We all like to think that before online dating, couples met exclusively through romcom-ready meet-cutes at the airport or in the bookstore.
But finding someone to date hasn't always been that easy — with or without Match.com. And if you want proof that technology has actually made things less awkward, a video from the '80s that's been making the rounds online will prove it.
The clip is called "Video Dating" and was uploaded by Found Footage Festival, a group that culls unbelievable clips from vintage VHS tapes, a few years ago. It's been re-uploaded to Vimeo and YouTube so many times that it's tough to tell how many times it's been viewed, but it's gone viral a few times over.
The footage in "Video Dating" is from 1987, FFF says, and features men basically delivering the video equivalent of a Tinder bio.
They sit in front of colorful backgrounds and try to sell themselves to the women who are (hopefully) watching.
The results are incredibly awkward.
Combine them with the unfortunate mustaches and loud sweater patterns, and you have to cringe.
"Hi, I'm Maurice. I'm an executive by day and a wild man by night."
"I'm looking for the goddess. Are you the goddess? Who's the goddess? A goddess is a woman, the woman, it's all women."
"No hamsters."
"I'm currently involved in cleaning up toxic waste."
"I've decided that I'm lonely."
"A co-ed bubble bath is something I've always wanted to try out."
"I seek a person that is childlike."
The video itself has been making the rounds online for a few years. Three of the guys featured in it even got to appear on "The Ellen Show" in 2012. They're mostly still single.
It's tough to find much info online about how the process of "video dating" actually worked beyond shooting videos like this one, but one Reddit user offered this explanation:
"Before there were dating sites, there were dating services. What many of them did was have the members record a video introducing themselves. [...] In order to view the videos people would go into the service's building. The staff would typically give people a bunch of videos to look at that they had pre-screened for common interests, much like dating sites do now but it was done by people rather than computers."
So yeah, just think about how much effort and desperation that took next time you think creating a new online dating profile is too much trouble.
Watch the entire cringe-worthy video below. And then maybe dash off a thank-you note to the inventor of your favorite dating app.
