SIRC Guide to Flirting: what social science tells you about flirting

This all may be eye-rolling advice but some of it is still worth jogging the subconscious about:<p>&#62; <i>When asked about flirting, most people – particularly men – focus on the verbal element: the ‘chatting-up’, the problems of knowing what to say, finding the right words, etc. In fact, the non- verbal element – body-language, tone of voice, etc. – is much more important, particularly in the initial stages of a flirtation. When you first meet new people, their initial impression of you will be based 55% on your appearance and body-language, 38% on your style of speaking and only 7% on what you actually say.</i><p>I can't be the only hacker in here who has wondered why a slickly produced shallow essay got more interest than the substantive essay printed on a static HTMl file set to 12 pt. Times New Roman/100% width. How Apple managed to succeed despite the respect of many an intelligent hardware enthusiast is a classic example.<p>This is partially related to attractiveness, yes, but all things being even, the presentation that is more thoughtfully welcome, accommodating, and empathetic...regardless of content...will have a surprisingly higher reach than we might expect

&#62; <i>The most striking exception to this rule is horseracing, where all the ‘action’ takes place in just a few minutes, the half-hour interval between races is dedicated to sociability, and friendly interaction between strangers is actively encouraged by racecourse etiquette. In fact, our own recent research on the behaviour of racegoers indicates that the ‘social micro-climate’ of the racecourse makes it one of the best flirting environments in Britain.</i><p>This is one of the most impressive conclusions the text comes to, because though the social climate absolutely leads itself to be a great place to flirt, I can only imagine the kind of people who would hit on me at the racetrack (or someones reaction when I tell them where I met my love).

"When you first approach an attractive stranger, having established at least an indication of mutual interest through eye contact, try to make eye contact again at about 4ft away, before moving any closer. At 4 ft (about two small steps away), you are on the borderline between what are known as the ‘social zone’ (4 to 12 ft) and the ‘personal zone’ (18in to 4ft).<p>If you receive a positive response at 4ft, move in to ‘arm’s length’ (about 2ft 6in)."<p>Reminds me of the "How To" Goofy cartoons -&#62; <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xxeL9bdSu-A&#38;t=102" rel="nofollow">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xxeL9bdSu-A&#38;t=102</a>

I had a young business co-founder who was into this stuff. Turned out to be a disaster. A top company was interested in incubating us, but didn't read a link she sent them soon enough, so she killed it and forced them to ask for it again. Another person wanted to connect us with some interested investors, and she agreed to meet, then canceled, then re-offered, etc.. It was just constant promise-withdraw routines and other flirting stuff to make her seem busy and valuable and desirable and someone to chase, but everyone else, myself included, were just old and tired and just wanted to get down to business and it was a major turn off.

I just read a couple of pages, and this is a great read.<p>"If you are mainly looking for flirting opportunities, . . . . seek out clubs full of happy, sociable under-achievers."<p>It's pure comedy gold, Jerry!<p>Having said that: I hate to stereotype, but I find us geeks (men) to be pretty bad at flirting. I don't know if a 26-page tome will solve that problem or not....

The PDF's metadata and the Internet Archive Wayback Machine say that this item (available via <a href="http://www.sirc.org/publik/flirt.html" rel="nofollow">http://www.sirc.org/publik/flirt.html</a>) originated thirteen years ago. Surely we readers of Hacker News don't fit the "awkward geek" stereotype that well?!<p>There is a newer "advanced" guide: <a href="http://www.sirc.org/publik/advanced_flirting.shtml" rel="nofollow">http://www.sirc.org/publik/advanced_flirting.shtml</a>

Well, at least this brings me from "I don't understand anything about flirting" to "Here's a list of everything I don't understand about flirting."

This topic is hard to compute. Why can't there just be an open source standard

Disclaimer: I have great respect for women. If you are a woman, please don't take offense from this post. Because none is intended. As your archetypical computer nerd, I had a very hard time dating. These are things that helped me. I want to share this info with other guys like me. Sort of like ... I wish I knew this when I was young.<p>----<p>I had a very hard time with the ladies. Somethings that helped:<p>- Move to a place with a better male-female ratio.<p>- Move to a place where you seem like a good catch.<p>- Seek out women in different professions than tech (I am convinced there are too few geek girls to go around. I never realized how bad the odds were.)<p>That's it. Seriously. For me, it was about location-location-location. I firmly believe there are certain cities full of women who just tease - they string you along as friends but no more. If you have had no dating success in 1-2 years, you might be in a dating dead-zone.<p>Some things that helped (but I sucked at doing these):<p>- Gym<p>- Good clothes (not by my definition but by a young woman's definition - these did not match at all. We're talking bright colors, shopping at Express ... this nearly brought a tear to my eye.)<p>- Good haircut (again, I thought I looked like an idiot ... the ladies really like it. Spiky hair=catnip?)<p>- Read "The Game" - it is not about pick ups. It is about confidence. Frankly, I think the same ideas described in this book for picking up women are used by so-called hustlers and suits in making business deals.<p>Heh ... maybe I should do a more detailed post on this one day. I clearly spent way too much thinking about this subject when I was single :p<p>Some important things:<p>a) DO NOT GET DEPRESSED! There are lots of losers out there. Getting with a loser is easy. One reason you are single is you want something better.<p>b) DON'T LOSE YOUR IDENTITY!! A lot of women described me as geeky when I was young. So what? I do what I love. That said, I'm okay compromising on clothes. However, when I dated women who wanted to change me completely, it was me who broke it off. That said, I do try to reduce my overall level of geekiness in front of strangers. Don't overwhelm them ;-)<p>c) DON'T GET DEPRESSED! When you are young, single and geeky, it might seems like the one thing you need to make life work is a mate. That's not true. Trust me. There are benefits to being single - like time to play video games, board games, travel on your own, hack around, read books, attend tech events, whatever you want. Never lose respect for yourself!<p>Best of luck to all my single, geeky HNers. I hope some of this will help.

WhyaretherenospacesinChrome'sbuilt-inPDFviewer?<p>tl;dr; Chrome's built-in PDF viewer has trouble with this file.

Ah, SIRC is great.<p>Their British Pub culture guide (<a href="http://www.sirc.org/publik/ptpintro.html" rel="nofollow">http://www.sirc.org/publik/ptpintro.html</a>) is the best and I think the only available research on the subject. It really helped me when I moved to the UK...

On Chrome/Fedora that PDF has no spaces between letters at all.

Hacker News: where we discuss advanced programming and elementary social skills.<p>I wonder if there's somewhere out there where it's the reverse.

Its rather mroe introductory but it's still an interesting and informative read. Defintiely something to print out and read when bored or give to a younger brother or any young person entering high school or college. Wish I had this when I was beggining my college days.