Why Dating Apps Don't Work Well(fairytrail.app) |
Why Dating Apps Don't Work Well(fairytrail.app) |
Match group should be torched to the ground with their exec team tied up inside.
And, even if we discard the notion that attention is being monetized, the presence of women as stated is essential to any of these dating apps' long term viability as a business. I think that's why there's this low-level constant outrage that exists with men who use them; they feel de-prioritized and discarded next to their female counterparts in the user base, because fundamentally, these platforms know they don't have to do shit to get male users. They will come, they will stay, regardless of what they're asked to do or deal with, and therefore they are not valuable to the platform and their needs, desires, and preferences are not catered to. As long as they can attract enough women to meet an emotional threshold for prospective male users, they'll come in droves, and probably spend money too.
Finding a good match is hard. The vast majority of relationships fail, most of them rather quickly.
I don't think dating apps need to go out of their way to preserve their user base. It sounds as if people believe that there's some perfect matching algorithm that the dating apps refuse to use, lest everybody suddenly get married.
Male and female users do end up being in conflict on dating apps -- the former getting too little attention, the latter getting too much. And the apps are rife with spammers and scammers, which are hard to clear out when the accounts are free. I think that suffices to explain why people get frustrated with dating apps.
There is a sense that people have gotten fed up with dating apps, here are two articles on it:
https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2024/04/datin...
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/03/12/business/dating-apps-tind...
It's pretty clear here that a huge opportunity exists because here is a fundamental human need. Match and Bumble might not be able to meet it because they are trapped by their business model (see Clayton Christensen's theory of disruptive innovation) and have a lot of accumulated ill will.
I think AI is a factor in the burnout, the fact is that ChatGPT or Microsoft Copilot can do a lot better at ingratiating people than most of us, if the average person used a chatbot as their wingman and they'd probably do better. Personally I ask Copilot for advice on this sort of thing a lot, the act of putting my thoughts into words is helpful, the advice is as good as you'd get from a lot of people, and it feels good.
You can see this as a hellscape of profiles that look like they were written by ChatGPT and endless spam and fraud like Ashley Madison but with today's NLP a site could get a lot of insight into people's behavior and put some structure in. Right now I am trying to deepen a relationship and practicing doing little nice things for people because I don't have good habits in this area -- if a dating site is going to be successful people need to have a P.M.A. and need to be cultivating behaviors and attitudes that are helpful in relationships. Something like that could benefit you even if you don't get a match but if you do get a match is going to multiply the value you get from it.
I don't think you can claim they don't work well when the number one way people meet these days is via apps.
I recently had a "meet cute" with someone on the bus that was out of the blue, the next time we rode it was kindof awkward: after something like that for instance you might not want to sit right next to them because it would be too close.
The day after that she brought along a close friend and we hung out in a group and that's what happens most mornings, it is a no-stress way to hang out that doesn't put any pressure on me to be smart or funny or smooth or not put my foot on my mouth. When we ride back we often end up sitting in adjacent seats and talking just a little if at all but I really relish that because I get to enjoy her presence without the pressure that I need to do or be anything.
I can't imagine that we're not going to go on a "date" someday because clearly the attraction is there and we have shared interests to explore. I do know though by the time it happens we are going to actually know quite a bit about each other and already had quite a bit of closeness so if my heart is pounding it's not going to be out of anxiety.
I don't know if this method is repeatable or scalable but I think it's the right idea. I remember hanging out with friends in college and some couples would break out of the group and it seems we're somewhat deliberately recreating that experience for people who are a bit further along in life.
The key, I think, is to
1. live in a big city with lots of single people your age
2. pay (if you’re a guy)
I don’t consider myself anything special, but following these 2 steps I literally had more dates than I could handle (with women I actually wanted to meet). 3 of those ended up being long term 1y+ relationships.
I'm not trying to downplay your experience but these kind of anecdotes don't mean much, especially when we're missing so much information.
Feels like a big ask.
To be honest, the people in my life with successful relationships often have in common that they never once dated in their lives. At least not to get to know a potential partner, they all have met through other means.
Of course not everybody is that lucky, but the people that do dating as a leisure activity and those that do not might simply not fit together and many only use online dating because they cannot find connections elsewhere. Perhaps I am lost in translation here, but none of those couples I know would ever say or have said "I am dating someone". They would do things together and maybe end up in a relationship. There is a difference and I think this approach might offer something better.
I have a friend who is interested in using settlements of either real or phony money to offer incentives and change people's behavior in online settings and I'm going to talk with him about applying this to dating tonight.
Some of the reason why it is easy to meet people when you are in school is that you are not just doing it one on one but you are in a group of people that share activities and interests and couples can break off but they have the support of the group from before they meet all the way to the wedding and beyond.
A site that builds a real community could capture all of this. Another thing to think about is habit change. I've written about a recent experience I've had and I've been thinking about what I can do to right now to help it develop and I know I need to get practice in showing gratitude, giving complements and doing little nice things because I'd like to be able to show my love.
On today's online dating sites on the other hand you are feeling ugly or harried or angry or frustrated and none of those those feelings are going to help you give and receive love.
Another way to encourage this I think is making it a paid service. Filters out anyone just using it to look at pictures or waste time.
I liked the bumble founders idea of having LLMs trained on peoples texts/social-media activity and having them talk to each other and then matching people based on that. Might be a good way to determine that one daily match.
I think Hinge actually had a pretty good system when I was using it a few years ago. It had a strict bio format, which required every used to answer exactly 3 questions (of their choice) - this format allowed me to identify people who cared about genuinely meeting someone, and had the depth of character to communicate well with me. The incentive to over-share is gone, because you're limited to 3 answers. The incentive to under-share is gone, because you know everyone is also sharing so you're not going to look desperate. People who couldn't or wouldn't give 3 interesting and honest answers were easily ruled out and a lot of the alluring "mystery" of those under-filled profiles was stripped away.
PMA?
I can say that women report over and over that the men they meet often have very poor relationship skills. Perhaps that's not surprising: the men with good relationship skills are in relationships for a while, but men with bad relationship skills will be back after one date.
Going on a vacation with somebody new seems like it could be a huge amount of fun but it really could go bad. The right kind of group could also create a safe-feeling environment.