Thoughts and ideas of a dyslexic designer/developer
Jason Silva has covered this before but this goes one step beyond.
We’re post-geographical beings, attentional proximity has been decoupled from physical proximity, collapsing geography
Attention proximity is interesting to me, especially because I have been known to be many miles away in attention from where I physically am.
The decoupling is something which I can relate to…
I’m proud to say Single Black Male took my application and said yeah they would like to me to write for them.
My first piece just went up live on the site…Technology Assisted Dating
Today’s guest post is from a writer from across the pond. I’m sure he thinks Americans are <redacted>, so be sure to prove him wrong by showing him some love in the comment section below. LOL! Welcome today’s post from Ian Forrester. Enjoy!
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I live in Manchester, no not Manchester Alabama, Georgia or anywhere in the states. Manchester in the United Kingdom or England. Yes, SBM has gone slightly international but fear not the reason why I talk about Manchester is to give some context.
Manchester is famous for many things but two lesser known facts are:
- It contains the second biggest group of singles in the UK outside London; and
- It’s extremely gay friendly.
Now I’m not gay or even bi-sexual but dare I say it, some of my friends are gay (which isn’t saying much living in Manchester). A trip to the coffee shop or a bar is full of surprises. Who has not heard of the likes of Grindr? Grindr is/was extremely popular with the urban single gay males and it seems highly effective in meeting other people.
You could see this as a digital wingman of sorts or a step on the way towards a technology assisted dating/hookup depending on what you’re actually after. Before you get on your high horse, suck in your gut and say, “So sad some people need this…” Just two things to remember:
- My gay friends have lots of fun with it (maybe the way dating should be – sort of fun); and
- Is this much different than the data and algorithms of online dating?
A little bit of help can go a long way and fellas there is nothing wrong with a little assistance once in a while (now breath out and say it with me).
If you’re anything like me, you’re wondering where’s the heterosexual version?
…I then go on to discuss if proximity based dating is a real thing and has anyone got stories which they can share in the comments.
SBM nicely clean up my grammar and spelling, but generally the words are my own and there will be more guest posts to come.
I wrote about OkCupid locals beta a while ago and said it was quite interesting to see the person on the phone in real life. This isn’t anything new but to see the hetrosexual world get there own thing even for a short while was interesting. Now there’s too many of them… Okcupid, Plenty of Fish, Meetmoi and even Zoosk has gotten into the field. You can now have that Bluetooting experience you’ve always wanted thanks to these apps… However are they actually used beyond having a giggle with your friends?
Another good question…
Well it seems like all this stuff, with so many different networks, the love of your life could be sitting next to you and you wouldn’t know because of the lack of interoperability between the services and their apps.
The reason why grindr did so well is because every gayman up for a bit of fun had it installed. Pushing out all the rest of the apps. If you were available and up for it, grindr was the app to have.
But back to the original question… Do they really matter?
I personally have removed Okcupid’s app from my phone because of the drain on battery and to be honest many people I know turn off the functionality. Privacy concerns and the fear of being stalked by some crazy ex may have a massive effect here? But frankly few people are openly using it and even if they are… there very unlikely to be on the same network as you.
I hate to say it but it looks like this one was the bluetoothing story all over again. Some people will have fun with the idea but for most people it will be another dream/fantasy/nightmare waiting to happen…
Stowe Boyd reflects on MG Siegler’s color experience in a bachelor party in Mexico
Maybe the $41M pre-launch injection of capital has sucked all the oxygen out of the discussion about the app. A bunch of folks were using it at the recent Podio launch party in San Francisco, and we all thought it was cool as hell.
Color really shines in a setting of maximum social density and activity — like parties, concerts, or conferences. It may be equally interesting to use in a voyeuristic way in areas of high population — like wandering through Soho — if there are enough hipsters around to give you their perspective via photostream.
It won’t displace other photo sharing apps, like Instagram, but it will change the way we experience the most socially rich events.
Absolutely, color in the right environment could be interesting and even useful. Now we know how there doing the proximity/matching. It makes total sense that you need to be in a venue which is used for a shared experience (or as stowe calls it maximum social density) like a club, bar, conference, concert, etc. If (and it seems like it) this is there patient pending technology, then there is absolutely no doubt that there will be other proximity photosharing services popping up real soon..
The concept of proximity based photosharing is going no where, but I think color certainly is. To be honest, I’m just happy to be able to use the correct spelling of colour again *smile*
Even PocketTweet on my windows mobile phone has the basic feature set for Proximity-Based Social Networking, I can’t understand how this could be granted a patent? Something is broken if Apple have been awarded this…