The commodification of intimacy

What I find disappointing and frustrating is that although there is a huge potential for technologies to connect people more innovatively, online dating sites have largely ignored any efforts to challenge the very ways in which we date. This neglect has been detrimental. So the status quo remains. Men still look in a certain way. Women still are objectified. Businesses make money as people consume.

Key questions remain - what about finding viable alternative ways of really connecting with people outside the square? Why don’t we demand more positive ways of connecting, intimately and otherwise?

Connecting to each other is a key human activity in the 21st century. We just all need to work much harder at connecting in the real world. It is too easy to shift tack and forget the real world in favour of alternative worlds offered by SecondLife and others. We know that humans desire and actually need to meet others physically to connect, especially in an intimate way. Despite all the promises of cybersex, there is something very false, alienating and artificial about it. Nothing can replace skin-skin contact. Anything else will always be second or third-best.

Online dating via deliberate or social networking sites looks set to continue to be a way in which people connect. Online technologies still have the potential to offer new ways of connecting. I believe that we just need to find much more radical and inspiring ways in which we can break free from traditional stereotypes about dating which particularly continue to place women and Others as objects and commodities rather than as equal, active partners.

In order to be viable in the long-term, the online dating (and the technology) industry will have no choice but find more innovative ways of encouraging us all to connect. Until then, maybe some of the answers lie firmly with all of us to find practical, creative and transformative ways of truly connecting with each other, intimately or otherwise.