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This article demonstrates the same failings as the dating apps its author wishes to disrupt. It does not discuss the safety concerns of dating, either online o

This article demonstrates the same failings as the dating apps its author wishes to disrupt. It does not discuss the safety concerns of dating, either online or offline. It does not discuss the cost of identity verification and other security measures. It does not discuss the revenue model at all. Craigslist and Tinder work because it's no more risky than chatting with a stranger at a bar, assuming you're smart and invite them to meet at a public place first. AM works [1] because it charges significant amounts of money and works very hard at background checks. All other sites in-between fail because they want to be the 'Amazon/eBay of dating', wherein they stand up a classifieds site with profiles, refuse to charge enough money to perform background checks, and promptly turn into a lemon market populated by malicious actors who are represented as vetted and safe. There is no mistaking what you're getting on Craigslist or Tinder for "vetted and safe". You're getting a complete stranger who you haven't seen in person yet. If that's your bag, you're set. There is no mistaking what you're getting on AshleyMadison, either. It's what they say and they work very hard, and charge quite a lot, to ensure that you'll only meet safe and vetted people. If you want to play the in-between market, you need to charge a lot of money for accounts and use most of that money to vet people's identity. You can charge less money than a specialist site like AM ("affairs only"), but you can't have any free users, or you'll just become a lemon market like all the rest. It's unfortunate that AM is so focused on affairs, because their model is the only one that seems to be working as an alternative to the classified-ads approach. Safety and secrecy cost a lot more than Okcupid was ever willing to charge. [1] Not that AM is any more successful, and in fact might be more fraudulent than the rest! e.g. https://gizmodo.com/ashley-madison-code-shows-more-women-and-more-bots-1727613924 https://gizmodo.com/ashley-madison-code-shows-more-women-and...

lostgame 7y ago
Hahaha, I used to work for the parent company of AM and it is largely bullshit. I’d love to do an AMA about it sometime. But, I mean, who would’ve guessed a company based on the idea of having affairs would have shady as fuck business practices? eye roll
- floatingatoll 7y ago
  Yeah, I’m super annoyed that no one else even tries. It seems like there’s not a lot of revenue in this model!
- pstuart 7y ago
  I'm sure I'm one of many who would love to hear all about it. Please do it!
mellosouls 7y ago
As has been discussed multiple times here on HN, it is highly debatable that apps like Tinder work for more than a minority of men at one end of the age spectrum, and women at the other. There are possibly therefore other gatekeeping opportunities to consider along with those you suggest and the brilliant parent "lemon market" comment, subject to the scale barrier noted.
nakkijono 7y ago
>It does not discuss the revenue model at all. This could be something that one could actually disrupt. Problem with Tinder is that its interest is not aligned with users who seek long term commitment. Tinder needs its users to stay in the swiping pool to create revenue. The users (at least some of them) on the contrary wish nothing more than finding the right partner and stop using Tinder. An anecdote from Bumble app, whenever a user finds a partner and therefore stops using the app, the app notices this and starts to aggressively match the user with new partners. This sudden influx of new potential partners makes commitment hard for some users. If the incentives would be aligned, the user would pay for finding the long term partner and for abandoning the app, instead of paying for super likes etc.
- floatingatoll 7y ago
  That’s what I mean about undercharging. If you’re charging enough for your service, you can deal with people finding a partner, you can make it dead simple to suspend/resume billing (automatically when they go inactive), you can do all these things that no one is willing to charge enough for because you’re charging enough to cover your costs regardless of whether you have many or few users that day.
  - klipt 7y ago
    Any kind of subscription payment misaligns incentives because the sooner they find you a partner, the less money they'll get. Traditional matchmakers who charge a fee only after you decide to get married, have much better aligned incentives.
    - floatingatoll 7y ago
      You pay for a month and find happiness and terminate service. If they get one month of revenue and you are happy, they made a profit from you for one month and there are no drawbacks. If they didn’t charge you enough to profit from one month of usage, that’s on them for undercharging. What fee is profitable in this scenario, for running a short-term subscriptions business? $50/mo? $100/mo?
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
jl6 7y ago
I always imagined the main benefit of AM was that “married” is an indicator of having passed some basic standards of behaviour - i.e. they are at least fit enough to have been married once. It seems like a plausible business model too, since presumably cheaters aren’t expecting long-term relationships and will be back for more.
- Plyphon_ 7y ago
  I think you're vastly over estimating the barrier of entry to marriage.
  - jl6 7y ago
    There’s noise as well as signal for sure but I maintain that marriage is absolutely a useful fitness filter. At the very least, at least one other person has agreed to enter into a long term relationship with them. It will filter out unsocialized basement dwellers, for example. Sure, there are drunken Vegas marriages to strangers which fall apart 24 hours later, but I think those are the exception.
    - sacado2 7y ago
      That's still a very low barrier to entry: sure, they managed to get married, but they apparently can't commit to a long-term relationship.
      - jl6 7y ago
        It’s a higher barrier to entry than a possibly-fake profile pic and a possibly-fake bio.
      - floatingatoll 7y ago
        It’s a very high barrier relative to “no barrier”. (Also: remember that open long-term marriages do exist with the voluntary consent of both parties.)
        7y ago
masonic 7y ago
Craigslist and Tinder work because it's no more risky than chatting with a stranger at a bar Um, take a look at what Tinder demands in terms of device privileges. Meanwhile, Craigslist dropped the dating categories a couple of years ago (in the US, anyway).

lostgame 7y ago

Hahaha, I used to work for the parent company of AM and it is largely bullshit. I’d love to do an AMA about it sometime. But, I mean, who would’ve guessed a company based on the idea of having affairs would have shady as fuck business practices? eye roll

floatingatoll 7y ago
Yeah, I’m super annoyed that no one else even tries. It seems like there’s not a lot of revenue in this model!
pstuart 7y ago
I'm sure I'm one of many who would love to hear all about it. Please do it!

mellosouls 7y ago

As has been discussed multiple times here on HN, it is highly debatable that apps like Tinder work for more than a minority of men at one end of the age spectrum, and women at the other. There are possibly therefore other gatekeeping opportunities to consider along with those you suggest and the brilliant parent "lemon market" comment, subject to the scale barrier noted.

nakkijono 7y ago

>It does not discuss the revenue model at all. This could be something that one could actually disrupt. Problem with Tinder is that its interest is not aligned with users who seek long term commitment. Tinder needs its users to stay in the swiping pool to create revenue. The users (at least some of them) on the contrary wish nothing more than finding the right partner and stop using Tinder. An anecdote from Bumble app, whenever a user finds a partner and therefore stops using the app, the app notices this and starts to aggressively match the user with new partners. This sudden influx of new potential partners makes commitment hard for some users. If the incentives would be aligned, the user would pay for finding the long term partner and for abandoning the app, instead of paying for super likes etc.

floatingatoll 7y ago
That’s what I mean about undercharging. If you’re charging enough for your service, you can deal with people finding a partner, you can make it dead simple to suspend/resume billing (automatically when they go inactive), you can do all these things that no one is willing to charge enough for because you’re charging enough to cover your costs regardless of whether you have many or few users that day.
- klipt 7y ago
  Any kind of subscription payment misaligns incentives because the sooner they find you a partner, the less money they'll get. Traditional matchmakers who charge a fee only after you decide to get married, have much better aligned incentives.
  - floatingatoll 7y ago
    You pay for a month and find happiness and terminate service. If they get one month of revenue and you are happy, they made a profit from you for one month and there are no drawbacks. If they didn’t charge you enough to profit from one month of usage, that’s on them for undercharging. What fee is profitable in this scenario, for running a short-term subscriptions business? $50/mo? $100/mo?

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

jl6 7y ago

I always imagined the main benefit of AM was that “married” is an indicator of having passed some basic standards of behaviour - i.e. they are at least fit enough to have been married once. It seems like a plausible business model too, since presumably cheaters aren’t expecting long-term relationships and will be back for more.

Plyphon_ 7y ago
I think you're vastly over estimating the barrier of entry to marriage.
- jl6 7y ago
  There’s noise as well as signal for sure but I maintain that marriage is absolutely a useful fitness filter. At the very least, at least one other person has agreed to enter into a long term relationship with them. It will filter out unsocialized basement dwellers, for example. Sure, there are drunken Vegas marriages to strangers which fall apart 24 hours later, but I think those are the exception.
  - sacado2 7y ago
    That's still a very low barrier to entry: sure, they managed to get married, but they apparently can't commit to a long-term relationship.
    - jl6 7y ago
      It’s a higher barrier to entry than a possibly-fake profile pic and a possibly-fake bio.
    - floatingatoll 7y ago
      It’s a very high barrier relative to “no barrier”. (Also: remember that open long-term marriages do exist with the voluntary consent of both parties.)
      - 7y ago

masonic 7y ago

Craigslist and Tinder work because it's no more risky than chatting with a stranger at a bar Um, take a look at what Tinder demands in terms of device privileges. Meanwhile, Craigslist dropped the dating categories a couple of years ago (in the US, anyway).