Hrmm... internet dating which will in turn result in a real relationship. Ok, I'm going to share a few stories with you about my experiences with this.
Back in the good ol days of the internet sometime around 1995 a friend of mine brought over a floppy disk and said "this is going to change your life". So what was it? Yep... good ol mIRC. He opened up the world of chatting on the computer to anyone in the world. How cool is this! So I would spend all my waking hours meeting other people my age and chatted most of my mid-teens doing such. During this time I had met a girl who lived in Toronto, Canada. I live in Michigan. We talked A LOT and eventually sent a few snail-mails and included pictures. Once the pictures were sent we grew even closer, and we really wanted to meet eachother. Being 5 hours away that isn't a simple task. I convinced my parents to take a weekend and go to Toronto cuz I had never been. Then I also told them I knew someone and wanted to go to the mall where we chould meet up.
So... we met, things were good, the sparks started to fly and we talked more. Used the phone, used letters, used email... etc. Then I would drive to Toronto once a month or maybe twice and spend the weekend at her place. (Now that I think of it I was only 16 at the time and I can't believe my parents let me drive to another country and stay with a stranger... scary) and sometimes she would take the train here and stay with us. To make this short... we were dating for a good 2 years or so. It was very hard with the distance and being so young... so it eventually fizzled out.
Now, call me crazy (or maybe just a geek) but I still used IRC once in high school and went to a local channel where people from michigan always hung out. Met this girl on there who happened to live only 10 minutes away. We talked a lot online... then eventually decided to meet somehow, and did. That turned out really well and we continued dating for nearly 7 months. We seperated when we both graduated and were heading to different Universities....
Lastly I bring you to the last example I've had. Once I came to college my roomates had a fantasy football league starting up, and I signed up. We did a lot of it through email/ICQ so we had to get everyone's info. Out of this group of about 20-25 people, there was one girl. I didn't see her, but I had her ICQ number. So one friday night when my roomates left me bored and alone I decided to chat. She was also home and we talked until 4 in the morning. The next day, chatted again for hours. So, we figured before we made any "trades" we should go to a movie or something. So we did... and now it has been over 3 years and we are still happily together and will be getting married in less than 2 years.
I don't know how that relates to your question, but just some examples showing the internet CAN work for meeting people and it isn't always some scary freak on the other side! I'm not sure about those internet ads people put in, but hey, it could work.