Online I think it flips somewhat because of the quintile skew, since there's typically more men online looking for women than women looking for men there ends up being a shift where women pick the highest quintile attractive males and males end up being effectively pushed down in matches while females tend to be more immune to quintile preferences since the men will adjust down just to be successful.

[jonmillward.com]

TL;DR: A man in the top 5 percentile of looks will pull less interest than a Plain Jane middle-of-the-distribution female, and for guys who do NOT cut model-level cheekbones and 6'0+ height, the statistics are far grimmer.

I think it could also be the cultural expectation that a man pursue a woman and that a woman not pursue a man. Women put their best pictures in order to be pursued and a man to make a woman happy to be pursued by them. That could definitely lead to some of the bias.

I do agree that such a thing leads to men who are not at the most attractive to receive no messages and for average and above women to feel bombarded by them.

Women are also usually more selective about whom they message. For instance most women will usually not message someone they have nothing in common with but a man sometimes will if he finds the woman attractive. In my profiles I have strictly put that I don't want a religious person and still get Christians, Catholics and hardcore religious types messaging me.

@ThereIsADog but isn't that also a sign of the skew (and something akin to online desperation) in that more men will be forced to broaden their scope in order to increase their chances of getting anything, while women have a deluge of messages and can therefore pick only the top quintile?

Culture likely does pay a role, but even so, the numbers alone favor the average-and-above females more than the average male.

I agree that it's a problem and have personally heard from men that online dating can be humbling at best and confidence crushing at worst. I don't think it's remotely the best system. If society encouraged women to pursue it might help but even that won't even the numbers. I think meeting women in meet up groups can be a much better experience. Even if a woman isn't interested she will talk to you and get to know you. There isn't that sterile rejection of no replies that there is online.

@ThereIsADog I hear atheist introvert misanthropic MeetUps are all the rage now

But, I do agree. Real life beats quintiles and statistics, and I agree that women don't typically message first, though in an era greater (more awarenesses of) equality I find that an odd throwback.

Still, I was very surprised to get three unsolicited messages as the numbers are against it.