Tag: tinder

Dating after a long relationship

Chess on the High Line

Lifehacker has a well reasoned piece about returning to dating at a older age. Its something nobody really wants to think about, married and happy then things go wrong. Before long you are separated or divorced and you are pondering what to do.

For me I decided to get back into dating as its very easy to slip into a endless cycle of regret and depression. To be fair I wasn’t really dating much beforehand just like the Thorin.

I’ve always felt dating was a weird experience in general, but somehow, coming back to it in the last few years feels different. I was married for several years in my late 20s, so I missed out on the earlier days of online dating sites. It was also a much more carefree time, when if you liked someone, that was enough. But now that I’m in my 30s, the rules and expectations are completely different—making it a lot harder to get back in the game.

I have said it before many times, this is why when talking to people in long term relationships, its hard to explain why things are different now.

…you have billions of other human beings at your fingertips through a variety of channels. As always, you can hit up bars, clubs, and shows. You can venture off to parties and barbecues. You can also go online and have access to loads of single people in your area. It’s a far cry from even high school, when your dating pool was largely pretty much your friends and their friends.

Online dating gives you more options than ever. Not just in people, but in sources. Dating sites like OkCupid, Tinder, Match, eHarmony, and Plenty of Fish all give you access to other single people in a matter of seconds.

I have a talk inside of me all about this and much much more. I gave a 10min overview at Best of British, which you can watch on youtube.

There are some really good points raised

The Deal Breakers Have Changed, and They’re Much Bigger Deals.
Yes the deal breakers are serious now, if something isn’t right for you. There are enough other people to give try. There is the downside to this of course, paradox of choice and people seeking the greener grass on the other side.

The “Game” Is Different, and Bluntness Is King
No body likes time-wasters and you need to be blunt and to the point otherwise things will drag on.  It doesn’t mean you have to be super rude, just honest and direct. People will thank you for it deep down, even if its painful at first. Of course you got get a think skin and be prepared for honest and direct feedback too. This is why getting over the fear of rejection is so important.

Automated your tindering

Tinderbox dashboard

This has got to be one of the most creepiest (and slightly impressive) things (I seen a lot of stuff, but nothing recently) I’ve seen recently in online dating news… Cheers Dave for the heads up on this project which is also available under a very free and easy licence on Github…

While my friends were getting sucked into “swiping” all day on their phones with Tinder, I eventually got fed up and designed a piece of software that automates everything on Tinder.

Dubbed “Tinderbox”, the first version only took 3 weeks to build. It uses an existing Tinder account and taps into Tinder APIs, which is nice so you don’t have to create an entirely new account. Tinderbox recreates the Tinder app in your browser, including the inbox and discovery preferences. The workflow is simple:

  • The built-in bot builds facial models using your likes/dislike

  • Bot examines profile images, cropping faces

  • Faces are loaded into an “average” face representing choices

  • Eigenfaces are computed from average faces

  • Bot then makes future selections based on Eigenface comparison

  • Comparisons are essentially k-nearest neighbor selection

Yes its a Tinder bot which starts conversations with people based on profile pictures… I’m glad I’m off Tinder. But the author also had this to add.

What do girls think of the bot? I’ve gone on at least 10 dates with the help of the bot and I’ve shown my partners the bot in its entirety. One date literally didn’t believe me and thought I was pulling her leg. Another person thought it was really cool and wanted the full tour. All were in agreement that it is not creepy, though some felt it was borderline.

Enough said really? This has got to be on this weeks Lovegrumps!

Breaking the rules of online dating with bristlr

At Silicon Drinkabout last night, I was introduced to John Kershaw who created a social network/dating site for people with and like beards – Bristlr. (yes this is the uniform dating style thing, basically for anybody)

  • Tell us where you are, and if you have a bear
  • Got a beard? We find people looking for beards
  • Want a beard? We find people with beards worth looking for
  • Send messages to people you match with
  • Your life now contains more beard love, you’re welcome

John seems to have got quite a few people on-board with no advertising or promotion. Its a interesting site and hits a niche really well.

How does it make money? Well funny enough me and John talked about this at length. Unlike most dating sites, he won’t be collecting and selling the data  of the users. His privacy policy seems to follow through on this…

Bristlr

We take your privacy seriously. We won’t sell your data. That’s a dick thing to do.

When you use Bristlr, we collect a fair chunk of data about you, but it’s the bare minimum required for the website to function. All of the information is collected explicitly from you.

As this is the internet, our servers collect loads of info like your IP address and some browser details. We do use standard internet tracking and monitoring software, namely Google Analytics, to tell us about who is using the website.

If ever we need to use your personal information for any reason which isn’t essential to the running of Bristlr, we will ask for your consent.

We may disclose your personal information if we are required by law. But we would be super fucking unhappy if this happened.

There is a premium option (there always is!) which shows you the people you’ve yet to match with who have “liked” you.  But realistically, its the price of a coffee or theres the pyramid approach with a referrals..

Bristlr Matches screen

I’m signed up, giving it a try and of course you can give it a try too for free. Theres a referral if you like to enable me premium for a bit  http://www.bristlr.com/?referral=cubicgarden

Blame tinder or the sick people

Killer Prom Date - Dig The Grave Black & White

Jody sent me a link on Facebook, to this horrible story of a women who was gang raped after meeting a guy on Tinder.

This is horrible and shows the sick and twisted people who hopefully nobody will ever come across. However I do find the advice the detective says a little difficult to take in one go.

Detective inspector Haddow said: ‘It’s absolutely vital that people using dating websites and apps remember that how a person portrays themselves on the internet can be very different from their real life persona.

‘With this in mind, we strongly advise people that if they decide to meet a person they have been introduced to via the internet, then ensure the meeting is in a public place and take a friend along with you.’

I have been on dates with women who have brought a friend along and its been a slightly surreal experience. Now to be fair one was sitting on the same table as us and another one in the next booth. If you are going to bring a friend, for goodness sake don’t bring them to the table!

The story is so horrible and I can’t imagine much worst but its really hard to give advice on what to do before going on a date besides the usual stuff like meet in a public place, text your friend to say you’re ok, get them to call you at a set time. Most of these things the lady in question did and she still ended up meeting these sick people.

I guess the point I’m making is, its not great to put hard rules down, they may help but its not bulletproof advice. Its a matter of judgement,  if you feel somethings not right, get up and go. Heck climb through the toilet window if you have to. But the only person who really knows what to do at the moment is yourself, which is another reason not to drink too much on dates.

Its too easy to say she should have done this, she should have done that (blaming the victim for something so horrible is also a stupid thing to do – don’t look at the comments!). Frankly love and dating are very risky, you can do much to minimise the risk but at some point you need to open yourself up or you never will know.

Online dating? Why so serious?

Why so serious?

In passing I also found the hierarchy of seriousness in the Guardian’s post, interesting following the last post

At the top is something like Guardian Soulmates or Match – the ones you pay for. At the lower end are the likes of OKCupid or PlentyOfFish (POF) which are free, more casual and less “Where do you see yourself in 10 years’ time?”

Although I do agree about the statement, I think of it as more like a spectrum. You have your Match and Guardian Soulmates on one end and your Social dating apps like Tinder at the other end. Around the middle is something like OKCupid.

The more serious end of the spectrum is full of people wanting kids and marriage quickly. Theres also a certain amount of desperation you can feel coming from that end. Its very much what people use to make jokes about when they thought of online dating.

The other end is less serious and more casual. Yes you get casual hookups that end too but also you get people who are more laid back and less pushy about being in a relationship. Right now my circumstances would favor somebody from this end.

The mistake people make, is thinking all the quality is at the non-casual end of the spectrum. I’m not economist but dating is a bit of a numbers game. I guarantee the number of people you meet at the social dating end is far greater, even if its to meet and think never again. I would also contest that you will get more tech savvy young professionals and geeks than the other end.

Game mechanics in online dating

Josh sent me this

Not quite sure why he sent it my way except to say I’ve had very little success with Tinder myself. I have theories and to be fair the article hints at the same conclusions.

It’s playful. You put in your pictures and add some information if you can be bothered. I started with one line “Single Canadian girl in London”. It’s superficial, based purely on physical attraction, but that’s what I was looking for. You go through what’s there, if you see someone you like, you swipe right. If he swipes you too, it lights up like a game, then asks if you want to keep playing….But Tinder is addictive. You find yourself browsing and swiping and playing on.

On Tinder everything’s disposable, there’s always more, you move on fast.

A game, addictive, disposable… Like a casual game? Candy crush, angry birds, cut the rope anybody?  Somewhere on my blog I wrote about how the application affects the mindset of the user. Sure Sherry Turkle talks about this too.

Funny enough Sarah a while ago sent me a post about Tinder from Buzzfeed.

Once again, the application has an effect on the user behavior. Tinder is simply too game like. I mean I would contest that most social dating sites are using game mechanics across their sites and apps.

There seems to be much debate about if “Love is a game?” but this simply isn’t sustainable…

Little social test, how men on tinder react to makeup?

graffiti, Shoreditch
Tim is once again on a roll with this  little test of the effect of makeup on profile pictures in the domain of online dating. Or how men on tinder reacted to three different levels of makeup.

As many of you know, on Tinder you cannot view any reciprocated likes (matches) until you indicate your interest in that person by swiping to the right. So, when planning my experiment, I decided to swipe right for the first 100 suggested matches per account, then allow one hour afterward to see what kind of messages and matches it turned up. I then counted the reciprocated likes, messages and ages of my matches to see any general trends when it came to my level of cosmetic “enhancement.”

To be clear this isn’t a scientific in anyway… but the results did surprise me and the conclusions were slightly interesting… I say slightly…

Despite my reservations about the entire concept, however, the guys on Tinder surprised me. More men flocked to a bare-faced girl than a heavily made up one, yet they seemed most aggressively interested in a face adorned in average levels of makeup. Their language seemed to reflect what they thought of the woman behind the makeup, treating my bare-faced account as a friend before a hook-up. While it’s unfortunate to me that many of these men treated a woman as more sexualized because of her cosmetics, their cordiality in most of the messages was refreshing.

Part of this could be the out of your league thing? Or maybe its a good thing for once…? Because heck nothing else good seems to come from Tinder 🙂

When will social networking dethrone online dating?

Year of making love professionals

On the plane I read a number of posts including, Could Instagram Dethrone Online Dating?

The latest word is that online dating may be on its way out – and that even includes explosively popular mobile apps like Tinder – and that social networks may be on their way in.

Which leads to a post from the same people asking… Is Facebook Becoming an Alternative to Online Dating?

…over 19,000 people who had been married between 2005 and 2012, and asked them how they’d met. Those who met on social networking sites were more likely to be younger and married more recently compared to those who met online in other ways. He was surprised to find that those who met via social networking sites were just as happy as those who met online, and those who met online in general were happier than those couples who met in more traditional ways, such as through friends.

I’ve been banging on about this for yonks…

No matter what the online dating sites think or even say (and I’m surprised how short sighted OKcupid and PoF CEOs are on this). They should be worrying about facebook.

So rather than go on about the obvious, I did spot something interesting in another related posted, Why Mobile Dating Is So Popular?

Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic, professor of psychology at University College London, told The Times: “[Using a dating website] is almost like booking a holiday or a job application, as you try to customize your partners. Mobile dating – and Tinder is a good example – is different. It is more linked to impulse and emotions and focuses on attractiveness and looks, which is more realistic, even if it is a bit more lazy. It replicates the traditional version of dating more closely than Match.com or eHarmony as it allows for more serendipity.”

Now you may already noticed Tomas’s name from the Year of Making Love that crazy show I was involved in (well somewhat…). Anyway passing over that, its a interesting point. I don’t think its necessarily true but who knows, the behavior of people on Tinder and Grindr is questionable and addictive. Not far off a night on the town? Or at least the last part of the night when you look around for someone to hook up with?

The browsing and snap judgments are somewhat part of Tinder and Grindr. If they happen to have something in common, thats a bonus. If a friend of a friend, then thats certainly a +1.

I think I saw you on Tinder?

Tinder costume

To be honest its happened a few times, not just tinder but other virtual places like my experience with TV and dating.

It could be awkward for many. But to be honest for myself, as I’m deadly truthful its doesn’t come as a shock that it is.. really me.

The last time this happened was at FutureEverything’s opening party. Unfortunately I was rushing off, so the women in question said hi and pointed out our friend in common.

Other people have come up on dating sites and I have recognised them and learned a tiny bit more about them. Of course no names… But people from work and other places. The tricky part is pretending they didn’t come up and saying nothing?

Some of them have lied about different things like height, age, where they work, etc. A couple I have spoke to and asked them why they feel the need to tell little and not so little while lies? My thoughts is something to do with a mix of social pressures and self-esteem issues. Its a shame really.

Whats in common with Tinder?

A while ago I wrote a piece for Single black male titled technology assisted dating.

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?

The likes of OKCupid and POF’s mobile apps use geolocation to find singles which match your profile. Grindr however seems to have that extra element of passive fun or hookup. So the question always has been? Wheres the hetrosexual version of Grindr? Those in the know, recommend Tinder. So I checked it out a while ago and recently gave it another try .

The thing about Tinder is its totally based on your Facebook profile. When I first saw this as a requirement, I read the privacy policy and though no thank you. But since I gave it a shot and found it weirdly interesting.

As said before the app requires (there is no other way to make it work) Facebook data. Once you hook it up every aspect of your Facebook data you get recommendations of people you may like. As I letter found out you can alter some of the settings in the app. Things like distance to search, sexuality and the age range.

The interface is a hot or not styled thing based on profile pictures from people around you. Its not exactly scientific in anyway.

However whats interesting is when Tinder finds something you like in common. This can be something you both liked or something you both have an interest in. It even points out any friends you both have in common. So instead of filling out loads of questions, its simply highlighting the commonality between you both.

Tinder app okcupids app

For example above, there are 3 common things me and Sally share. If I click the i, I can find out which things exactly. In this case Sally likes donnie darko, fight club, and the watchmen. If we had friends in common it would put a number in the other box too.

Once you’ve done all this, thats pretty much it. If the other person comes across your profile and also hearts you, then your both made aware of this connection.

Its simple but also quite effective, if your facebook profile is maintained and well used. The problem I have is I don’t really use Facebook and its apps much, so alot of it is more guess work than matching. Maybe I might consider updating and managing parts of my FB profile in future.

Using Facebook makes a ton of sense and I’ve always maintained that Facebook makes a great dating site.

So its pretty frictionless as a app and service. I have already seen people adding additional information like there twitter username and even email address to the one and only free text area. Which makes me wonder how there going to make any revenue from the app and us the users? Its also lot less realtime that Grindr, so I don’t expect to see people wondering around with the app open, so no real time adverts.

Is it all about the data and what they can sell on? Will there be a pro version on the cards? Will they start selling adverts? Or will they simply go for a walled garden type thing like most other dating sites? It would be good know before I can really recommend the service.

But as a whole, I’m quite liking Tinder and it will stay on my android devices for now. Its certainly not Grindr for us hetrosexuals but its something smarter and slightly clever.