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What really happens inside a dating app

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Re: What really happens inside a dating app

#161

The qualities that women find attractive in men cannot be captured in a static profile on a website ... plus most of the men in that site are there because they don't have those qualities. Let's just say that if you can open your mouth enough to say hi to a woman without hesitation, you are completely wasting your time on dating sites.

If you’re good looking, you’re not going to be wasting time on apps These days, saying hi seems to be risky for more reasons than rejection. Maybe more so if you’re not good looking. Hence the apps

Can confirm as a good looking male, I slay on apps compared to my peers.

However I believe it also boils down to personality traits too.

Saying "Hi" isn't enough. One needs to be creative to stand out from the field. Women get absolutely swamped on the apps.

Re: What really happens inside a dating app

#162
I paid for a lifetime membership to Bumble premium a couple years ago, but as I noticed matches/likes declining for no apparent reason, I made a 2nd account with different credentials, paid for a week of premium, and had a bunch of matches (exact same profile as my other account).

From my anecdotal experience, they have some algorithm that leads to diminishing returns in order to keep extracting money for boosts or whatever.

Re: What really happens inside a dating app

#163

I paid for a lifetime membership to Bumble premium a couple years ago, but as I noticed matches/likes declining for no apparent reason, I made a 2nd account with different credentials, paid for a week of premium, and had a bunch of matches (exact same profile as my other account). From my anecdotal experience, they have some algorithm that leads to diminishing returns in order to keep extracting money for boosts or w…

sounds like you're swiping through people inyour area faster than they join?

Re: What really happens inside a dating app

#164
post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

61% of women in the US are married or cohabitating and that doesn’t include those who are dating. https://www.pewresearch.org/social-trends/2021/10/05/rising-... Yes I know that not all women are heterosexual. But I also didn’t include women who are in a heterosexual relationship but are not living with someone. It’s statistically impossible for only 20% of the men to be in a relationship or having sex.

> 61% of women in the US are married or cohabitating and that doesn’t include those who are dating. > It’s statistically impossible for only 20% of the men to be in a relationship or having sex. That's a backward-looking number though. Look at how fast the lines on your link's graph are dropping, and what that implies the rate might be among the newest cohorts.

Is much of that disparity due to economic causes?

From my original citation:

> Among those ages 25 to 54, 59% of Black adults were unpartnered in 2019. This is higher than the shares among Hispanic (38%), White (33%) and Asian (29%) adults.

https://www.pewresearch.org/2023/12/04/wealth-gaps-across-ra...

Many people don’t want to get married until they are financially stable.

(On a side note: I had no idea that there was such a disparity between Black weslth and White wealth and I’m Black).

Ignoring race, but males aren’t doing as well financially as in the past and they may have something to do with them dating less and getting married less often.

Re: What really happens inside a dating app

#165
post #2

> To me, if you are a guy on a dating app and your pictures are not taken by a professional photographer then you are losing your time, and if you are paying you are also throwing your money. Don't do this. You need good pictures that convey attractiveness (looks, as well as personality). Using professional photos conveys neediness & a level of desperation hidden under a shell of an ego the shot tries to portray. So…

>> To me, if you are a guy on a dating app and your pictures are not taken by a professional photographer then you are losing your time, and if you are paying you are also throwing your money. > Don't do this. > pay a photographer for canned real shots (nothing highly edited). So, instead of having my pictures taken by a professional photographer, you recommend that I pay a professional photographer to take my pictur…

English doesn't seem to be their first language. My interpretation of what they were saying is that if you don't have pro photos you are wasting your time, along with any money given to the app (not the photographer, who you didn't pay anyway)

Re: What really happens inside a dating app

#166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you’re good looking, you’re not going to be wasting time on apps These days, saying hi seems to be risky for more reasons than rejection. Maybe more so if you’re not good looking. Hence the apps

Can confirm as a good looking male, I slay on apps compared to my peers. However I believe it also boils down to personality traits too. Saying "Hi" isn't enough. One needs to be creative to stand out from the field. Women get absolutely swamped on the apps.

Swamped is on point. I watched my roommate-now-girlfriend get over 1,000 likes in no time at all (I can't remember well but certainly on the order of hours, not days). It was in a populated, well-off area, but still. When you see something like that, it puts a lot of this whole thing into perspective.

Re: What really happens inside a dating app

#167
Dating apps are scams. The developer is out to make money, which happens through subscription renewals. Profile visibility means nothing. Messages mean nothing. You can send message after message after message, but unless you have spent enough money or are onenof the lucky ones that the system allows through, your profile is not shown to anyone but bots.

Want to test this? Remove your image from your profiles on social media and remove your last name (i use my middle name as my surname on facebook). The key is to remove your profile image. Set your privacy to maximum, so other images of you cannot be searched. Try talking with someone. With no way to profile you, the chat bots used by the dating apps cannot have a "conversation." You will never be matched, conversations will hit walls and go in circles or you get ghosted because the chat bot has no data to use.

After your first renewal - after you have spent more money - then you may actually get to talk to a real person.

No. Never again.

Re: What really happens inside a dating app

#168
post #152
post #95

Equal parts fascinating and dystopian. I'm even more convinced now that online dating has reached a local optima, but eventually someone is going to find a solution that is less shallow and predatory and blow it out of the water.

I think they’re pretty close to global max on “relationship-flavored entertainment app for single adults” Optima for “stable-relationship-forming app” are yet to be discovered — and also, I think, to really be sought at all

OKCupid was doing pretty well at this until they were acquired.

Re: What really happens inside a dating app

#169

I paid for a lifetime membership to Bumble premium a couple years ago, but as I noticed matches/likes declining for no apparent reason, I made a 2nd account with different credentials, paid for a week of premium, and had a bunch of matches (exact same profile as my other account). From my anecdotal experience, they have some algorithm that leads to diminishing returns in order to keep extracting money for boosts or w…

sounds like you're swiping through people inyour area faster than they join?

I'm a digital nomad and changing locations frequently, so I have actually tried this A/B test a couple times when arriving in a brand new city. Same results.

Re: What really happens inside a dating app

#170

We built a dating app and saw these same metrics. Our "twist" was that anyone could be a matchmaker, pairing other people (in addition to our recommendation engine). An interesting thing happened: lot's of people just like using dating apps in a voyeuristic way, with no intention of dating. Tinder eventually launched this feature, but it fell flat. I still think there's merit to human-based recs over "AI" matchmakers…

Have you done any research on the type of users who use dating apps primarily?

The article is really good on the product decisions but light on what kind of life and situation these users have.

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