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Why Dating Apps Don't Work Well

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Re: Why Dating Apps Don't Work Well

#21

Post by PaulHoule »

ToucanLoucan wrote: post #12
brokenalgo wrote: post #3

Because they are designed to make finding/matching people impossible. Match group should be torched to the ground with their exec team tied up inside.

This is true and you're right to say it. However much like other problematic software products in the attention economy, I don't know that there's really a solution. By definition: if a dating app (assuming it isn't a hookup one anyway) is doing it's job, it will lose two users with every "success" it achieves. Which means success for the user and success for the company are not just different, they are opposed. An a…

I'll say this.

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.

Re: Why Dating Apps Don't Work Well

#22

Post by tgma »

The title is misleading. The article is not that dating apps don’t work well (they clearly work if you look at the stats for relationships). It’s that they haven’t cracked how to make dating apps be a good business for them.

Re: Why Dating Apps Don't Work Well

#23

Post by brokenalgo »

ToucanLoucan wrote: post #12
brokenalgo wrote: post #3

Because they are designed to make finding/matching people impossible. Match group should be torched to the ground with their exec team tied up inside.

This is true and you're right to say it. However much like other problematic software products in the attention economy, I don't know that there's really a solution. By definition: if a dating app (assuming it isn't a hookup one anyway) is doing it's job, it will lose two users with every "success" it achieves. Which means success for the user and success for the company are not just different, they are opposed. An a…

You explained exactly why apps should be apps and not business.

Re: Why Dating Apps Don't Work Well

#24

Post by borski »

KenArrari wrote: post #19
sfmz wrote: post #4

My dating app idea is this: Men can only message 1 woman per day, but they get 1 more message coupon if they microblog about their day based on the premise that women are more interested in how men operate in the world than just good looks. If women don't respond after like 40 messages, then boot them off the platform because they are just using it for an ego boost with no intention of dating.

I like the idea of having limited but higher quality interactions. 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…

So instead of human matchmakers, next step: AI-arranged marriage?

Re: Why Dating Apps Don't Work Well

#25

Post by KptMarchewa »

brap wrote: post #10

I keep reading about how dating apps don’t work, but at least from my own personal experience and from my friends’ experience, they work very well. 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 tho…

Being a paypig is my limit. Fortunately it's not expectation in my country.

Re: Why Dating Apps Don't Work Well

#26

Post by jfengel »

ToucanLoucan wrote: post #12
brokenalgo wrote: post #3

Because they are designed to make finding/matching people impossible. Match group should be torched to the ground with their exec team tied up inside.

This is true and you're right to say it. However much like other problematic software products in the attention economy, I don't know that there's really a solution. By definition: if a dating app (assuming it isn't a hookup one anyway) is doing it's job, it will lose two users with every "success" it achieves. Which means success for the user and success for the company are not just different, they are opposed. An a…

I've heard this theory before, and it doesn't make sense to me.

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.

Re: Why Dating Apps Don't Work Well

#27

Post by jfengel »

PaulHoule wrote: post #21
ToucanLoucan wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is true and you're right to say it. However much like other problematic software products in the attention economy, I don't know that there's really a solution. By definition: if a dating app (assuming it isn't a hookup one anyway) is doing it's job, it will lose two users with every "success" it achieves. Which means success for the user and success for the company are not just different, they are opposed. An a…

I'll say this. 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 busine…

if a dating site is going to be successful people need to have a P.M.A.

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.

Re: Why Dating Apps Don't Work Well

#28

Post by KenArrari »

borski wrote: post #24
KenArrari wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I like the idea of having limited but higher quality interactions. 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…

So instead of human matchmakers, next step: AI-arranged marriage?

I mean, you don't have to marry who they suggest, but it seems like a good first step for someone you talk to. At least a little bit stronger of a data-point than "I liked her face and 140char bio"
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