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145 comments

  • Met my fiance on a dating app, but I think they really peaked in the pandemic for the reasons the article stated that nobody had anywhere else to go.

    Now it's likely just filters for people who spend the time cultivating a social presence elsewhere.

  • Met my now-wife on Bumble in 2019, but I have a feeling it peaked around that time based on all the stories I've heard.

    Might have to do with commodifying relationships, but who am I to guess 🙃

  • There are ways to fix the issue, but it wouldn't be 'profitable'. It probably could not be run as a for-profit company. It would also necessarily be deeply intrusive; there's no way to beat some of the problems that make dating apps such a pain in the ass without also giving up a lot of privacy to the company running the app.

    You've got a couple of issues going on. First, women--and some men--end up getting harassed on these platforms. Related to that, you have people using them that simply aren't safe, such as people convicted of violent crimes and sexual assaults. Second, you have a number of people using them to cheat on existing partners. Third, catfishing and scams. Fourth, the profit motive of the company means that they aren't really interested in seeing you finding a partner at all.

    For starters, you'd need to have a system that required your real name, and would require verification on the order of opening a bank account built into it. (Yes, that means that you'd need really strong security.) They would need to run background checks, and look for things like criminal history, and searching tax records to make sure that you weren't filing taxes jointly. It would also forcibly populate fields about e.g. how many children you have. You'd likely need to set it up with geolocation (both GPS and WiFi); trying to use a VPN or any other privacy-centric processes running would prevent the app from functioning.

    Rather than subscriptions, you pay a single fee up-front, and activate/de-activate your account as desired.

    For harassment/catfishing/scams/paid sex work, etc., you could create a reporting system that would result in permanent bans for anyone found to be engaging in those behaviors. You'd likely need to also have systems in place and warnings against moving conversations to other platforms (e-mail, texting, etc.), so that harassing and scammy messages could get reported easily. Catfishing would be much more difficult if accounts were linked to your real identity.

    This is just kind of brainstorming. As I said, there are ways around all of the issues that people have with apps, if they're serious about meeting people. You can't fix hook-up culture per se; someone can lie to you just as easily IRL as they can on an app. But you can at least remove the worst trash from apps.

    • you have people using them that simply aren’t safe

      i feel like it would be better to describe them as potentially dangerous or violate, rather than "not safe" as that's a little weird IMO. Maybe you're talking about how people convicted of violent sexual crimes get violently criminalized on dating apps though lol.

      Second, you have a number of people using them to cheat on existing partners.

      i feel like this isn't really a problem, seems like it would be at least somewhat expected to me lmao. I'm also not really sure why it would matter, other than the dating base is probably shitty, but i hear it doesn't exist anyway so.

      (Yes, that means that you’d need really strong security.)

      actually it doesn't it just means you need to pretend that you have strong security, until your database gets hacked and leaked, and then you actually improve the security before the government bonks you on the head. (this one was just a shitpost)

      You’d likely need to also have systems in place and warnings against moving conversations to other platforms (e-mail, texting, etc.), so that harassing and scammy messages could get reported easily.

      a good solution for this one is to make the on platform chat not fucking awful. I can't imagine any of these dating apps have good chat platforms built in. That or maybe partner with something more universal?

      • i feel like it would be better to describe them as potentially dangerous or violate, rather than “not safe” as that’s a little weird IMO.

        Either/or. The language isn't important, but I think that excluding people with convictions and/or arrests for violent crimes and domestic violence--or at the very least putting red flag warnings in their profile that they can't remove--would be helpful. There was a website that purported to do similar, but it was based on first-hand accounts rather than public records, and ended up getting sued into oblivion. But if you're using public records, then as long as it's factual, there's no reasonable claim of defamation.

        i feel like this isn’t really a problem, seems like it would be at least somewhat expected to me lmao.

        If you're actually looking for a serious relationship--and not the hookup culture that people are supposedly fleeing--then knowing that a potential partner isn't legally married is pretty much the low end of the bar. It's not a guarantee, but it's something you can use that's a matter of public record that can exclude people.

        actually it doesn’t it just means you need to pretend that you have strong security, until your database gets hacked and leaked,

        Well, if you don't have very strong and effective security, then you need very deep pockets to pay out the damages when it does get hacked.

        That or maybe partner with something more universal?

        That's a pretty good idea.

        I think that, for me, an ideal system would be one that was end-to-end encrypted unless one of the two participants forwarded the message chain to a safety team at the company, and only then would it be visible to the safety team. So no one could just peek at your chats, but as soon as you sent a message to a safety team about harassment, the entire chat up to that point would be visible.

        You'd need to have very clear guidelines set up so that it was clear what constituted a "no", so that there wasn't a lot of room for interpretation; there are plenty of people (all genders) that will take anything up to a hard 'no' as a 'try harder', and there are a bunch that will even take that 'no' as a 'try harder'.

        As I said, I think that the problems with apps can all be solved, but I don't think that they can be solved if you're trying to monetize the whole thing. It only works if the goal is matching people up rather than making boatloads of cash.

  • Meeting people via clubs, activities, and friendships is the key to success these days.

145 comments