VIRTUAL DATING: The Real Thing In a world dominated by computers, it would not be difficult to imagine-at this point- that dating would change dramatically with the Internet. And it has. Boy, has it! STORY AND PHOTOS BY DAN SMITH How about a staggering statistic or two to start your day? There are 54.25 million "of-age" single people in the U.S. right now and 41.25 million of them have tried online dating. So says statisticbrain.com, which doesn't stop there. It goes on to tell us that online dating revenue is $1.25 billion annually, or $239 per dater, per year. If you meet online and ultimately get married-which almost never happens, according to our little local unofficial survey-it 36 | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2015 Robin Miles, 50, interior designer takes 18.5 months to reach that point. It's 42 months after you meet offline. About 20 percent of all our committed relationships began online-and those are only the people who'll admit it. OK, hold on to your hat. A third-a full third-of women online daters say they've had sex on their first online date. Ten percent of daters are sex offenders. There's a bunch more we could THEROANOKER.COMhttp://www.statisticbrain.com http://www.THEROANOKER.COM