5 ms·

For any transaction in a market, two things are needed 1. price: a number to be agreed upon 2. liquidity: availability of a willing buyer and a willing seller

by quanto 2y ago

For any transaction in a market, two things are needed 1. price: a number to be agreed upon 2. liquidity: availability of a willing buyer and a willing seller to transact at some price A seller can set a price for her item very high; even if there are many otherwise willing buyers, no one will buy the item due to the unreasonable price. Conversely, even if the price is fair (by some common metric), sellers and buyers may not transact due to the opaqueness of the market: the sellers and buyers may not know the availability. This is why auction houses/farmers' markets exist: to make the information more available and make the market less opaque. In a dating market, a dating app solves the problem with (2) liquidity, but it does not help with (1) price. In fact, it makes the problem with (1) price worse by giving people the illusion of choice and availability, inflating their egos and thus asking for unreasonable prices. In other words, expectations for romantic partners are higher than ever, but both economic and social factors contribute to people not meeting these requirements. Japan's NEET phenomenon is a classic, well-studied example of a problem with (1).

Rinzler89 2y ago
>In fact, it makes the problem with (1) price worse by giving people the illusion of choice and availability, inflating their egos and thus asking for unreasonable prices. Worse for who? The dating app's goal is to keep you as a long term paying customer, not help you find THE ONE quickly. So if people are constantly mismatching due to inflated egos, but staying on the platform due to the illusion of overabundance, it's a slam dunk for the dating app's shareholders' bottom line. People finding their mate quickly is bad for business. It seems that dating, just like with housing and healthcare, if you turn it into a private business for shareholder to rentseek on, it's guaranteed to be turned to shit for most people as they're now seen as cash cows to be milked for all they're worth rather than human being with human problems.
- megadal 2y ago
  That's why dating apps should focus on lifestyle and romance as well as matching. Couples still could use apps to help coordinate their dates, etc. find suggestions of places to go, meet other couples for double dates, find couples events nearby etc...
  - Rinzler89 2y ago
    I doubt it. From my experience, anytime you try to turn human interaction into a mass market app that can appeal to all users, it inevitably turns to shit over time as it keeps getting gamed by all parties involved till it implodes from the shittyness. Tinder was also fun and cool in the early years when it was a niche app few people knew about, but it kept getting worse and worse over time: paywalled subscriptions and features, bots, women got a lot more flaky, men got a lot more creepy leading to a feedback loop of enshitification. It's kind of like the early days of online internet chat versus the internet of today. It was safer, cooler and more fun when only a few geeks were on it, anyone you met online was an experience not a fear, but once all and sundry moved in along with profit motives of big corporations, it became shit with ads, dark patterns, bots, trolls and weirdos everywhere. The same thing happened to Couchsurfing. It started off as a cool, niche, geeky way to travel and meet people, and over time it turned into a dating app where dudes from Paris/Barcelona/etc are renting their couch to young travelers form North America in exchange for sex. Same with the dozens of meetup apps for "making friends and meeting new people" which inevitably devolve into unofficial dating apps for creeps and weirdos who aren't there for any friendships. IMHO, it seems that on the mass market for-profit internet where everyone is allowed (and encouraged) to join, we just can't have nice things. To whit, the best online communities I found are now either in public places that are devoted to super niche things which don't attract trolls or big corporations to monetize, or on stuff like private torrent trackers where getting in only happens through personal referral.
    - megadal 2y ago
      > From my experience, anytime you try to turn human interaction into a mass market app that can appeal to all users, it inevitably turns to shit over time as it keeps getting gamed by all parties involved till it implodes from the shittyness. But what I described doesn't appeal to all users. It appeals to a subset of the exact same demographic using dating apps, it just also appeals to them beyond finding their first match. You join the app and still have to find a match (or join with your partner; admittedly, a different demographic) to access any additional features. It's not some app you hop on to find a good grocery shop for Manuka honey or booking a flight. If the matching aspect works fine, adding additional features shouldn't reduce use of or interest in the app, unless they're coupled with an annoying UX ("Hey, we took time to add this so you must use it"). It's not an "everything" app, it's about providing additional value to the existing audience that extends beyond just matches. I don't think we can definitely say something like that does or doesn't work until we see enough of them crop up and fail. From what I have heard, niche dating apps (or "singles apps", more appropriately[1]) do okay in localized regions. I would bet they probably would do okay on a larger scale, just that real life dating probably is a different game from city to city and so you can't just ship the exact same experience as you might for Vancouver to Springfield [1] https://dvt.name/2020/02/24/rfc-lets-disrupt-dating-apps/ https://dvt.name/2020/02/24/rfc-lets-disrupt-dating-apps/
squigz 2y ago
There's something deeply unsettling to me about referring to intimate human relationships in terms of a market.
- RockRobotRock 2y ago
  It's really the HN special.

by quanto 2y ago

Rinzler89 2y ago

>In fact, it makes the problem with (1) price worse by giving people the illusion of choice and availability, inflating their egos and thus asking for unreasonable prices. Worse for who? The dating app's goal is to keep you as a long term paying customer, not help you find THE ONE quickly. So if people are constantly mismatching due to inflated egos, but staying on the platform due to the illusion of overabundance, it's a slam dunk for the dating app's shareholders' bottom line. People finding their mate quickly is bad for business. It seems that dating, just like with housing and healthcare, if you turn it into a private business for shareholder to rentseek on, it's guaranteed to be turned to shit for most people as they're now seen as cash cows to be milked for all they're worth rather than human being with human problems.

megadal 2y ago
That's why dating apps should focus on lifestyle and romance as well as matching. Couples still could use apps to help coordinate their dates, etc. find suggestions of places to go, meet other couples for double dates, find couples events nearby etc...
- Rinzler89 2y ago
  I doubt it. From my experience, anytime you try to turn human interaction into a mass market app that can appeal to all users, it inevitably turns to shit over time as it keeps getting gamed by all parties involved till it implodes from the shittyness. Tinder was also fun and cool in the early years when it was a niche app few people knew about, but it kept getting worse and worse over time: paywalled subscriptions and features, bots, women got a lot more flaky, men got a lot more creepy leading to a feedback loop of enshitification. It's kind of like the early days of online internet chat versus the internet of today. It was safer, cooler and more fun when only a few geeks were on it, anyone you met online was an experience not a fear, but once all and sundry moved in along with profit motives of big corporations, it became shit with ads, dark patterns, bots, trolls and weirdos everywhere. The same thing happened to Couchsurfing. It started off as a cool, niche, geeky way to travel and meet people, and over time it turned into a dating app where dudes from Paris/Barcelona/etc are renting their couch to young travelers form North America in exchange for sex. Same with the dozens of meetup apps for "making friends and meeting new people" which inevitably devolve into unofficial dating apps for creeps and weirdos who aren't there for any friendships. IMHO, it seems that on the mass market for-profit internet where everyone is allowed (and encouraged) to join, we just can't have nice things. To whit, the best online communities I found are now either in public places that are devoted to super niche things which don't attract trolls or big corporations to monetize, or on stuff like private torrent trackers where getting in only happens through personal referral.
  - megadal 2y ago
    > From my experience, anytime you try to turn human interaction into a mass market app that can appeal to all users, it inevitably turns to shit over time as it keeps getting gamed by all parties involved till it implodes from the shittyness. But what I described doesn't appeal to all users. It appeals to a subset of the exact same demographic using dating apps, it just also appeals to them beyond finding their first match. You join the app and still have to find a match (or join with your partner; admittedly, a different demographic) to access any additional features. It's not some app you hop on to find a good grocery shop for Manuka honey or booking a flight. If the matching aspect works fine, adding additional features shouldn't reduce use of or interest in the app, unless they're coupled with an annoying UX ("Hey, we took time to add this so you must use it"). It's not an "everything" app, it's about providing additional value to the existing audience that extends beyond just matches. I don't think we can definitely say something like that does or doesn't work until we see enough of them crop up and fail. From what I have heard, niche dating apps (or "singles apps", more appropriately[1]) do okay in localized regions. I would bet they probably would do okay on a larger scale, just that real life dating probably is a different game from city to city and so you can't just ship the exact same experience as you might for Vancouver to Springfield [1] https://dvt.name/2020/02/24/rfc-lets-disrupt-dating-apps/ https://dvt.name/2020/02/24/rfc-lets-disrupt-dating-apps/

squigz 2y ago

There's something deeply unsettling to me about referring to intimate human relationships in terms of a market.

RockRobotRock 2y ago
It's really the HN special.