"Urban Cougar: it's not a stigma, it's a sophisticated species of female who seeks the pleasure of younger males. She avoids the entanglements of a "relationship," in favor of the freedom of the hunt.

This website is a celebration of the urbancougar lifestyle, the women who embody it, and the prey who love them for it![Via urbancougar.com]

You never know how you'll get your big idea. For an ambitious 29-year-old entrepreneur who calls himself Dynomite, the eureka moment came after a one-night stand with an older woman, aka a cougar. Thus was born the CougarConnection (www.urbancougar.com), a fledgling online dating service that would make Mrs. Robinson proud.

For the uninitiated, a cougar is a woman who finds herself (gasp!) on the "wrong" side of 35 and has a predilection for younger action. CEO Dynomite and cofounder "Cash Money" are hoping they can make some bucks, if not yuks, from a cultural moment when celebrity cougars—Cher, Joan Collins—are brazenly taking up with buffed boy toys. "An older woman has so much to offer a younger man," says Dynomite, who estimates his site's male-to-female ratio is two to one. "She's someone who doesn't have as many insecurities, knows what she wants, and isn't afraid to pick up the check."

Will their Harold and Maude mating scheme allow them to quit their day jobs? (Cash Money sells software; Dynomite, real estate.)

"CougarConnection has hit the ground running," says Dynomite, who admits he doesn't yet have figures for May-December romances stirred by the site. (A quick log-on reveals that the site piggybacks on passion.com, a seamy "dating" portal for erotic encounters of every breed.) But even if the founders do acquire fame and fortune from their fetish, can they weather the criticism from a culture steeped in PC righteousness? "We haven't received a single negative email," insists Cash Money. Dynomite's mother was initially disappointed—that she wasn't the first Cougar of the Month. "My mother is proud of the fact she married a man eight years younger. She constantly calls me with new ideas." [Via sanfran.com By Leslie Crawford]