The techno-yenta has arrived. And she is a terrible, yet irrepressible creature. Rendezbook.com, founded by Harvey Mudd College junior Thomas Barr, builds off of the Facebook.com in order to match mutually interested parties with one another. Users log in, and are greeted with their Facebook friend list. Next to each friend, the user may check a box if he or she would like to renew or strengthen a friendship, date or have a relationship with a friend, or have a random fling. The idea is that if two people want to have a random fling with one another, they are notified of the match. If a pair doesn’t match up, the object of desire hasn’t a clue. This ingenious system efficiently saves admirers the laborious effort of traditional social ritual. It also protects the user from risk and rejection.

Prior to Rendezbook (pronounced RON-day-book), initiative needed to be taken in order to progress from stalker to half of a happy couple. Yes, one could scrutinize profile interests, memorize favorite quotes and use Photoshop to insert oneself into pictures of the beloved. But, the object of affection still had to be cornered after class or sent a carefully-crafted AIM message to find out if the feelings might be mutual. The uncertainty was nerve-wracking—what if, after all that mustering of courage, the initiator was rejected? Oh, the embarrassment and personal shame that would entail! Still, there was no other way. Unless one wanted to end up a brittle spinster, risks were a necessary evil.

But our generation hates risks. This is largely due to the fact that we have never had to take them. Our parents voted at PTA meetings to outlaw tag at recess because it made us feel like losers. We were told by our teachers that there are no stupid questions and that all interpretations are valid. When we are asked a question we do not know, we can look it up on the spot with our laptops and always sound informed without knowing anything. As a result of taking few risks, the idea of failure petrifies our generation. Fortunately, the desire to get a mate seems to be strong enough to have forced us to swallow our fears and put ourselves out there—sort of. Many of us have learned the fine art of circumlocution, the skill of interpreting cryptic away messages and the great potential of utilizing a random hook-up as a prelude to a serious relationship. It once seemed impossible to excise the terrifying middle part on the path from being friends to being more-than-friends. We had to fumble through uncertainty and the possibility of failure and rejection. Until Rendezbook came along.

Rendezbook is a harbinger of technology actively negotiating human interactions. With online communities such as Facebook and MySpace, which receives more daily hits than Google, we have found a way to replace our disappearing tangible neighborhoods. We don’t go to the corner store to catch the latest gossip; we read blogs. Technology serves as a passive vehicle for us to interact with one another, as a means of communication that shapes the substance of our interactions—witness Facebook. Logically, the next step is to elevate the Internet to an active role negotiating the less efficient parts of life for us—as Rendezbook helps us avoid the possibility of risk and rejection.

Rendezbook could be only the beginning. Sex is often the forerunner of change. The “world’s oldest profession,” prostitution, represents the rise of currency and tangible communities. In the modern day, the sex industry was one of the first sectors to take advantage of the Internet as a virtual agora—pornography, sex forums and dating sites comprised some of the earliest Internet communities.

Our initial reaction may be to reject Rendezbook and the implications of social change it brings. But if we do so, it is only based on morals handed to us by our pre-technical revolution parents. As our culture becomes yet more intertwined and accustomed to technology it seems probable, for better or for worse, that our children or our children’s children will be free of such moral scruples. If not we, then they will embrace an easier life of computer-assisted match-making and general efficiency.