Duncan has been working in the dating sector for over 25 years and as a director of The Dating Lab, has been providing online dating sites to UK and European media partners such as The Daily Telegraph, The Times, Global Radio since 2004.Before that he worked for its parent company, Telecom Express Ltd in a variety of operational, technical and commercial roles.He started in his family textile business in France, before striking out on his own (‘I wanted to replace my dad, so I left after two years and started my own’).
A great diversity of online dating services currently exists.
Some have a broad membership base of diverse users looking for many different types of relationships.
Most services offer digital messaging, while others provide additional services such as webcasts, online chat, telephone chat (VOIP), and message boards.
Members can constrain their interactions to the online space, or they can arrange a date to meet in person.
Online dating (or Internet dating) is a system that enables strangers to find and introduce themselves to new personal connections over the Internet, usually with the goal of developing personal, romantic, or sexual relationships.
An online dating service is a company that provides specific mechanisms (generally websites or applications) for online dating through the use of Internet-connected personal computers or mobile devices.
The idea is that instead of replacing those serendipitous meetings so beloved of Hollywood (our eyes met longingly across the crowded room, etc etc), it just makes them easier, helping you find people you wished you'd spoken to, but couldn't quite muster the courage to do so.
‘The dating space was too virtual, you were seeing a kind of catalogue of profiles. These are the people around you, the people you just crossed paths with, right now,’ says Didier Rapapport, the serial entrepreneur behind Happn.
It is, he says, all about reconciling the digital world with the real world.
Unlike a lot of entrepreneurs behind smartphone apps, Rappaport had a life and a career before the digital world.
As one of the joint founders of the ODA, he has helped shape the values and role that the ODA represents to the dating industry.