eHarmony is planning an extra long Free Communication Weekend this New Year. Starting next Thursday, January 1st to January 4th 2009 new members of eHarmony will be able to not only review matches for free but communicate with them as well (just like a paid member).

Since we started counting, this makes it, Free Communication Weekend number 14 for eHarmony. The last two were in November, 2008. This would be a good time to see if eHarmony is the type of dating service for you as the next time this promotion most likely will be available (if history is any indication) is in February, on the Valentine's Day weekend.

Read our eHarmony review for more information on this award winning dating site.

Last year we started the 2007 Dating Sites Reviews Choice Awards in late August and it was a resounding success. This year we hope to continue the momentum with the 2008 Dating Sites Reviews Choice Awards! This annual event attempts to find the best online dating site for the current year in several dating categories. Our visitors can also participate in this selection process.

First up is the poll for the Single's Choice Award. This award is our top award and is voted on by you. This year you can select from 10 of the most popular dating sites on the internet today. Please cast your vote:

For this year's Editor's Top Picks Awards we plan on keeping the same dating award categories as 2007. They are:

• Top Pick - Over All
• Top Pick - Innovative
• Top Pick - Match System
• Top Pick - Christian
• Top Pick - Senior
• Top Pick - Canadian
• Top Pick - Wealthy
• Top Pick - Sexy

• Is the site popular with online daters?
• Would I recommend this dating site over others within the category?
• Are most members happy with the dating service?
• Is the dating site striving to offer the best user experience?
• Are new features being explored and is the dating site being updated to take advantage of new technologies?

This year's dating awards are expected to wrap up by late November. Take a look at last year's winners with our Summary of the 2007 Dating Sites Reviews Choice Awards.

Related items: Poll - 2008 Dating Sites Reviews Single's Choice Award.

I logged into Yahoo! Personals the other day to note any changes and notice a few surprises with regards to the memberships. The first is, Yahoo has gone from 3 membership levels down to 2. Their Premier Membership has been removed and the remaining membership pricing will be just a dollar more, when compared to the old casual membership. Subscription prices are now between $13.99 to $25.99 per month depending on the length of the membership. The old Premier prices for a month ranged from $20.83 to $39.95. The features that where part of the Premier subscription level (which dealt with searching and rating matches) have either been removed or rolled into the existing paid memberships. The free membership as far as I can tell has remained unchanged.

The major surprise is Yahoo! Personals has a guarantee now. If you purchase a 6 month membership Yahoo will make you a 6-Month Promise. If you do not find someone special by the end of your subscription, they will give you another six months for free. You must have a approved searchable profile with a photo and must communicate with at least 5 different members each month to be eligible. Another nice touch is they will email your status each month to help you keep track of your eligibility.

It appears that the 6-month promise started in May, 2008. I am unsure why Yahoo did not promote this at all since few dating services actually offer a guarantee. If promoted they would have brought in more members and received some free publicity from dating blogs such as this one. Sometimes you have to wonder about large companies marking departments, it doesn't take much to release a press release.

Yahoo Personals promise is very similar to Match.com "Make Love Happen Guarantee". In fact it is virtually the same except for a few small details. I guess they figured if it works for Match, it will work for Yahoo.

For more information on Yahoo! Personals, please read our review.

Since you are divorced, please reply with the county and state of your divorce proceedings, the name of the judge, and the date your divorce was finalized. We hope you understand that this information is very important in order to protect the integrity of our matching process. Once this information is received, we will be very happy to reset your Relationship Questionnaire for you. You will need to retake the questionnaire so that we can accurately assess your relationship needs and provide matches who are deeply compatible with you.

I notice over at Yahoo! Personals that they have 14 different job position openings with categories ranging from User Experience and Design, Engineering, Marketing and Business Development and Finance. Each position has an in depth description of what you would be required to do at the job and what schooling and work experience you must have. There is also a link so you can apply online. So if you are a Designer, a web developer or a Product Manager why don't you give Yahoo a try?

On a side note, if you are a web developer and get the job at Yahoo Personals, the first thing you can work on is the "Things not looking quite right?" notification I received when viewing the job openings page. I am using Internet Explorer 7, one of the browsers Yahoo Personals does recommend!