Personals are filled with abbreviations and conventions that can confuse a first time reader. It seems as though everyone assumes you just know what DJM ISO D/DF SOCAL SJF means. (That meant "divorced Jewish male in search of a drug/disease free single Jewish female in Southern California," by the way.) Add the lingo for gay, lesbian, bi-sexual, and transgendered people, toss in the abbreviations for some potentially shocking sexual acts, and it's no surprise that some people think personals are more trouble than they're worth to decode.

Online Personals: Nothing like the Newspaper

And yet, the number of success stories from blissful couples and happy customers indicate that it may be worth it to use personals for dating. Online personals are actually a lot more user-friendly than old fashioned newspaper ads. One simple reason for this is that web space costs a lot less than newspaper space. People often write very terse profiles or ads in a newspaper because they are paying by the word or they have a word limit. Online, even if there's a word limit, you can usually write a few paragraphs before you reach it.

Newspaper personals have a definite stigma associated with them. Online personals initially shared this negative press, but over the last couple of years, people have started to have a lot more respect for the Internet as a place to make a serious effort to find a good relationship. It is the quality of people using it that makes the Internet better--more and more intelligent, interesting, attractive, and generally cool people are putting up profiles, so critics are being silenced by their success in finding love.

People of all ages are using the Internet to find friends and partners. You can meet someone anywhere in the world, or only within 20 miles of you. Whatever values, traits, or traditions are most important to you, you can express your thoughts on them without being limited to a ridiculous limit like 50 words.