Online dating 'great for making friends'

• July 8, 2008
  
  
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  Social networking online has become such a massive phenomenon that internet dating sites are now a great way to meet new friends as well as finding romance, according to an industry expert.
  
  Recent research from a popular dating and friendship website revealed that nearly 20 per cent of respondents said that they felt more comfortable meeting new people online than by using "traditional" methods.
  
  However Ben Camm-Jones, news editor of Web-User magazine, said that meeting people online has totally lost its social stigma and that people who use the internet to meet people are not desperate, but are merely supplementing their social lives with new methods of communication.
  
  He added that online dating is not for people to cultivate social lives where they didn't have one before, but is a good way to meet different types of people that you may not have been able to otherwise.
  
  "Social networks do give us the chance to communicate with people that wouldn't normally be within our social sphere," said Mr Camm-Jones.
  
  "I don't think the sort of people who are using them are confined to the house, so petrified of meeting people in reality that they have to resort to social networks."
  
  Whether you're looking for love or friendship, search for your perfect date!
  
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