Ghanaians Vs Internet Dating

Not long ago when internet came to Ghana, it was limited to the elite. Barely a handful of people knew about it and could surf. The main use of the internet at the time for most of these Ghanaian folks was emailing and reading of news.

Now, every nook and cranny in Accra you find internet cafés and Ghanaians as young as 7years surfing. It’s only amazing that you find children from a third world country surfing the internet for information and learning new things. Some of them even have email addresses and have made a lot of friends from other countries. By 2005, the Internet Relay Chat (IRC) system was popular amongst the youths of Ghana particularly those living in the capital city, Accra.

When the chatting system became another significant aspect of the internet for them, it was mostly limited to yahoo and MSN but now, you find downloads of numerous chat software on their computers.

Ghanaians became more and more interested in the internet when online dating hit the core of their hearts. Tens of hundreds of Ghanaians have found their dream partners online and are happily married. Some date online for fun, long term relationship and marriage purposes.

Initially some Ghanaians thought that, only women who were not getting attention from men would go on the internet, advertising themselves for attention and vice versa but the mentality has changed of late.

One major reason that can be attributed to the change in mentality is the exposure Ghanaians gained from foreign dating websites where you find responsible adults posting their ads to seek romantic relationships and the like. There has also been a growing number of whites seeking to marry Ghanaians or blacks on the whole.

The Ghanaian Internet Dating started with the concept of whites or singles living abroad seeking Ghanaians and that has been the trend until now. Internal online dating is very minimal. There are a few reasons for that; there hasn’t been any special website dedicated to Ghanaians which provides purely dating services in the past but thanks to www.Ghanasinglesnet.com, which has been described as the fastest growing Ghanaian Dating website and the nation’s number one. In the first two weeks of launching the beta stage of the website and with little or no advertisement, there were more than two hundred registered members, 75% resident Ghanaians, 20% non-resident Ghanaians and 5% other singles. The statistics tells of Ghanaians’ readiness to welcome the website which provides 100% free dating services for Ghanaians.

Online dating services in Ghana have also witnessed a few setbacks which I think are worth considering. The first and foremost is scam or scamming. Cases where men or women fake up their profiles for fraud purposes are very rampant.

Another setback is the method of payment for online dating services. Mostly the foreign websites accept credit cards and the like which are not common in Ghana. This is a hindrance because even if they join a pay dating website, they would not enjoy all the features of the website, in most cases you cannot initiate a contact or send a message at all. This is why the only online dating website dedicated to Ghanaians; www.ghanasinglesnet.com was made free for all.

When it started, Ghanaians in Diaspora and foreigners had immense confidence and trust in Ghanaians seeking a foreign partner but frequent and rampant fraudulent activities have deteriorated the trust.

The situation is even worse when men disguise themselves as women and use photos of models to defraud their victims.

The team behind Ghanasinglesnet.com said that, they will do anything technologically possible to get rid of such members on their website. Steps like this can help curb the menace and rebuild the trust foreigners once had in Ghanaian singles.

However, the number of Ghanaians dating online is increasing every day in and day out. There are a lot of real Ghanaians who are seeking for love and do not disguise themselves. Internal online dating is growing as well and Ghanaians are getting to understand that; you may join a dating website for fun, friendship, long term relationships, casual dating and even marriage. Wherever you fit is a matter of choice.

If you are looking for love online on one of the hundreds of online dating websites, don’t feel lonely, since there are probably millions of lonely guys and gals around the world looking for true love they couldn’t find in their offline lives. The only thing, however, that should raise your eyebrows about online dating sites is the gigantic number of fake profiles created to dupe the people like you. YES! Online foreign dating scams are on the rise and the number of people getting tricked is also increasing at menacing speed.

Financial and emotional loss of the victim in such a scenario is inexplicable. However, you should not get carried away with what people are saying about online dating scams. The truth is, and always remain, that if you are cautious enough, ninety nine times out of hundred, you’ll avoid falling into the trap. And that can be achieved only if you have sufficient knowledge about the tricks these scamsters are up to and their modus operandi. If you are one of the lonely hearts looking to find genuine love online without getting scammed, read on.

The first thing that you need to look for in a suitable partner on an online dating site is his or her profile. The user profile is the first impression of the person you’re about to choose. And as they say, “First impression is often the last impression!” The same holds true in case of people uploading their profile on the online dating websites. First comes the username. The red lines are ‘sex-filled’ username of a girl and ‘handsome-wealthy’ username of a man. If any of these attributes are visible in the usernames of the girl or man, simply look for another suitable option!

Then come the photographs accompanying the profile. If the girl is posing and looking like a drop-dead-gorgeous model or movie star, or the boy has the picture of a tall-dark-handsome man seeming like a model or movie star, chances are that the profile is a fake or of non-serious user who is either after sex or your money. However, this does not mean that such profiles can never be genuine. If all other aspects seem fine to you, then may be you have chanced upon your dream girl or man!

If your date is asking for money in any form for whatever reasons, simply run away for this is the most common trap laid out by the scamsters.

While you are chatting with a user to assess your mutual compatibility, watch out for the delay time of the response from other end. If you are getting replies after a gap of over 90 seconds, chances are that the person on the other end is having multiple chats with other users and simply out there fishing for novice users.

Another common trick that you need to watch out for is the expression of love at an early stage. If the person at the other end is bombarding you with love messages after just a few email exchanges, you know what to do, don’t you? Yeah! Simply stop sending the replies for the person is a fake.