Since the site began as TrentDating.com, I've posted its About section here:

       Founded in May of 2003 by Mike McCarthy, at the time a third year student at Trent University, the site was established for the purpose of making it easy for students to develop relationships with one another. Countless efforts -- including development time, alternate versions of TrentDating.com, and marketing efforts, have made the site into what it is today.

I've broken down the site's history here:

September 2003
The preliminary site is launched at The University of Ottawa, where my hometown is. The site is extremely basic, but functional. Users are required to pay $3.99, which gives them access to the site for four months. Inefficient payment process on my end. Lots of time spent promoting the site, and very few users signing-up. Every ad posted at The University of Ottawa gets ripped down on the same day it is posted. Nobody reads The Fulcrum, the school's newspaper. I purchased a small advertisement in September's issue.

October 2003
My "reading" break. The University of Ottawa's dating site is now free. Very few members still. If I make a site, it may as well be used.

January 2003
TrentDating.com is launched. The site is an exact replica of The University of Ottawa's site, so it is still very basic, but free. 1,500 students join over the course of four months. Lots of foot work on my part, in terms of walking around campus and posting ads wherever possible. Lots of negative publicity from The Arthur, the school's newspaper. Complaints about poor site design, lack of features, and having a heterosexual appeal. Click here to read the full article by Nathaniel Christopher.

Summer 2004 Development
I used July and mainly August to fix everything that needed fixing, including the suggestions I received from students; everything that was talked about in Nathaniel's article; and lots more. I even changed the site's design, and added plenty of searchable criteria, including major; residence location; and program year -- to name only a few things.

Fortunately other, non-dating related, sites that I run, did very well this summer. I didn't have to work my former Wal-Mart job. This also helped fund many aspects of TrentDating.com.

September 2004
The University of Ottawa's dating site is now closed. Lack of interest from students, and no time to promote the site on my part. Domain name expires.

The "new" TrentDating.com is launched. Database cleared of "old" users. Students are now required to pay a one-time fee of $10 to the sole proprietor "College Dating". This can be done via credit card, cheque, or even cash at a mailbox I've set-up in the Champlain College mailroom. This is thanks to Bill, who is a very friendly guy that works there.

I knew students wouldn't react nicely to the $10 charge, but I thought I would give it a try regardless. I needed to get some reward out of all of my hard work, even if only enough to pay the site's server bill every month.

Sure enough, it wasn't worth my time developing the new site. I gave away about 300 free accounts at the start of the year, because nobody was signing-up under the paid system. I thought 300 users would be a sufficient incentive for other students to sign-up under the paid system. But, I was wrong. Hardly any students signed-up after that. Oh well.

January 2005
Escalating commitment kicks in. I thought that, perhaps, I had designed the system all-wrong. Instead of charging students a one-time fee of $10 to get initial access to the site, I would allow everyone to sign-up; create a profile; and even send out messages for free. This is how many of the "big players" do it. I would only ask for a small, one-time payment of $4.99 if someone wanted to read a message. Paying this small fee would allow students to read all messages they received over the course of the year.

Guess what? I was wrong again, so I gave up. I've concluded that students simply don't want to pay for a site like this, so I will make the site completely free in the near future.

November 2005
I spent the entire summer, as well as September and October, literally every day, developing a new TrentDating.com that has all the same features as the "big players". Why did I do this? I really don't know. I just want the site to be outstanding, and I want students to use it again. The site has never seen so many new features all at once. Due to popular demand, the site is now completely free, and I will never charge students to use it. Boy am I exhausted. But the work isn't over yet. There's more I want to do, in terms of bringing the site to other campuses, and creating a site for North America. A special thanks goes out to Edward and Licinio, who both played major roles in getting the site to where it is today.

December 2005
Every major University in Ontario now has its own dating and friendships web site. I hope that other Universities will enjoy the same free service offered at Trent. In terms of web development, my work is officially over with the College Dating network. I can finally move on to marketing these sites, as well as building other web projects that I've been wanting to build for a long time.

That's it for TrentDating.com's history.

       So far I have received a couple of success stories which I will post once I have enough that I can make a whole section out of. I, for one, have been on numerous dates through the site, and have met many interesting and fun people -- most of which I remain in contact with to this day. If you're ever wondering where to go on a first date, I suggest the Sapphire Room on 137 Hunter St W. And no, I do not work for them :>. I've tended to take my dates there on the first date, because it is a great place to talk and to get to know each other better.

       In terms of the future of TrentDating.com, the site is being made better all the time. I'm open to suggestions, from anyone. From what I understand, most of the student body here at Trent is aware of the site, and the students that use it are enjoying the service. I've had no complaints this year, and hope that this will continue.

Thanks for reading,

- Mike McCarthy/Founder