No, he's got a pretty good point. Dating people that you already know really does help in filtering out people that might otherwise take you several dates to realize aren't any good for you. You can get to know single members of the opposite sex, prior to trying to fuck them. Getting "set up" by friends can be extremely awkward and sometimes people don't have good judgement in that sort of thing, but it can also work great because hopefully the people matching the couple up know them, know their interests etc. And just the fact that you're running in the same social circles automatically means that you're likely more compatible than two strangers meeting over the internet. But "set ups" aside, meeting someone through friend or a hobby/activity is a pretty good way to go about things. If you're dating online, you either have to be extremely lucky, or go through a lot of chicks, before you're going to stumble across one that's even reasonably compatible for you.
So then you friend up with a couple of them and fuck their friends who do not work with you. Everyone wins!