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The dating app paradox

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Re: The dating app paradox

#431

Post by Extasia785 »

solatic wrote: post #47

It's only a paradox until you realize that dating apps would shoot themselves in the foot with such a user-hostile model, trashing their brand. Hanlon's Razor directs us to the simpler explanation, which is that 90% of people on dating markets stay on dating markets; for which there are many, many highly personalized reasons. No dating app can fix its users' mindsets. There are three rules on dating apps, and they ha…

I completely agree. I'm always amused by the idea that dating apps have this secret, sophisticated algorithm that gives you dates that are nice but leave you wanting more. Human relationships are hard and I doubt that the best experts in the field could come up with something like that, and it's certainly impossible for an algorithm without any information about the person. I always feel that these complaints come from the frustration of not being able to find the perfect partner, from people who don't even come close to the standard they want in a partner.

In my experience, online dating is a pretty well functioning marketplace. People have a limited amount of time to date, so they'll take the best one they can get. Of course, online dating narrows down the ranking process to superficial information, but I don't think there's a technical solution to that. As a man I've seen both sides of the coin. When I started out with online dating I didn't have good pictures, no good bio, no good writing skills and didn't pay. I went months without a good match and even longer without a date. Then I decided to clean up my profile, highlight my strengths as a potential partner, learned to carry a fun conversation and started paying for the product and suddenly had to reject women, simply because I had too many options for any given night.

Dating apps are just a more extreme form of real dating. Dating always has been a competition, people will choose the best partner they can get. The advantage of the real world is that people often don't have many choices, but the disadvantage of the real world is also that people don't have many choices. Apps get rid of that disadvantage, but also of that advantage.

Re: The dating app paradox

#432

Post by ed_balls »

mensetmanusman wrote: post #351
ed_balls wrote: post #334

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have very little info. I like snowboards, standup, dogs, no description. I've put software engineer as a job. A couple years ago, I've A/B tested a few photos and with regular photo in a t-shirt I've only got a 2-4 likes per week. With a very similar photo to this one https://e0.pxfuel.com/wallpapers/29/831/desktop-wallpaper-io... I've got about 60 likes per week. I've thought that's a lot, but my ex told me she's…

Your Ex shared her hit ratio?

Yes, she was bragging that she was chosen to Tinder Select or whatever it's called.

Re: The dating app paradox

#433

Post by felsokning »

sweetro17 wrote: post #248

Former dating app founder here - lots of thoughts on the space - feel free to AMA High level though, there's a lot of human behavior which makes dating frustrating with or without apps. At it's core, even in the best case, dating has A LOT of rejection. Dating apps introduce more opportunity for incremental validation (you got liked!) but also incremental rejection (you got ghosted!) and the sheer number of interacti…

>...and figured out a feedback mechanism to reward users who were generally pleasant / respectful on their dates.

This sounds like a social scoring system, which is bound to be fraught with issues.

It's also possible/plausible that trying to increase the instances of this proposed reward (e.g.: per date) is bound to end-up being an objective - in and of itself; not to mention that the reward instances would potentially occur far more frequently for people who are generally considered "attractive".

Re: The dating app paradox

#434

Post by shiroiushi »

throw310822 wrote: post #375
lmm wrote: post #365

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Considering that what people want from dating apps is sex and partners, and that both are easier to obtain from people of matching attractiveness. But people don't have an accurate perception of matching attractiveness. The average person is a 5 who thinks they're an 8. And they've been looking at celebrities rather than average people, so if you match them with a 5 then they'll think that's a 3.

And yet the overwhelming majority of people of average attractiveness have mated and formed couples and married since forever. So that's possible. If an app is not able to match them, must be a failure of the app, not of nature.

Ages ago, people had very, very limited dating options: generally only the suitable partners in their village. They didn't have porn to distract them, and they weren't allowed to just stay single because of social pressure and (for women) economic need. It was rare that anyone stayed single, and they were generally considered weird or "unmarriageable".

So basically, people took what they could get, even if it meant someone they didn't care about or worse, someone who was downright abusive.

The higher rate of singledom these days isn't necessarily a bad thing. Centuries ago, these people would have gotten married, had terrible marriages, and produced kids (remember, no contraception back then) that were neglected and abused and grew up to be awful people.

Re: The dating app paradox

#435

Post by lou1306 »

carabiner wrote: post #403
sweetro17 wrote: post #366

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I see your point here - and I do agree, from experience, people sometimes express a desire for a bit of reality distortion in dating (we often heard that they want the experience to feel more like 'fate' or 'chance' than overly engineered). That said, I don't fully agree with the idea that there's a uniform concept of x/10 scale for daters and that they uniformly will balk at those below that uniform rating and there…

Do you also think women hate shirtless photos? Btw, this photo went viral a few weeks ago: https://imgur.com/a/CfXdtK2

This is an advertisement for underwear. And it features a professional actor. Context matters.

Re: The dating app paradox

#436

Post by shiroiushi »

sweetro17 wrote: post #366
hnthrowaway6543 wrote: post #336

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Apps are more transparent and equitable with how they expose profiles to other users. Don't bias toward highly liked people to increase perceived "quality" and shadow-hide show profiles that aren't liked often (and then ask them to pay lol). Show people more randomly, to better represent the true cross section of people on the app. This won't work; if you do this, you'll expose that the average online dating user i…

I see your point here - and I do agree, from experience, people sometimes express a desire for a bit of reality distortion in dating (we often heard that they want the experience to feel more like 'fate' or 'chance' than overly engineered). That said, I don't fully agree with the idea that there's a uniform concept of x/10 scale for daters and that they uniformly will balk at those below that uniform rating and there…

>Additionally, on the point of weight / body type, we found that a little under half of daters (and > 50% of women interested in men) do not report body type to be a significant factor in their decision making. So it is a meaningful factor, but for about 1/2 of daters it isn't.

According to the previous poster, 69% of Americans are overweight (36% obese). Assuming the dating app users are representative of Americans, then well over half of those daters are, themselves, overweight. So of course many of them won't report body type to be a significant factor! They're already overweight, and their expectations in a partner are probably realistic. What's disturbing is that only about 1/2 of daters said it wasn't a meaningful factor: this means that almost 20% of daters are both overweight AND (assumedly) expect to date fit people.

Re: The dating app paradox

#437

Post by alickz »

echoangle wrote: post #146
mensetmanusman wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Humans are the universe, everything humans do is natural.

Only if you assume a useless definition of natural. By your definition, everything would be natural, right? Can you give an example for something thats not natural?

Non-natural numbers?

Re: The dating app paradox

#438

Post by glimshe »

garciasn wrote: post #153
glimshe wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Any examples you would be comfortable sharing (ok to change the low level details of the situation)?

I had no access to any financial account, ever. Once I gained access, after the fact, there were nearly $16K in cash advances against a credit card I didn’t even know I had. Purchased all new dresses. Purchased workout equipment (rarely, if ever used). Purchased sex toys and sex-related clothing I never saw used. 5 new credit cards in her name. Pieces of paper with divorce related info I assumed were for a friend of…

I'm sorry to hear that. If you believe in any sort of natural order, be sure that she will get retribution from life.

Re: The dating app paradox

#439

Post by alickz »

ravenstine wrote: post #249
renjimen wrote: post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Many women in my locality are looking specifically for a good time with him. Attention != success.

For some men, such an experience would be the closest thing to success they've seen in quite some time.

Some men are so attention starved they would settle for negative attention

Re: The dating app paradox

#440

Post by alickz »

shiroiushi wrote: post #369
nvarsj wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The way these apps work, you pretty much have to pay as a guy. It's like a club where women get in free. The algorithms will derank you very fast unless you're a 10/10 male, and you will basically get no matches from then on. Most guys who are successful on dating apps are paying for it.

That hasn't been my experience at all, and I definitely don't think I'm a 10/10. I've had absolutely no trouble getting dates. (This does not mean that all the dates were great, or led anywhere BTW; the vast majority were nice enough people but there was no interest on one side or the other.) When I see posts like this, I really wonder if men like you just don't know how to write a decent profile intro/bio and post s…

> When I see posts like this, I really wonder if men like you just don't know how to write a decent profile intro/bio and post some good photos.

Do you ever wonder if your experiences are just not reflective of the majority?

Could be they make all the right moves and still lose, it happens more than people are willing to admit I think

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