

Well, I feel more comfortable talking to a person online immaterial whether I have met the person or not. But, I would make sure that the person is honest, etc before I meet him since there are many dishonest people around who use the internet

[st_hart]

Well, I prefer to separate my online life from offline life. It's not that I pretend to be someone else on the internet. I tend to be myself online or offline as it's easier and need less effort to do that.

[daftcow]

Meeting people online is fine as long as you have good instincts and know where to look for good people.

I met both my best friends online.  One of them is now my boyfriend, althought it doesnt really count as an internet reomance because we met face to face as friends and had been friends for 5 years before we realised we had feelings for one another!

As long as youre careful, online is a great place to meet people!

[reira]

Meeting someone you've known via chatting is a good thing to do in order for you to know the person well. I've been doing that since I was in college it's no biggie at all. You just need to be confident enough to talk to that person face to face.

[daftcow]

While thats true, the internet does make it easy for people to lie.  You need to be really careful and take precautions like telling a trusted friend where youre going and when you will be back etc, better still, take a friend with you.   ITs dangerous otherwise

[anaklio]

The internet is a wonderful tool. I've met many great people online. As far as finding a spouse, that is challenging. Internet relationships are often long distance. While the internet is a good way to maintain relations, I don't think it is a good place to build them.

I've often encountered mismatches between the real and virtual world. These come from two places. One, people present themselves online as who they want to be in the real world and not necessarily who they are. Two, I have in my mind what I'm looking for, and I fill in the blank virtual space with my fantasies which cannot be easily met in real life.

Still, I don't want to discourage anyone from looking and trying. Love is hard to find and it is worth the long process :-)

[wasd44]

I think it is a mixed bag that in the future will be considered more "normal".

You basically have two things that can happen:

1. the person can be as good/better than you expected
2. the person can be worse.  sometimes, much, much worse.

Good luck.

[anaklio]

Yeah, the internet date is pretty much like a real date. In general, there's the same risks and rewards.

But it seems unlikely to be better than expected. The internet allows you to accentuate your positives and hide your negatives more easily.