It's a total disaster tbh.

If you click on "Account", then "Who's online" and then "Advanced" you can search by specific things like distance from your zip code.

I've only been here myself for a few days but would also just caution you that this site is full of fake accounts and scammers. Almost every account I see that comes up in the search list is fake. It's like maybe 1-5% real people here.

I'll try to keep this as brief as I can.

I was never really that big into the online dating scene. I'm very old fashioned and just did things the old fashioned way (meeting people in real life.)

Unfortunately, with the way the world has changed in recent years, everyone has become addicted to smart phones and social media, and it seems most women (especially attractive women my age) refuse to date the old fashioned way now and basically expect you to have a smart phone, have social media and be online.

Well, I still don't have a smart phone but I've decided to give this online dating thing a try.

Since I still use a flip phone many modern dating platforms like Tinder are not an option for me, although based on what I've heard from others it doesn't really sound like it would be a good fit since it's used primarily for one night stands and non-committed relationships (I am looking for a real relationship.)

I gave POF a try, it's an old site that I'm at least marginally familiar with but it seems to have devolved into a complete disaster over the years. The response rate from real women for men is almost nonexistent, and most of the accounts on there are fake. The extremely few real women on there who actually do message you or reply to your messages are almost always either there for money, playing weird games or also just looking for casual encounters/one night stands and not interested a real relationship.

Frustrated with POF, I decided to give this site a try and my experience here has not been much different. In the past few days virtually every attractive woman around my age I encountered on this site turned out to be a fake account trying to social engineer me for my personal details like my e-mail address and cell phone number. One of them accused me of being fake after trying to get me to give her my real life cell phone number (I provided a google voice, don't know who in their right mind would give their real cell phone number to a total stranger they just met online 5 minutes ago) and blocked me.

Is this pretty much the state of online dating now? Should I just give up on this? Is there some hidden technique for better results that doesn't involve getting a smart phone and signing up for questionable sites like Tinder?

Just kind of fed up with this and am wondering if I should even bother continuing with these sites or if I should just throw in the towel and settle for being single for a while.

Edit: yeah I think I'm done here. Good luck to anyone still trying this. I'm going back to (attempting) dating in real life the old fashioned way because this online thing is a complete and total disaster. It's not even worth it IMO.