Today 11 March 2012 we celebrate the 136th anniversary when the first bi-directional phone call was made in what would be classed as the biggest invention of the 19th century. ARPANET (Project in U.S. Defense) in 1960 used this invention to create the communication medium for computers that ultimately evolved as the internet that we know today.

This makes online dating singles think that being the first nation of the internet, it is also the fastest in the U.S. Not true!!

USA is ranked as the 15th nation worldwide in terms of the speed of internet available to the public. Hard to believe, yet it’s true, but popularity of free internet dating sites that depends on this very public network has USA claiming the no. 1 spot as compared to other developed countries.

In terms of penetration of the internet, if we look at the three years data, in 2007 almost 8.5 million people opted for broadband connection which saw a downfall in 2008 where 5.4 million new users were added. In 2009, this figure dropped again by 1%. This was the time when USA was going through a major financial recession and the same time when free dating sites saw a rise in the user base by 1%. Exactly the opposite!

This inverse proportion of internet and free internet dating sites will be a good topic for pundits of research companies. But, for free dating sites it is a good sign which shows that this business is clearly recession proof.