This isn't my idea. I have permission to post it, without attribution (although I won't claim it's mine). I have kept it completely intact.
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I have an idea for a dating site that I haven't ever seen before, and I'll let you have it at no cost. Make a site that queries the user extensively on their basic interests, habits, likes and dislikes. Include a user profile (like Facebook...), but allow the person to choose what information they do or don't want to give, with full customization of the privacy settings for all information. (A user's profile could be completely public if they want it to be, allowing users to contact each other outside the site's matching system.)
Now, using a database with a fun, stylish, friendly, and extremely functional interface, allow the user to constantly rate experiences that they've had, including activities, hobbies, books, films, restaurants, events, etc. If they have an experience they want to rate that isn't in the database, give them everything they need to add all the information they can about it.
Next, develop a system by which the site will recommend experiences based on existing user data, similar to the movie recommendations on Blockbuster and Netflix, allowing the user to rate interest AND previous experience for every item. The system should include a function that serves up suggestions for all forms of entertainment, activities, events, organizations, and experieces that fall within a user-customized distance range from their location.
All of this, of course, can already be accomplished on the internet, but your site will do two important and useful things. First, it will aggregate all of the experiential information and suggestions into a single user interface, eliminating the time-consuming and often frustrating task of internet searching. Second, and most importantly, your site will match the user with someone else who most closely matches their tastes, connect those two people (or more, if so desired) with all available on-site and off-site contact information, and suggest experiences or upcoming events that they are most likely to enjoy sharing, with every possible tool for setting up the experience (like buying tickets or making reservations online). Matched connections should also be completely transparent, so that a user can see exactly why the match was chosen. In other words, they should be able to see the data if they want to.
Make a site that does all that, and you will be a millionaire within a year.
Oh, and you might notice that I didn't mention a damn thing about personality profiles. Want to know why? Because they DON'T WORK!!!! A rated experience database is all the personality profile you need.
[A few hours later, he said] I think [these ideas] should be free so that someone will actually do it. I can see such a site really bringing more joy to a lot of people's lives. And the world needs more joy.
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I'll timestamp the idea creation roughly at 10:40am, December 9, 2010. Codename "Drew the Cook," although the idea's creator is neither named Drew nor a cook. ("Drew the cook" means something in my record-keeping.) The footnote about joy can be much more precisely timestamped: Thu, Dec 9, 2010 at 9:23 PM (USA EST, GMT -5).