However, I'm troubled by how profit motives distort online dating. The business model incentivizes engagement over meaningful connections, creating a system where genuine relationships feel like marketing bait for swipe addiction.
Hinge worked best for me and several friends, but I suspect its designers know how to better facilitate connections—improvements they avoid implementing because they would hurt revenue.
This has sparked my interest in creating an open-source, non-profit dating platform—one designed to address loneliness without answering to shareholders who prioritize metrics over human well-being.
I’m not sure that I’ll ever go through with it but I think it would be a worthwhile project to consider.
I used to really like OkCupid. Old school OkC reminded me of Bantr from Ted Lasso, it was more personality-driven. You'd answer hundreds of questions and see compatibility scores with people nearby. Even though that might be a questionable metric (I actually enjoy dating people different from me), it was interesting to sort by inverse and see who I was supposedly incompatible with.
What I love most about meeting through apps is how low-pressure it feels. There's no second-guessing about whether they're interested, if they're single, or worrying that you're bothering them. A dating app that actually tries to help people connect instead of sucking us dry through backtrack fees would be amazing.
I have no knowledge of the non-profit space, how would you initially fund something like that?
If you can figure out how to select people seriously looking for a relationship without becoming a pay to play app then it would be popular. But so far nobody knows how to do that. Or maybe someone does know but they won’t do it because there’s no profit in it.
Is it possible to root out everyone who “isn’t serious”? Definitely not, but I think there’s a lot more that can be done when you remove a profit motive.
This only works if the local people accept you. I know many LGBT people who aren’t accepted by those around them. Personally, I left everyone I grew up around because I couldn’t find friends or work.
Of course, those kinds of situations depend on the goodness of those doing the matchmaking, i.e. there must be no money changing hands (to coerce anyone), and the happiness of the potential couple must be the primary goal.
Getting one's selfish motives out of any interaction is a root problem in the human world, especially in many old-world cultures where women's rights don't count for shit. The sooner those old cultures are reformed, the better.
Girl Power!
Plus, in my experience, I felt very similarly in that I wanted to meet someone in “real life”. That felt important to me, to have some kind of story about how the relationship began that wasn’t “we met on Hinge”.
But after meeting that person, after so much trying and heartbreak and struggle, I realized how much I don’t care at all how we met. Just that I’m so happy to have them in my life.
Meeting in person is awesome, but having a companion who feels like your person isn’t diminished because you met on a dating app in my opinion and experience.
I know I fall into a unique-ish category, but let me tell why about 1% of men flock to it. Because they have the skill in dating but online is easiest. Before online dating my potential to match with an attractive woman was once per week. With online dating: 25 per week.
I'm at best an average looking guy. Having a cleft lip and being skinny doesn't help.
But with dating I've honed my hacker mindset. Like computers, human social systems are systems to be curious about. There are ways to influence it that helps you get to where you want to go.
Before dating apps, my favorite way to find dates was to compliment people on the street around 1 PM (lunch break while working remotely). Anyone I saw that I had a genuine compliment for, I'd give it. Men, women, dog (who's a good boy? :D), cat (hey cat, I respect you, please be kind :') ), didn't matter. 50% of people thank you and immediately move on. The other 50%, I'd just see where the vibe would go. Most of the time nothing would happen. Occasionally, I'd land a date or find a friend. The idea here simply is: it's a numbers game of finding people that you jive with.
The reason it needed to be also social is because when I tried to make it solely romantic, I became too needy and had too much of a taker's mindset. When I made it more social, I always had more of a giver's mindset (regardless of whether I was attracted to someone or not). I've experimented quite a bit to land on this way of getting dates.
I tried online dating for a few times, and it didn't work out as I got 0 to 3 matches per month. But then, like dating in real life, I decided to put on my hacker mindset. Over the course of a few months, I slowly saw my matches increase. The principles I found that worked are:
1. You need to be in front of as many people as possible
2. You need to be as high on the stack of cards as possible (so the other person doesn't have swiping fatigue)
3. You need to look as hot as you possible can
I optimized towards that. Fun fact about #3: the way you look in pictures doesn't even need to correspond that much to real life, not really. If you think I'm wrong, go and test it! Hackers test, so do scientists. Having a testing mindset has been invaluable when it comes to dating. What also helped is a really big motivation to "get this handled". I don't know why my motivation has been this big but it was. I've met people that look and act similar to how I am but aren't as motivated and they're not really getting anywhere (one of them is a very close friend of mine).
So back to #3: I basically became good at Photoshop and photography. I'd take pictures and edit pictures in such a way that it'd be the best picture I take in my life. My justification for editing: if it stays within the range of how women "edit their face" with make-up, then this is digital make-up for men. So it was nothing too crazy. But it definitely helped. And just like the female instagram models have all these tricks to look more attractive, I learned from them and figured out my own tricks. Are you skinny? A blazer is your best friend as it will make your shoulders look much larger. And so on. I never got called out on this as I stayed within the range of "make-up editing" and I'd show up on dates with a blazer as well. Humans are vein like that and after decades of not leaning into it, I decided to lean into it.
I'm married nowadays :) It took me 30 online dates in my thirties to find her. And countless of IRL dates and failed relationships that I have happened in my twenties. Oh, and therapy and self-therapy (the self-therapy being exposure to social situations that I'd have anxiety from).
Anyway, I hope this helps. I sometimes write about dating on this site as I know there's a group out here that still have as much difficulty as I did when I was younger. Feel free to search on my comments. It should have enough info on how to get out of it. I used to help people who emailed me but I don't have the bandwidth at the moment.
The irony here is that part of what I've learned is because of PUAs. Not Andrew Tate though, his advice is criminally toxic. And a lot of advice is metaphorical dirt to the point that it really does feel like one is mining for nuggets of gold of wisdom. Being sceptical but open really helped. Back then (2004), I had nowhere else to look. PUAs taught me the concept of playfulness really well, including the advice that taking improv classes help with that as well.
It was really hard to understand, given my specific blend of neurodivergence, but once I understood how a big part of my personality is inherently playful (always has been), a lot of my dating issues were fixed. Not all though, but I think unearthing my own inner playful self, which was there behind all the layers, has helped me tremendously. Thoroughly understanding and digging up my own playfulness has been one of the best investments in my life.
I also learned a lot thanks to Tal Ben-Shahar's positive psychology class in 2006. In an indirect way, I owe my HN username to that class as metta is loving-kindness meditation and meditation super charged my life (and dating life).
It’s hard enough bringing it up. I bring it up to give evidence to the fact that I am not a stereotypical good looking guy. Because I am not.
It's a bit like if I say I want to write a novel, but all I do is sporadically open up Google Docs and write for 30 minutes before losing inspiration and doing something else. If I never write a book, is that Google Docs fault, or mine? Despite their flaws, I think modern dating apps actually provide a pretty good toolset for finding a long-term partner. But like any tool, your results will depend mostly on your skill and dedication in putting it to use.
The reason the "tool" works for you is that you are willing to game the system. Everything can be a hammer.
Those really looking for a casual hookup rarely are honest about it. The pond might shrink if they are (maliciously or not). This then requires a much more guarded and hard approach for those seriously looking for longterm relationships.
There is a signal value in what tool you use. Even though they might all look like a hammer to you.
People are accepting invitations on Facebook. But around here it is commonly known to only mean either an intention of attending (or just showing support even). Again Facebook the tool is not to blame. Hence I do not use that tool. No fault of the tool in itself.
So I think that the lament is not that dating apps are misused. People are "free" to do that. But what should the people who want a (for the lack of a better term) "real dating" app do?
Some thrive in this new world. But I would claim that we get more and more lonely while hiding behind our screens.
The extroverts had an easier time even before the apps. With the apps they thrive. The introverts just got an even harder time navigating this.
Dating apps are pure hell for those who "want to write the book". I do not blame the tool but I do see a real world issue.
> The stats are bleak. Industry-wide, only about 10% of users find a long-term partner. Hinge? Roughly 5%.
However, this is not what their linked source says:
> Tinder is also the most successful matchmaker, with 29.6% of respondents engaged or married to a partner from the app. Bumble and Hinge trail behind at 12.9% and 5%, respectively.
5% of survey respondents were engaged or married to someone from hinge. This reflects the relative popularity of the different apps, not your odds of finding love on them.
To be honest I have a lot of the features that people think equal automatic success on a dating app but I would still go weeks, sometimes months without a match. Or worse, get matches but have nobody respond despite taking the time to come up with something funny or interesting to say (not just “hey”).
Something important I realized now that I’m out of it is to take breaks, sometimes long breaks, from any kind of “trying”, whether online or in-person. I took many breaks that were out of a place of being angry at myself for not being attractive or charismatic enough or whatever it was that was causing me to fail. But if I could do it over again, I’d be telling myself that I’m getting tired of this right now, and that’s okay. I’ll put it away for a few weeks or months or even years if I felt I needed that time. Then try again.
imagine being so revolting you didn't get any like me keep ya head up
> They understand that people don’t make decisions based on features or specifications, alone. They make decisions based on how something makes them feel.
> Despite innovative products, countless tech startups remain bland and interchangeable in the public eye. The reason? They focus on what they do, not why they do it. Tech companies pour resources into engineering and user acquisition, but treat branding as an afterthought – maybe a logo here, a quirky Twitter (now X) voice there. Technical solutions solve functional problems but they’re not equipped to make people care.
> Facts tell, but stories sell.
A bunch of good examples.
For the standard objections that some people pick things not because of feelings but because they have a problem to solve: why do these people want to solve that problem?
Answer, because it's a problem. It's by definition. Oxford: "a matter or situation regarded as unwelcome or harmful and needing to be dealt with and overcome"
But the thing is, if you’re online dating there is no reason to settle. If you wanted to settle, you’d just meet people in real life. Online dating is for you to take a chance at getting the best you can get. Sometimes it works and sometimes not. People just don’t understand this. If you’re not at the top % of the dating pool in attractiveness, stick to real life
