16 ms·

Five Years That Changed Dating

109 points by lnguyen 8y ago

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
bachmeier 8y ago
As someone that has been married for 16 years (and not looking for someone for considerably longer than that) this sounds like a giant leap for mankind. A market of other people who signal that they are also looking, but whom you are unlikely to ever interact with again if it doesn't work out.
- village-idiot 8y ago
  I’m in the opposite corner. Watching my single acquaintances try and fail with dating apps is kind of depressing.
  - nradov 8y ago
    Why do you think they're failing?
    - LoSboccacc 8y ago
      Dunno about op but can tell what I see here: dating on tinder has become kinda an online shopping experience with a convenient return policy included. That's to say I see people just so focused to look for a prefer match that they forgot what a relationship and growing tougher is. There's far too romanticism and unrealistic expectations involved and too little effort and commitment put into it. Hard to quantify and pinpoint the issue exactly, but in general looking for that one love seems the issue.
    - village-idiot 8y ago
      I can only speak for the male side, since said acquaintances are male. Men almost never get matched back. Even moderate to moderate good looking men in stable careers get matched back ~10% of the time, and get fewer dates still.
      - ryandrake 8y ago
        If the number is as high as 10%, then they just need this automatic right-swiping device [1]. At 10% they wouldn't even need to run it overnight. 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IaoDfOaYF4w https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IaoDfOaYF4w
        pseudalopex 8y ago
        Users report that swiping right too often decreases your swipe limit and how often other users see your profile.
        village-idiot 8y ago
        Makes sense, they’d want to dissuade this exact behavior.
- watwut 8y ago
  Crucialy, you don't interact with them before attempting to date either. So the pre-selection one normally does, the one based on observing how the other person interacts with others when not trying to impress, is not available. I think I would expect more "did not worked out" outcomes without that pre-selection. I mean, that preselction is way more important when looking for potential long term partner and closer to how you will be treated then dating which is sort of artificial situation.
- theoh 8y ago
  Anecdotal evidence from smaller markets (city of just a million or so) is that online dating doesn't work, and you certainly can't be sure of not running into people again. Your comment evokes something like a tuple space, where people are essentially querying a database by uploading their dating profile. Tinder's "architecture", whereby only mutual matches are informed, is a bit like that in principle. In practice it means there is no way to message someone who hasn't matched with you, whether because they are not actively looking through matches or some other reason: there is no way for contact to be initiated unilaterally. This is a big change in the dynamics of the dating situation. I'd almost prefer a professional matchmaking service to the kind of "shadow labour" that's involved in swiping through Tinder profiles—particularly because of this problem of matches being, as it were, a passive/uncoordinated rather than active/coordinated phenomenon. Unfortunately, Tinder's interface encourages very superficial judgements based on appearance, and the way you are required to "flirt" by text with people you haven't met is absolutely a bad thing.
- hopler 8y ago
  That's a recipe for the destruction of society. It's a good thing that people development a reputation visible to would-be mates.
village-idiot 8y ago
First: I think that dating apps are fantastic for small sub populations that might otherwise have a hard time meeting each other. Grindr, JSwipe, MuzMatch, etc. But for the larger population, I’m not sure that apps like Tinder are a good idea. For every few positive stories, including the ones in the article, there seems to be dozens of stories of misogynistic rants, unsolicited dick picks, and worse. Men appear to suffer pretty bad on the match ratio with the vast majority of matches going to a minority of men, while women appear to suffer the majority of the abuse. It seems pretty inefficient, and I’m kind of amazed that everyone seems to have an unspoken agreement to keep using these apps.
- stared 8y ago
  I would add OKCupid (though, it started changing in the direction of Tinder, sadly). For small populations it is easy to filter people based on their preferences. On Tinder it you interact with "mainstream" and it feels like searching for a needle in the haystack... just to get to one's target group. On a lighter tone, http://www.collegehumor.com/post/6948732/what-youre-really-saying-with-your-dating-app http://www.collegehumor.com/post/6948732/what-youre-really-s....
  - village-idiot 8y ago
    I had no idea most of these existed. I thought badoo was a search engine?
    - kachnuv_ocasek 8y ago
      You probably confused that with Baidu.
- lotsofpulp 8y ago
  The long term monogamous dating market requires two people to accept that they likely won’t find someone better than the person they have found, so putting all of the options at one’s fingertips increases the risk of feeling like you could have done better.
robertAngst 8y ago
EDIT: Married since 2012 here: At first glance, Tinder sounded like some end game dating opportunity. While its first users were embarrassed to say they were doing online dating, I reassured them- Its fine! Find your SO! Years later, it seems to have turned into a world of unmet expectations. When its incredibly easy to find a date, people don't seem to try as hard to make things work. They find flaws and compare. The worst offenders never seem to be happy. Admittedly, it might have also further shrunk the pool of "the good ones", where the only people left have bad jobs, drug problems, and incredibly high expectations. On another note, I'm wondering how it has changed Sex. It seems sex has never been easier to have due to these dating apps. I wonder if people will be able to settle down.
- e40 8y ago
  All the articles I've read say people are having less sex. I don't know if they are true, but it definitely seems to fly in the face of the readily available dating apps. I can tell you, as a lurker in some of the dating subreddits, it seems lots of guys complain they never get matches, or rarely do. And, a lot of the women complain about a constant stream of terrible matches with men. Here's a thought: maybe focusing purely on looks (like Tinder does) isn't a good recipe for sexual compatibility.
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
  - hopler 8y ago
    Tinder promotes the ancient practice of polygamy, very effectively. The highest status males are having sex with many many women , and the major of males are having less than their peers of the last did. Women hold mostly steady but are more like to part of a "harem" than a monogamt relationship.
    - bb611 8y ago
      Is there data to support this argument?
stared 8y ago
Side note - does anyone know why did OKCupid get "tinderfied"? I mean: - requires real first name (bad if you name is too common or too rare; also, it was cool and a great discussion starter) EDIT: real names by default - messages only after likes (it changes the dynamics a lot; before I got much more interesting discussions) - option to swipe (fortunately, still it is possible to search) Vide: - https://www.marketwatch.com/story/why-these-women-are-quitting-okcupid-after-it-required-daters-to-use-their-real-names-on-the-site-2017-12-26 https://www.marketwatch.com/story/why-these-women-are-quitti... - https://www.reddit.com/r/OkCupid/comments/7pv9mp/ladies_of_okcupid_how_are_you_liking_the_recent/ https://www.reddit.com/r/OkCupid/comments/7pv9mp/ladies_of_o... - https://theblog.okcupid.com/why-okcupid-is-changing-how-you-message-f14d492e7853 https://theblog.okcupid.com/why-okcupid-is-changing-how-you-... (may make sense for some mainstream, basing their judgments of appearance... but then - why not Tinder? plus, it is easy to filter too short or repetitive messages, so if OKC only wanted to solve that, it would be a piece of cake) My two cynical guesses are: a) there is a Tinder mole in OKC b) since they are owned by the same group, there will be a post showing it was natural to join two (effectively killing OKC)
- miduil 8y ago
  requires real first name (bad if you name is too common or too rare; also, it was cool and a great discussion starter) That is not true, https://help.okcupid.com/article/67-how-to-change-your-name https://help.okcupid.com/article/67-how-to-change-your-name : We ask that you use your first name instead of a username, but if you're not comfortable showing your first name, feel free to use initials or a nickname, as long as it's something you're comfortable having your date call you! Edit: (See other posting in sub-thread) Also: messages only after likes (it changes the dynamics a lot; before I got much more interesting discussions) I don't think this is a good argument for "tinderification". There were so many people (mostly men) harassing other people (mostly women) on OkCupid. I think this was a proper measurement to reduce unwelcome messages. https://twitter.com/OKCupidmen https://twitter.com/OKCupidmen https://shitguyssayonokcupid2.tumblr.com/ https://shitguyssayonokcupid2.tumblr.com/
  - stared 8y ago
rococode 8y ago
I think the 80/20 problem - the top 80% of women matching with top 20% of men [1] - is a major issue preventing dating (not hookups) with current apps. Most of my guy friends who use Tinder swipe right very generously because they don't match frequently, while my girl friends swipe conservatively since they match pretty much every other guy (or when they need a bit of an ego boost, they can just spam right swipes for a string of matches). I believe the key problem is the high visibility of profile pictures, which makes it easy to stick to unrealistically high expectations for the physical attractiveness of people you're willing to talk with. This is reinforced by the constant stream of pictures - when you're swiping right on the couple of really attractive people every 15-20 profiles, it's much easier to swipe left on people who aren't unattractive to you, but just don't reach that level "ok this person is super hot". In other words, "super interesting and decent-looking", while traditionally a good combination, probably doesn't do particularly well on dating apps. The 80/20 problem, then, comes from the fact that guys swipe right more often than girls, so girls end up matching with a ton of top 20% great-looking guys and feel no need to swipe on the other 80% of guys even though they often never have conversations that go anywhere (at least that's my impression from seeing the smokin hot dudes that my girl friends match with). To be honest, this seems fine for hookups, where you mostly care about physical appearance / attraction. But for longer relationships, I think there's a real lack of effective "modern" options. What I'd like to see is an app where you don't get to see any pictures until you've initiated a conversation (of some minimum length) with a person. So while browsing profiles, you just get a short bio and some demographic information. I also personally think it'd be nice to filter for certain broad categories (education - for example, same school for college-age folks, income, ethnicity, etc), because intuitively I think people tend to end up with people from similar overall backgrounds - but I can see how that could cause problems. Regardless, I think an app where you at least don't see photos of the person you're talking to until a certain amount of conversation would be great. It would deal with a number of issues: 1. the 80/20 problem with respect getting any kind of conversation going is largely solved, as I believe that stems from people having profile pictures to quickly decide yes/no 2. by showing photos at some point, you still take into account the importance of physical attraction, but this time a person's image is backed by some level of existing rapport 3. you make a higher commitment to each person you talk to since you have to talk a certain amount to see what they look like 4. you're more likely to match with people who have shared values and interests since you have to actually talk with them 5. people are more likely to send messages since without pictures, there's never a feeling of "oh this person is out of my league, no point sending a message" It's not perfect but I think it'd be a good start for non-hookup dating apps compared to the current choices. (if you agree with my thoughts and have some spare time pls feel free to make something like that haha) [1] https://medium.com/@worstonlinedater/tinder-experiments-ii-guys-unless-you-are-really-hot-you-are-probably-better-off-not-wasting-your-2ddf370a6e9a https://medium.com/@worstonlinedater/tinder-experiments-ii-g... (not really a rigorous study but the reasoning makes sense)
stared 8y ago
The lack of kindness on Tinder is a know problem - so many female friends showed me outright rude screenshots, especially after these women said they are feminist, or turned down some sex offer. But... why not introduce some rating? (As in Uber or so.) I know it sounds Black Mirror-ish, but if it would penalize rude guys, it would be a win for everyone (incentive + filtering + hetero-women more interested in using this app.)
- dgellow 8y ago
  One person’s perception of rudeness will be what someone else will find funny or honest or ... . Not excusing bad behaviors, it’s just important to consider that looking for a mate/date/kookup is really different for different people, where looking for a car driver will be almost the same for anyone (I would expect, though I’m sure there is also some subtlety there), I don’t think a similar rating system would be adapted.
  - stared 8y ago
    Things like "DTF?" in the first line can be considered rude or direct and honest. Things I saw were like "ugly feminist bitch" after a (previously) "nice" guy had been turned down. It leaves much less space to interpret it as "funny or honest". Plus, all ratings are average. If you are rude to 50% people, it is more than being rude to 5% (maybe actually misunderstanding)%.
    - turtlecloud 8y ago
      The tough thing with dating apps is effectively conveying emotion in a text. that the old adage rings true.. “it’s not what you say, it’s how you say it”
    - dgellow 8y ago
      Do you mean that if you’re rude to 50% you should have a lower grade, so be teamed with other low grades mates? If yes, how is that a good system? If not, then what else do you envision? That’s even without considering that people won’t review fairly, and will abuse such a system and the new power they get by having a higher rank than others.
booleandilemma 8y ago
All women are going after the same top x% of men, so most men miss out. Men are a lot less picky, but the women they’re interested in are too determined on being with the top x% to be interested in them. I think all problems with dating and finding love in general can be shown to stem from this. The obvious solution is to send the top x% of men off to war. Sorry guys ;)
- throwaway555443 8y ago
  Well, yes, but there are other solutions :) The trick is to raise the baselines (as in, every guy should be reasonably fit (quite easy) and well dressed, etc) while having more dimensions on which to measure men and partners (as in, not just bank account; find niches where you can excel, probably the easiest approach is to combine two separate areas/skills, for example be a specialized lawyer, or learn Chinese if you're American and combine it with your profession).
  - Hendrikto 8y ago
    > probably the easiest approach is to combine two separate areas/skills, for example be a specialized lawyer, or learn Chinese if you're American and combine it with your profession No girl I know would be interested in that. I do not know how that could help with dating. I speak 3 languages fluently (German, English, Dutch), and have a biotechnics degree (German BTA) in addition to studying CS atm. Those are specifically the two points you mentioned. Has any girl ever been interested in that? No. What you are describing is a method for getting a job, not a partner.
    - jhwang5 8y ago
      He may have meant his Chinese ability will allow him to widen his dating market to Chinese women.
      - throwaway555443 8y ago
        Not only. I agree the advice is also towards getting a job, but also helps getting a date. Of course, other factors interest women, such as confidence, assertiveness, looks, intelligence, sense of humour and all that. It also depends which age group we're addressing. There's a world of difference between 20, 30 and 40yo. All else being equal, you are more interesting if you speak more languages, for example. Although it depends how you frame/sell it :) Anyway, what I meant to say is that the top X% story is not the whole story. It's not just relative, your absolute status is very important as well.
throwawayasdfgh 8y ago
I'd like to make a couple of comments to put things into perspective. First, this is all US-based. Granted, Tinder is a thing here in Europe but as far as I know the overwhelming majority of sexual encounters here still occurs in meatspace. I do believe online dating only caters to a certain demographic with a certain personality type and the market will be eventually saturated. Likewise, 'dating' as most people know it is primarily an American concept. Due to the cultural influence the US has over the world, this concept has been imported/distorted here (to my dismay, but that's more of a personal view), but the concept of repeatedly taking someone else out until things evolve or devolve (first base, second base, whatever) is just not the norm everywhere in the world. In many places people just hit it off first, then 'date' later. There are also things like arranged marriages, 'debutante balls', and so on. Also, it bears repeating that online dating, in its current implementation, is a privacy nightmare rife with plenty of repulsive and shady practices [1]. There's plenty of research done about this, but what I find worrying is that researchers may request access to the entirety of everyone's conversations with everyone else, complete with username and location database, as well as the history of matches, dismissals, and so on. Likewise, Tinder execs harvest all this precious and intimate data for advertisers with little concern for security or privacy. It also reveals worrying trends about society. Research has shown that "the average woman’s desirability drops from the time she is 18 until she is 60. For men, desirability peaks around 50 and then declines." Likewise with education, "desirability is associated with education most strongly for men, for whom more education is always more desirable. For women, an undergraduate degree is most desirable; postgraduate education is associated with decreased desirability among women." [2] As for ethnicity: "there is also a clear and consistent dependence on ethnicity, with Asian women and white men being the most desirable potential mates by our measures". Black women and Asian men would be the least desirable. (For information, desirability is usually computed by giving everyone a score, usually derived from a PageRank-like method or something like an Elo rating.) I get that people working behind the scenes are not trendsetters and only follow what is currently the norm to maximize user engagement, but in this age of reckoning about big tech and privacy, perhaps now is the time to imagine a product that actually caters to people into dating instead of selling their information, doing creepy data mining and compelling them to stay on the apps? [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18713837 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18713837 [2] Aspirational pursuit of mates in online dating markets (http://advances.sciencemag.org/content/4/8/eaap9815 http://advances.sciencemag.org/content/4/8/eaap9815)
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
golemotron 8y ago
How are OkCupid and Tinder preventing trafficking on their platforms? Even of a loose reading of FOSTA makes them a target for federal action.
fromthestart 8y ago
>Dating apps originated in the gay community; Grindr and Scruff...launched in 2009 and 2010, respectively This is just untrue. Plenty of Fish launched in 2003. Okcupid in 2004. Both clearly listed on wikipedia. What is going on with modern journalism? I'm supposed to put faith in the rest of the article, when the author can't get basic facts straight? What I'd really like to see is a piece on how dehumanizing the online dating game is for men. Yeah, women complain about being sex objects, but all men online are treated with a heavy suspicion of wanting only sex. I think there's a greater developing problem in Western society with hypergamy, but no one is paying any attention to the bottom 20-30% of men who are involuntarily single, and it's only going to get worse, as the idea of male privilege breaks further into the mainstream while ignoring the relative difficulty that modern men increasingly have with romantic fulfilment. Romantic companionship is part of Maslow's Heirarchy for a reason. Having a substantial proportion of the populous lonely and depressed because of unfulfillment of a basic need can't be good for society. And this isn't as easy as simply working on oneself when hypergamy is shifting female standards further and further out of reach of the average male. Perhaps it is time for women to start checking their own privilege.
- hawaiianbrah 8y ago
  Were either of those considered “apps”? Dating sites have been around for a while longer than apps, sure. But they were pretty distinct categories.
- pseudalopex 8y ago
  The author mentions dating sites as predecessors to dating apps. Plenty of Fish and OkCupid launched their apps after Grindr. Also, they were basically mobile websites with notifications.[1] The mobile-first, photo-first experience of online dating today seems to have originated with Grindr. [1] https://www.datingsitesreviews.com/article.php?story=OkCupid-Launches-a-iPhone-App https://www.datingsitesreviews.com/article.php?story=OkCupid...
- bb611 8y ago
  > the bottom 20-30% of men who are involuntarily single Is there data to support this percentage? > Romantic companionship is part of Maslow's Heirarchy for a reason Maslow doesn't classify it as a requirement, it's a contributing element of the Love/Belonging level but there's plenty of self-actualizing people who don't have an intimate partner.
amelius 8y ago
I'm still waiting for an app that matches based on DNA, or scent (pheromones), or both.
- aqme28 8y ago
  How would DNA matching work, and why? Do you want someone with similar DNA to you? Vastly different DNA? This sounds like a terrible idea at the outset.
  - amelius 8y ago
    Well, you have to look at it from a big-data perspective. E.g. train a classifier on a large number of successful and not so successful marriages (or non-partners), using DNA as the underlying data. Now use this classifier to suggest partners in a dating app. Regarding pheromones, there's a lot of scientific research [1]. For example: > Individuals rated those of the opposite sex as more attractive if they preferred the individuals pheromones odour. Now I suppose that preference for pheromones is (at least partially) encoded in DNA somehow. So you can see what I'm getting at. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Body_odour_and_sexual_attraction https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Body_odour_and_sexual_attracti...
- nradov 8y ago
  Yes as the cost of full human genome sequencing is now approaching $100 I think this is inevitably going to happen. Probably a few companies are secretly working on it already.
jarmitage 8y ago
Perhaps you should educate yourself about the fallacious logic and death cult-ism of incel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fD2briZ6fB0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fD2briZ6fB0
- fromthestart 8y ago
  So, one can not criticize the dating experience, and recognize that it is biased in favor of women, without being slandered as an incel? Why do you think more men are turning to such extremism? You think they are perpetually frustrated and bitter by choice? Remember when we used to call these men "geeks" and "nerds"? Why won't anyone acknowledge the validity of their involuntary suffering? These men are marginalized and exist on the outskirts of society for reasons beyond their choosing. Attractiveness is a continuum, and there's only so much one can do to raise ones percieved value to meet the standards of others. It isn't a secret that apps like tinder tend to make women even more selective.
  - empath75 8y ago
    > These men are marginalized and exist on the outskirts of society for reasons beyond their choosing. I can assure you that the reason that most self professed incels are on the outskirts of society is that they’re fucking creepy. I mean have you read their subreddits. They make my skin crawl. And I have no idea what any of them look like.
    - fromthestart 8y ago
      Inceldom is an extremist manifestion of a growing epidemic of loneliness. Frankly, they have nothing to do with this actual discussion, and stifle discussions around male loneliness. >is that they’re fucking creepy. That's the point. They're different. What does creepy mean? Difficulty with social norms? Unusual interests? Physical unnatractiveness? You think these are choices? Incels are just especially self aware and bitter "geeks" and "nerds" of yore, back before those terms were coopted by the mainstream. I think these men are bitter because they exist with the same needs for romance that you and I do, but have no realistic way of actualizing these desires. Their pain is involuntary and real. Look past the vileness of their rhetoric and understand that they are suffering.
hutzlibu 8y ago
What I think is very interesing is how Onlinedating is percieved in different groups: While other groups of people I know everybody is on tinder, but in my local area(germany) a friend of mine is actually ashamed to admit that he met his new date through tinder.. And well, I do not think it is something to be ashamed of, but persanally I also think, that you meet dates in real life.
- grecht 8y ago
  Germany is notoriously slow at adapting "new" things. Think credit cards, internet speed, ...
  - hutzlibu 8y ago
    Think renewable energies, green technology ...
    - grecht 8y ago
      Things that are widely recognized as "good". Who could say no to that for the sake of minimal change? Also, this doesn't affect life in a way that dating or the hassle of having to carry cash with you to buy bread do. Of course Germany's a leader in a lot of things. But Germans do have a tendency to be cautious and sceptical about innovations that would impose a change to their (everyday) life.
blakesterz 8y ago
These comments are pretty interesting, especially the "80/20" and the "top x% of men". Assuming those are both at least partially true... I can't help but think the rankings change within 5 years of being married. That is, what women (probably men too) want when they're dating (or browsing potential matches on apps) changes quite a bit after they're married and have kids. That is to say, things that match you on apps don't keep you happy for the next several decades. Maybe an example would be something like "he's cute and has a good job" is boyfriend material, but ten years later "all he does is work" really gets old fast. Not meaning to generalize at all with this, just some thoughts based on what I've seen around my social groups.
whateveracct 8y ago
The way HN talks about the macro-"economics" of dating and marriage skeeves me out. A very impersonal way of talking about a very human and personal topic.
- InGodsName 8y ago
  Yea, I'd agree with you. After passing their initial filters, they are not very critical of your qualities. But before passing their filters, your qualities absolutely play a role if you were not already in their circle HN people are brainstorming the before the latter thing
qqn 8y ago
The absolute best thing about this piece is learning that there's a woman out there somewhere named Holly Wood.
emberdemonoid 8y ago
I haven't seen anyone here put together, why women are so picky with online dating. I admit that it's easy to say "well, because they can, d'uh", but that is not what I see when I talk to women about dating men. When men complain about bad matches, what they usually mean is that the woman turned out to be boring or not as good looking, hell maybe she even had a kid that she never mentioned. I hardly hear women complain about that. What I hear is that they didn't want to go on a date or maybe wanted to leave one and in response got insults, threats of violence/murder, maybe even someone trying to get handsy if they actually met in meatspace. So the minor factor of "if a woman dates too many men, she's a slut" aside, if women are not picky, they are in danger of getting physically assaulted. If they just reply nicely online and don't agree to a first date, they "only" risk getting insulted and threatened. And having someone stalk you because you rejected them on Tinder doesn't happen often, but it happens. So why on earth would they not be picky? What is their incentive to be open to opportunities? Of course they wait until they have strong indicators that this guy might be the right one or is at least worth the risk. The image of a single woman floating in this sea of open opportunities that I see here is very romantic. Sadly most of them feel like taking a swim in a pond full of piranhas because they were promised, one of them is a cursed prince. Edit: Reading this again, I should mention, that I am aware that not every man responds violently to rejection. I am aware of that. Sadly, it's not single cases only either and a minority here is enough to make the situation scary.

109 points by lnguyen 8y ago

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

As someone that has been married for 16 years (and not looking for someone for considerably longer than that) this sounds like a giant leap for mankind. A market of other people who signal that they are also looking, but whom you are unlikely to ever interact with again if it doesn't work out.

village-idiot 8y ago
I’m in the opposite corner. Watching my single acquaintances try and fail with dating apps is kind of depressing.
- nradov 8y ago
  Why do you think they're failing?
  - LoSboccacc 8y ago
    Dunno about op but can tell what I see here: dating on tinder has become kinda an online shopping experience with a convenient return policy included. That's to say I see people just so focused to look for a prefer match that they forgot what a relationship and growing tougher is. There's far too romanticism and unrealistic expectations involved and too little effort and commitment put into it. Hard to quantify and pinpoint the issue exactly, but in general looking for that one love seems the issue.
  - village-idiot 8y ago
    I can only speak for the male side, since said acquaintances are male. Men almost never get matched back. Even moderate to moderate good looking men in stable careers get matched back ~10% of the time, and get fewer dates still.
    - ryandrake 8y ago
      If the number is as high as 10%, then they just need this automatic right-swiping device [1]. At 10% they wouldn't even need to run it overnight. 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IaoDfOaYF4w https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IaoDfOaYF4w
      - pseudalopex 8y ago
        Users report that swiping right too often decreases your swipe limit and how often other users see your profile.
        village-idiot 8y ago
        Makes sense, they’d want to dissuade this exact behavior.
watwut 8y ago
Crucialy, you don't interact with them before attempting to date either. So the pre-selection one normally does, the one based on observing how the other person interacts with others when not trying to impress, is not available. I think I would expect more "did not worked out" outcomes without that pre-selection. I mean, that preselction is way more important when looking for potential long term partner and closer to how you will be treated then dating which is sort of artificial situation.
theoh 8y ago
Anecdotal evidence from smaller markets (city of just a million or so) is that online dating doesn't work, and you certainly can't be sure of not running into people again. Your comment evokes something like a tuple space, where people are essentially querying a database by uploading their dating profile. Tinder's "architecture", whereby only mutual matches are informed, is a bit like that in principle. In practice it means there is no way to message someone who hasn't matched with you, whether because they are not actively looking through matches or some other reason: there is no way for contact to be initiated unilaterally. This is a big change in the dynamics of the dating situation. I'd almost prefer a professional matchmaking service to the kind of "shadow labour" that's involved in swiping through Tinder profiles—particularly because of this problem of matches being, as it were, a passive/uncoordinated rather than active/coordinated phenomenon. Unfortunately, Tinder's interface encourages very superficial judgements based on appearance, and the way you are required to "flirt" by text with people you haven't met is absolutely a bad thing.
hopler 8y ago
That's a recipe for the destruction of society. It's a good thing that people development a reputation visible to would-be mates.

village-idiot 8y ago

First: I think that dating apps are fantastic for small sub populations that might otherwise have a hard time meeting each other. Grindr, JSwipe, MuzMatch, etc. But for the larger population, I’m not sure that apps like Tinder are a good idea. For every few positive stories, including the ones in the article, there seems to be dozens of stories of misogynistic rants, unsolicited dick picks, and worse. Men appear to suffer pretty bad on the match ratio with the vast majority of matches going to a minority of men, while women appear to suffer the majority of the abuse. It seems pretty inefficient, and I’m kind of amazed that everyone seems to have an unspoken agreement to keep using these apps.

stared 8y ago
I would add OKCupid (though, it started changing in the direction of Tinder, sadly). For small populations it is easy to filter people based on their preferences. On Tinder it you interact with "mainstream" and it feels like searching for a needle in the haystack... just to get to one's target group. On a lighter tone, http://www.collegehumor.com/post/6948732/what-youre-really-saying-with-your-dating-app http://www.collegehumor.com/post/6948732/what-youre-really-s....
- village-idiot 8y ago
  I had no idea most of these existed. I thought badoo was a search engine?
  - kachnuv_ocasek 8y ago
    You probably confused that with Baidu.
lotsofpulp 8y ago
The long term monogamous dating market requires two people to accept that they likely won’t find someone better than the person they have found, so putting all of the options at one’s fingertips increases the risk of feeling like you could have done better.

robertAngst 8y ago

EDIT: Married since 2012 here: At first glance, Tinder sounded like some end game dating opportunity. While its first users were embarrassed to say they were doing online dating, I reassured them- Its fine! Find your SO! Years later, it seems to have turned into a world of unmet expectations. When its incredibly easy to find a date, people don't seem to try as hard to make things work. They find flaws and compare. The worst offenders never seem to be happy. Admittedly, it might have also further shrunk the pool of "the good ones", where the only people left have bad jobs, drug problems, and incredibly high expectations. On another note, I'm wondering how it has changed Sex. It seems sex has never been easier to have due to these dating apps. I wonder if people will be able to settle down.

e40 8y ago
All the articles I've read say people are having less sex. I don't know if they are true, but it definitely seems to fly in the face of the readily available dating apps. I can tell you, as a lurker in some of the dating subreddits, it seems lots of guys complain they never get matches, or rarely do. And, a lot of the women complain about a constant stream of terrible matches with men. Here's a thought: maybe focusing purely on looks (like Tinder does) isn't a good recipe for sexual compatibility.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- hopler 8y ago
  Tinder promotes the ancient practice of polygamy, very effectively. The highest status males are having sex with many many women , and the major of males are having less than their peers of the last did. Women hold mostly steady but are more like to part of a "harem" than a monogamt relationship.
  - bb611 8y ago
    Is there data to support this argument?

stared 8y ago

Side note - does anyone know why did OKCupid get "tinderfied"? I mean: - requires real first name (bad if you name is too common or too rare; also, it was cool and a great discussion starter) EDIT: real names by default - messages only after likes (it changes the dynamics a lot; before I got much more interesting discussions) - option to swipe (fortunately, still it is possible to search) Vide: - https://www.marketwatch.com/story/why-these-women-are-quitting-okcupid-after-it-required-daters-to-use-their-real-names-on-the-site-2017-12-26 https://www.marketwatch.com/story/why-these-women-are-quitti... - https://www.reddit.com/r/OkCupid/comments/7pv9mp/ladies_of_okcupid_how_are_you_liking_the_recent/ https://www.reddit.com/r/OkCupid/comments/7pv9mp/ladies_of_o... - https://theblog.okcupid.com/why-okcupid-is-changing-how-you-message-f14d492e7853 https://theblog.okcupid.com/why-okcupid-is-changing-how-you-... (may make sense for some mainstream, basing their judgments of appearance... but then - why not Tinder? plus, it is easy to filter too short or repetitive messages, so if OKC only wanted to solve that, it would be a piece of cake) My two cynical guesses are: a) there is a Tinder mole in OKC b) since they are owned by the same group, there will be a post showing it was natural to join two (effectively killing OKC)

miduil 8y ago
requires real first name (bad if you name is too common or too rare; also, it was cool and a great discussion starter) That is not true, https://help.okcupid.com/article/67-how-to-change-your-name https://help.okcupid.com/article/67-how-to-change-your-name : We ask that you use your first name instead of a username, but if you're not comfortable showing your first name, feel free to use initials or a nickname, as long as it's something you're comfortable having your date call you! Edit: (See other posting in sub-thread) Also: messages only after likes (it changes the dynamics a lot; before I got much more interesting discussions) I don't think this is a good argument for "tinderification". There were so many people (mostly men) harassing other people (mostly women) on OkCupid. I think this was a proper measurement to reduce unwelcome messages. https://twitter.com/OKCupidmen https://twitter.com/OKCupidmen https://shitguyssayonokcupid2.tumblr.com/ https://shitguyssayonokcupid2.tumblr.com/
- stared 8y ago

rococode 8y ago

I think the 80/20 problem - the top 80% of women matching with top 20% of men [1] - is a major issue preventing dating (not hookups) with current apps. Most of my guy friends who use Tinder swipe right very generously because they don't match frequently, while my girl friends swipe conservatively since they match pretty much every other guy (or when they need a bit of an ego boost, they can just spam right swipes for a string of matches). I believe the key problem is the high visibility of profile pictures, which makes it easy to stick to unrealistically high expectations for the physical attractiveness of people you're willing to talk with. This is reinforced by the constant stream of pictures - when you're swiping right on the couple of really attractive people every 15-20 profiles, it's much easier to swipe left on people who aren't unattractive to you, but just don't reach that level "ok this person is super hot". In other words, "super interesting and decent-looking", while traditionally a good combination, probably doesn't do particularly well on dating apps. The 80/20 problem, then, comes from the fact that guys swipe right more often than girls, so girls end up matching with a ton of top 20% great-looking guys and feel no need to swipe on the other 80% of guys even though they often never have conversations that go anywhere (at least that's my impression from seeing the smokin hot dudes that my girl friends match with). To be honest, this seems fine for hookups, where you mostly care about physical appearance / attraction. But for longer relationships, I think there's a real lack of effective "modern" options. What I'd like to see is an app where you don't get to see any pictures until you've initiated a conversation (of some minimum length) with a person. So while browsing profiles, you just get a short bio and some demographic information. I also personally think it'd be nice to filter for certain broad categories (education - for example, same school for college-age folks, income, ethnicity, etc), because intuitively I think people tend to end up with people from similar overall backgrounds - but I can see how that could cause problems. Regardless, I think an app where you at least don't see photos of the person you're talking to until a certain amount of conversation would be great. It would deal with a number of issues: 1. the 80/20 problem with respect getting any kind of conversation going is largely solved, as I believe that stems from people having profile pictures to quickly decide yes/no 2. by showing photos at some point, you still take into account the importance of physical attraction, but this time a person's image is backed by some level of existing rapport 3. you make a higher commitment to each person you talk to since you have to talk a certain amount to see what they look like 4. you're more likely to match with people who have shared values and interests since you have to actually talk with them 5. people are more likely to send messages since without pictures, there's never a feeling of "oh this person is out of my league, no point sending a message" It's not perfect but I think it'd be a good start for non-hookup dating apps compared to the current choices. (if you agree with my thoughts and have some spare time pls feel free to make something like that haha) [1] https://medium.com/@worstonlinedater/tinder-experiments-ii-guys-unless-you-are-really-hot-you-are-probably-better-off-not-wasting-your-2ddf370a6e9a https://medium.com/@worstonlinedater/tinder-experiments-ii-g... (not really a rigorous study but the reasoning makes sense)

stared 8y ago

The lack of kindness on Tinder is a know problem - so many female friends showed me outright rude screenshots, especially after these women said they are feminist, or turned down some sex offer. But... why not introduce some rating? (As in Uber or so.) I know it sounds Black Mirror-ish, but if it would penalize rude guys, it would be a win for everyone (incentive + filtering + hetero-women more interested in using this app.)

dgellow 8y ago
One person’s perception of rudeness will be what someone else will find funny or honest or ... . Not excusing bad behaviors, it’s just important to consider that looking for a mate/date/kookup is really different for different people, where looking for a car driver will be almost the same for anyone (I would expect, though I’m sure there is also some subtlety there), I don’t think a similar rating system would be adapted.
- stared 8y ago
  Things like "DTF?" in the first line can be considered rude or direct and honest. Things I saw were like "ugly feminist bitch" after a (previously) "nice" guy had been turned down. It leaves much less space to interpret it as "funny or honest". Plus, all ratings are average. If you are rude to 50% people, it is more than being rude to 5% (maybe actually misunderstanding)%.
  - turtlecloud 8y ago
    The tough thing with dating apps is effectively conveying emotion in a text. that the old adage rings true.. “it’s not what you say, it’s how you say it”
  - dgellow 8y ago
    Do you mean that if you’re rude to 50% you should have a lower grade, so be teamed with other low grades mates? If yes, how is that a good system? If not, then what else do you envision? That’s even without considering that people won’t review fairly, and will abuse such a system and the new power they get by having a higher rank than others.

booleandilemma 8y ago

All women are going after the same top x% of men, so most men miss out. Men are a lot less picky, but the women they’re interested in are too determined on being with the top x% to be interested in them. I think all problems with dating and finding love in general can be shown to stem from this. The obvious solution is to send the top x% of men off to war. Sorry guys ;)

throwaway555443 8y ago
Well, yes, but there are other solutions :) The trick is to raise the baselines (as in, every guy should be reasonably fit (quite easy) and well dressed, etc) while having more dimensions on which to measure men and partners (as in, not just bank account; find niches where you can excel, probably the easiest approach is to combine two separate areas/skills, for example be a specialized lawyer, or learn Chinese if you're American and combine it with your profession).
- Hendrikto 8y ago
  > probably the easiest approach is to combine two separate areas/skills, for example be a specialized lawyer, or learn Chinese if you're American and combine it with your profession No girl I know would be interested in that. I do not know how that could help with dating. I speak 3 languages fluently (German, English, Dutch), and have a biotechnics degree (German BTA) in addition to studying CS atm. Those are specifically the two points you mentioned. Has any girl ever been interested in that? No. What you are describing is a method for getting a job, not a partner.
  - jhwang5 8y ago
    He may have meant his Chinese ability will allow him to widen his dating market to Chinese women.
    - throwaway555443 8y ago
      Not only. I agree the advice is also towards getting a job, but also helps getting a date. Of course, other factors interest women, such as confidence, assertiveness, looks, intelligence, sense of humour and all that. It also depends which age group we're addressing. There's a world of difference between 20, 30 and 40yo. All else being equal, you are more interesting if you speak more languages, for example. Although it depends how you frame/sell it :) Anyway, what I meant to say is that the top X% story is not the whole story. It's not just relative, your absolute status is very important as well.

throwawayasdfgh 8y ago

I'd like to make a couple of comments to put things into perspective. First, this is all US-based. Granted, Tinder is a thing here in Europe but as far as I know the overwhelming majority of sexual encounters here still occurs in meatspace. I do believe online dating only caters to a certain demographic with a certain personality type and the market will be eventually saturated. Likewise, 'dating' as most people know it is primarily an American concept. Due to the cultural influence the US has over the world, this concept has been imported/distorted here (to my dismay, but that's more of a personal view), but the concept of repeatedly taking someone else out until things evolve or devolve (first base, second base, whatever) is just not the norm everywhere in the world. In many places people just hit it off first, then 'date' later. There are also things like arranged marriages, 'debutante balls', and so on. Also, it bears repeating that online dating, in its current implementation, is a privacy nightmare rife with plenty of repulsive and shady practices [1]. There's plenty of research done about this, but what I find worrying is that researchers may request access to the entirety of everyone's conversations with everyone else, complete with username and location database, as well as the history of matches, dismissals, and so on. Likewise, Tinder execs harvest all this precious and intimate data for advertisers with little concern for security or privacy. It also reveals worrying trends about society. Research has shown that "the average woman’s desirability drops from the time she is 18 until she is 60. For men, desirability peaks around 50 and then declines." Likewise with education, "desirability is associated with education most strongly for men, for whom more education is always more desirable. For women, an undergraduate degree is most desirable; postgraduate education is associated with decreased desirability among women." [2] As for ethnicity: "there is also a clear and consistent dependence on ethnicity, with Asian women and white men being the most desirable potential mates by our measures". Black women and Asian men would be the least desirable. (For information, desirability is usually computed by giving everyone a score, usually derived from a PageRank-like method or something like an Elo rating.) I get that people working behind the scenes are not trendsetters and only follow what is currently the norm to maximize user engagement, but in this age of reckoning about big tech and privacy, perhaps now is the time to imagine a product that actually caters to people into dating instead of selling their information, doing creepy data mining and compelling them to stay on the apps? [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18713837 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18713837 [2] Aspirational pursuit of mates in online dating markets (http://advances.sciencemag.org/content/4/8/eaap9815 http://advances.sciencemag.org/content/4/8/eaap9815)

deleted 8y ago

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golemotron 8y ago

How are OkCupid and Tinder preventing trafficking on their platforms? Even of a loose reading of FOSTA makes them a target for federal action.

fromthestart 8y ago

>Dating apps originated in the gay community; Grindr and Scruff...launched in 2009 and 2010, respectively This is just untrue. Plenty of Fish launched in 2003. Okcupid in 2004. Both clearly listed on wikipedia. What is going on with modern journalism? I'm supposed to put faith in the rest of the article, when the author can't get basic facts straight? What I'd really like to see is a piece on how dehumanizing the online dating game is for men. Yeah, women complain about being sex objects, but all men online are treated with a heavy suspicion of wanting only sex. I think there's a greater developing problem in Western society with hypergamy, but no one is paying any attention to the bottom 20-30% of men who are involuntarily single, and it's only going to get worse, as the idea of male privilege breaks further into the mainstream while ignoring the relative difficulty that modern men increasingly have with romantic fulfilment. Romantic companionship is part of Maslow's Heirarchy for a reason. Having a substantial proportion of the populous lonely and depressed because of unfulfillment of a basic need can't be good for society. And this isn't as easy as simply working on oneself when hypergamy is shifting female standards further and further out of reach of the average male. Perhaps it is time for women to start checking their own privilege.

hawaiianbrah 8y ago
Were either of those considered “apps”? Dating sites have been around for a while longer than apps, sure. But they were pretty distinct categories.
pseudalopex 8y ago
The author mentions dating sites as predecessors to dating apps. Plenty of Fish and OkCupid launched their apps after Grindr. Also, they were basically mobile websites with notifications.[1] The mobile-first, photo-first experience of online dating today seems to have originated with Grindr. [1] https://www.datingsitesreviews.com/article.php?story=OkCupid-Launches-a-iPhone-App https://www.datingsitesreviews.com/article.php?story=OkCupid...
bb611 8y ago
> the bottom 20-30% of men who are involuntarily single Is there data to support this percentage? > Romantic companionship is part of Maslow's Heirarchy for a reason Maslow doesn't classify it as a requirement, it's a contributing element of the Love/Belonging level but there's plenty of self-actualizing people who don't have an intimate partner.

amelius 8y ago

I'm still waiting for an app that matches based on DNA, or scent (pheromones), or both.

aqme28 8y ago
How would DNA matching work, and why? Do you want someone with similar DNA to you? Vastly different DNA? This sounds like a terrible idea at the outset.
- amelius 8y ago
  Well, you have to look at it from a big-data perspective. E.g. train a classifier on a large number of successful and not so successful marriages (or non-partners), using DNA as the underlying data. Now use this classifier to suggest partners in a dating app. Regarding pheromones, there's a lot of scientific research [1]. For example: > Individuals rated those of the opposite sex as more attractive if they preferred the individuals pheromones odour. Now I suppose that preference for pheromones is (at least partially) encoded in DNA somehow. So you can see what I'm getting at. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Body_odour_and_sexual_attraction https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Body_odour_and_sexual_attracti...
nradov 8y ago
Yes as the cost of full human genome sequencing is now approaching $100 I think this is inevitably going to happen. Probably a few companies are secretly working on it already.

jarmitage 8y ago

Perhaps you should educate yourself about the fallacious logic and death cult-ism of incel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fD2briZ6fB0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fD2briZ6fB0

fromthestart 8y ago
So, one can not criticize the dating experience, and recognize that it is biased in favor of women, without being slandered as an incel? Why do you think more men are turning to such extremism? You think they are perpetually frustrated and bitter by choice? Remember when we used to call these men "geeks" and "nerds"? Why won't anyone acknowledge the validity of their involuntary suffering? These men are marginalized and exist on the outskirts of society for reasons beyond their choosing. Attractiveness is a continuum, and there's only so much one can do to raise ones percieved value to meet the standards of others. It isn't a secret that apps like tinder tend to make women even more selective.
- empath75 8y ago
  > These men are marginalized and exist on the outskirts of society for reasons beyond their choosing. I can assure you that the reason that most self professed incels are on the outskirts of society is that they’re fucking creepy. I mean have you read their subreddits. They make my skin crawl. And I have no idea what any of them look like.
  - fromthestart 8y ago
    Inceldom is an extremist manifestion of a growing epidemic of loneliness. Frankly, they have nothing to do with this actual discussion, and stifle discussions around male loneliness. >is that they’re fucking creepy. That's the point. They're different. What does creepy mean? Difficulty with social norms? Unusual interests? Physical unnatractiveness? You think these are choices? Incels are just especially self aware and bitter "geeks" and "nerds" of yore, back before those terms were coopted by the mainstream. I think these men are bitter because they exist with the same needs for romance that you and I do, but have no realistic way of actualizing these desires. Their pain is involuntary and real. Look past the vileness of their rhetoric and understand that they are suffering.

hutzlibu 8y ago

What I think is very interesing is how Onlinedating is percieved in different groups: While other groups of people I know everybody is on tinder, but in my local area(germany) a friend of mine is actually ashamed to admit that he met his new date through tinder.. And well, I do not think it is something to be ashamed of, but persanally I also think, that you meet dates in real life.

grecht 8y ago
Germany is notoriously slow at adapting "new" things. Think credit cards, internet speed, ...
- hutzlibu 8y ago
  Think renewable energies, green technology ...
  - grecht 8y ago
    Things that are widely recognized as "good". Who could say no to that for the sake of minimal change? Also, this doesn't affect life in a way that dating or the hassle of having to carry cash with you to buy bread do. Of course Germany's a leader in a lot of things. But Germans do have a tendency to be cautious and sceptical about innovations that would impose a change to their (everyday) life.

blakesterz 8y ago

These comments are pretty interesting, especially the "80/20" and the "top x% of men". Assuming those are both at least partially true... I can't help but think the rankings change within 5 years of being married. That is, what women (probably men too) want when they're dating (or browsing potential matches on apps) changes quite a bit after they're married and have kids. That is to say, things that match you on apps don't keep you happy for the next several decades. Maybe an example would be something like "he's cute and has a good job" is boyfriend material, but ten years later "all he does is work" really gets old fast. Not meaning to generalize at all with this, just some thoughts based on what I've seen around my social groups.

whateveracct 8y ago

The way HN talks about the macro-"economics" of dating and marriage skeeves me out. A very impersonal way of talking about a very human and personal topic.

InGodsName 8y ago
Yea, I'd agree with you. After passing their initial filters, they are not very critical of your qualities. But before passing their filters, your qualities absolutely play a role if you were not already in their circle HN people are brainstorming the before the latter thing

qqn 8y ago

The absolute best thing about this piece is learning that there's a woman out there somewhere named Holly Wood.

emberdemonoid 8y ago

I haven't seen anyone here put together, why women are so picky with online dating. I admit that it's easy to say "well, because they can, d'uh", but that is not what I see when I talk to women about dating men. When men complain about bad matches, what they usually mean is that the woman turned out to be boring or not as good looking, hell maybe she even had a kid that she never mentioned. I hardly hear women complain about that. What I hear is that they didn't want to go on a date or maybe wanted to leave one and in response got insults, threats of violence/murder, maybe even someone trying to get handsy if they actually met in meatspace. So the minor factor of "if a woman dates too many men, she's a slut" aside, if women are not picky, they are in danger of getting physically assaulted. If they just reply nicely online and don't agree to a first date, they "only" risk getting insulted and threatened. And having someone stalk you because you rejected them on Tinder doesn't happen often, but it happens. So why on earth would they not be picky? What is their incentive to be open to opportunities? Of course they wait until they have strong indicators that this guy might be the right one or is at least worth the risk. The image of a single woman floating in this sea of open opportunities that I see here is very romantic. Sadly most of them feel like taking a swim in a pond full of piranhas because they were promised, one of them is a cursed prince. Edit: Reading this again, I should mention, that I am aware that not every man responds violently to rejection. I am aware of that. Sadly, it's not single cases only either and a minority here is enough to make the situation scary.