One thing I’ll say about the old model was that out of all the dating apps, Bumble was the only one where every woman who I met or even just messaged with could hold a conversation. That one requirement of them reaching out first set the bar, and I knew they were making the choice to speak to me out of all the other guys they were drowning in. I ended up with more dates through Bumble than any other app, and even made great friends with some people I didn’t romantically click with. Online dating is awful, or was for me, but Bumble was the least awful one of the bunch. The new model sounds not so great.
I met my fiancée on Bumble 4 years ago, but I also created this from my experience on the app:
“We’re seeing a greater need for authentic human connections”
I’m going to take a wild guess and wager that this is about increasing engagement by increasing the amount of opening moves that are created on the platform.
Dating sites profit by increasing engagement with the platform, not by getting you an “authentic connection” that gets you off the platform and into a healthy relationship.
There’s a reason people are going analog again. They know these sites are just a thirst trap.
Calling it a thirst trap is too innocent. These dating app companies are scum-sucking vampires designed to make most people feel lonely and desperate enough to give them money in perpetuity. People just handed one of the most important and intimate aspects of their lives over to US tech bros, pressured everyone else to do the same, and two whole generations are not just having less sex than their parents, but half of them have never had a long-term relationship as they’re approaching 30.
Why can’t we go back to meeting people on BBS and forums. Shit I met my partner in 2009 on a forum. It was organic and real, no apps, no algorithms just good ol’ fashion php with a dash of flame war.
Or just… talk to people IRL? I met my wife at my apartment complex, and plenty more meet their SOs at a local social event or whatever. Go to meetups for stuff you’re interested in and talk to people. I trust that way more than dating apps that pair you with strangers given a short bio…
Yeah, talking to people sucks, I get it. I’m quite introverted and need to relax after putting myself out there. When I met my wife, we texted for 2-3 days before I had enough social energy to ask her out on a date, even though I was quite interested in her. She’s a little introverted as well, so we’re a good match.
Text is way easier for me, but in-person is way more effective. Most of my friends met their SOs in person at some kind of meetup, whether a DND night, tech meetup, or a dance (not a club, that’s way too loud). Online worked for my brother, but I just don’t see nearly as much success as with in-person meetups, at least among my friends.
People especially women hate meeting people in public. It’s either “inappropriate,” or there’s music louder than a war playing. There is no in between.
I’m talking about pretty “safe” settings, like:
- game night with mutual friends - your and their friends will help keep things on the level
- co-ed sports (again, with mutual friends)
- community events, such as at a local library or whatever
- meetups for interests - often hosted at some local business that does something related to the thing (I’m a dev, so I go to local Rust, Go, Python, and JS meetups on occasion)
In other words, places where people are “forced” to interact doing something that interests them, while around other people that could come to your aid if someone is being creepy. The goal shouldn’t be to find a SO (that attracts the wrong type), but to interact with people that share an interest. You should be looking to make friends, and if that blossoms into something more, I guess that’s cool too. Don’t go into it looking for an SO, go into it looking to engage about something you enjoy.
I think we should get a blind match dating app, where we emphasize on the content and not on the visuals. You just add some information about what kind of a person you are, what you are looking for, etc. and after you match and exchange some messages, you can open the pictures.
But dating apps are turning into those cheap e-commerce sites where everyone judges the items by the packaging and no one actually cares about the content. And mind you in a lot of cases the pictures of the packaging are highly exaggerated or from a couple of years, from better times. And you know, no matter how shiny this package is, there would be a day you will need to throw it in the trash and you will need to decide whether to throw the product along or only the package.
Excuse my metaphors.
I have an inkling that would result in people speedrunning all the stuff up until they can see what someone looks like…
Looks do matter, and everyone has different preferences.
The problem isn’t that people are judging people based on only their looks, it’s that these companies have tuned their matching algorithms to match people who enjoy each others appearance, and specifically don’t like each other as people.
In reality, for a satisfying relationship you need both. It’s really hard to be more than friends with someone that physically repulses you, and it’s really hard to be more than friends with benefits with someone you don’t like as a person.
By specifically tuning their system to only give you one, and never the other, they keep people in the grind. You might be pretty happy using these apps for hookups, but even there the algorithm will actively be working against you stumbling onto someone you might wanna meet more than once, because they want you back to swiping for the next person asap.
The fact remains that the matchmaking industry is doomed to be toxic in a capitalist system, because actually being good at it, also means getting rid of your customers.
So… tinder? Every other dating app?
