Hey, another online dating story — Match.com and AT&T Wireless are launching a service to let people find compatible matches using their cell phones. The dream is that eventually they’ll be able to use the ability to locate very specifically where a given phone is located to help you find people who are within flirting distance.

This is a new idea here in the states, but as usual the Japanese have beaten us to it — they were doing something similar four years ago with the Lovegety, a device like a pager that contained a profile of your interests and which would go off if you were near another Lovegety user who was a good match for you. Similarly, Howard Rheingold wrote last year about the huge adoption among teens of wireless matching in Brazil. So-called “texting” — flirting by SMS — has also caught on in Europe. Just like all other things mobile phone-related, we’re playing catch-up — it will be interesting to see if services like this have the same impact here as they have there.