We aren't comparing being a barfly with online dating, we are talking about online dating replacing how couples traditionally meet - which has been mainly through friends or through family.
BTW, it's pretty easy to get dates in most social places (not just bars, but bars are included) if you have good social skills. Having good social skills also makes other aspects of your life better in as well.
Problem with online dating is it seems to make people fickle and overly critical, which is the reason I gave up online dating. Few years later I meet my spouse, in a bar.
Was he/she surprised to see you? That must have been awkward...(kidding, of course)
I mostly missed online dating the first time around, but after getting out of a long term relationship last year, I gave it a shot. Seemed to at least be a way to improve the statistical side of things.
I agree that it can make people fickle and critical. It often seemed as though people treated it like window-shopping on Amazon. I'd certainly never run across the phenomenon of "ghosting" in more traditional dating compared to online dating, but sure enough, you could go out with someone several times and enjoy yourself...only to have them drop off the face of the earth as their interest moved on.
I certainly didn't expect to be of interest to everyone (or even many at all) but while I can handle polite rejection as well as anyone could expect, the frequency of ghosting was a real surprise.
Still, there were positives. Went out with some lovely people who I would still consider friends or at least friendly acquaintances today. Met one person who I'm still involved with after several months. And it just felt like an interesting and more direct way to connect people specifically looking to date.
It's like being able to go to a bar or other social meeting place and then specifically ask to hang out only with people single-and-looking who you might be interested in. Doing that in the real world is a lot harder to approximate.
BTW, it's pretty easy to get dates in most social places (not just bars, but bars are included) if you have good social skills. Having good social skills also makes other aspects of your life better in as well.
Problem with online dating is it seems to make people fickle and overly critical, which is the reason I gave up online dating. Few years later I meet my spouse, in a bar.