>Can someone explain to me how Tinder has such a bot problem? It's a feature. All dating apps/websites go through the same 3 part lifecycle. At any given time,

>Can someone explain to me how Tinder has such a bot problem? It's a feature. All dating apps/websites go through the same 3 part lifecycle. At any given time, there is only one "hip" service that everyone is using and that attracts all of the tier 1 members (i.e. attractive women) to use exclusively. Right now, that app is Hinge. Before Hinge took off, it was Bumble. And before that it was Tinder. The app that occupies this top space is generally able to get there by optimizing for the female experience, to the complete detriment of the male experience because men will always go where the attractive women are, and they will put up with anything because of that. As a new service comes along and takes all the tier 1 users, the previous front runner drops to the second part of its' lifecycle. This is where there's still a modicum of tier 1 users left, enough to give an impression of vitality to the community and continue pulling in the new users (desperate single men) who will pay for the service's extra features in hopes of finding someone. Bumble currently occupies this space. At this second part of the lifecycle, there becomes a strong incentive to start balancing out the UX optimization between male and female, because you're no longer in the growth stage and need to start extracting revenue. Finally, once a new service again comes along that displaces the current number one, the original number one drops to the third part of its' lifecycle. This is where Tinder is now. At that point, it has completely lost relevance to all tier 1 users, but it's able to continue along in a zombified state based on its' previous reputation and the purposefully allowed proliferation of bots that create an illusion of vitality. This is honestly where dating apps make the most money, even if the service itself is terrible. You have no mandate to continue innovating or providing good customer service, and you can totally optimize for the male experience (which is far more profitable) because there are no real women left. source: Worked for $large_dating_app in the mid-2010s