[HN Gopher] Bumble S-1
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Bumble S-1
Author : tempsy
Score : 143 points
Date : 2021-01-15 17:09 UTC (5 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.sec.gov)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.sec.gov)
| bob_theslob646 wrote:
| Will be incredibly interesting to see if investors start to clamp
| down on what they consider an "active user."
|
| Also, I wonder how they deal with fraud? Huge problem for them
| and Tinder.
|
| Tons of phishing attempts / attempt to get you off app to sell
| you paid Snapchat or Onlyfans
|
| Here is an interesting article about the fake profiles on Tinder
|
| http://in.lifestyle.yahoo.com/us-model-sues-dating-1-5-b-ove...
|
| " The lawyer for a Florida model suing dating site Match.com as
| part of a 1.5-billion-dollar-class-action-lawsuit said that
| Match.com can easily weed out fake profiles by using software
| that can help pinpoint most fake profiles. Yuliana Avalos, a
| mother and part-time model, said that hundrerd of fake profiles
| on Match.com have used her pictures without her consent. The
| class action lawsuit filed in Manhattan Federal Court on Thursday
| alleges that copyright laws were broken by the dating site, which
| also committed common law fraud by allowing fake profiles with
| unconsenting people's images to be approved, ABC News reported."
| offtop5 wrote:
| Fraud is a key part of the business model.
|
| Check the FTC filling against Match.
|
| The fake profiles get you engaged, and then you get a
| notification of your match. By the time you actually view it
| the other account is disabled. But you already paid.
|
| One needs to think of the ideal consumer of this stuff. Let's
| create a character , Dave.
|
| Dave logs on, gets a match the first week. He goes out with
| Sarah . They hit it off and he cancels his subscription.
|
| Very bad for dating apps. That's lost revenue.
|
| Let's play it back. Sarah was actually a bot which got disabled
| before Dave could even chat. But as Dave has no way of knowing
| this, it motivates him to stay subscribed.
|
| Which one of these two scenarios is more beneficial to Match /
| Bumble , etc ?
|
| In my experience I actually went out with a good amount of
| people. All were 30ish , unemployed and constantly complaining
| about their parents. Since I'm not interested in people like
| that I only date in real life.
|
| The results have been tremendous. I went out with several six-
| figure earners in 2019, including one special girl who was
| making 200k. Plus I don't really trust bumble or whoever to not
| sell my private information to make a few extra bucks.
|
| Life is a journey not a destination
| cheriot wrote:
| They don't need to use bots. Pretty much every dating app
| gives new users an initial boost in visibility to get them
| hooked. Each app has its own demographic that I've noticed
| can change in different cities. Last I was using these,
| Coffee Meets Bagel had the professional crowd near me.
|
| FYI, it comes across poorly the way you seem to evaluate
| partners based on their income.
| offtop5 wrote:
| >They don't need to use bots.
|
| https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/press-
| releases/2019/09/ftc-s...
|
| >FYI, it comes across poorly the way you seem to evaluate
| partners based on their income.
|
| In my experience people ether have fantastic careers and
| know where they're going in life, or don't want to do
| anything at all.
|
| Getting involved with anyone who doesn't have a job is
| never going to end well. I learned this the hard way...
| tomc1985 wrote:
| Why does Bumble need to go public?
|
| Yet another promising company prostituting itself to public
| shareholders for those precious tendies. Le sigh.
|
| Who wants to take bets on how much Bumble is going to suck in a
| year or two?
| rchaud wrote:
| > Why does Bumble need to go public?
|
| Because VCs aren't charities and prefer to invest in moonshots
| instead of a potentially sustainable business models.
|
| Any company starts to 'suck' from the moment the VC money teat
| is taken away. These companies are not profitable when they
| IPO, how can they survive without trying to cash in by any
| means necessary?
| tomc1985 wrote:
| There is a huuuuuuuuuuge(!!) gap between moonshots and
| charity work.
| cheriot wrote:
| So employees can buy houses and achieve other normal financial
| goals. So those of us that are not VCs or Bumble employees can
| own a piece.
|
| They're transitioning out of a model where investor money
| subsidized our dating lives. That means things will change
| regardless of who owns it.
| tomc1985 wrote:
| And if the company had a reasonable scope, with a reasonable
| headcount, then all those things would be attainable while
| staying private, without corrupting the product or spreading
| one's legs to the markets, as it were.
|
| But now, the only thing that's going to work for them in the
| long run is growth. At all costs. Far beyond whatever is the
| most appropriate point for what could have been a humble
| dating site, because the public will demand no less for a
| return on their investment.
| cheriot wrote:
| Because non-public startups don't grow at all costs and
| hire too many people? You're attributing things to public
| companies that any company can do or not.
| ttam wrote:
| I always found it curious that Whitney would associate herself
| with Badoo, but I guess that's business as usual.
|
| Pre-Tinder, Badoo was a fast growing dating app that was shady
| af, full of dark patterns on the site/app -
| https://www.wired.co.uk/article/sexual-network [2011]
|
| Then this came out a while ago, and I can't say I was surprised
| how the founder is portrayed
| https://www.forbes.com/sites/angelauyeung/2019/07/08/exclusi...
|
| (and I would also not be surprised at all if I found out that
| Bumble's data was being sold to others - AFAIK no signs of that
| currently happening)
| fasicle wrote:
| Revenue:
|
| "Bumble and Badoo are two of the highest grossing online dating
| mobile applications... generated $376.6 million... in the period
| from January 29, 2020 to September 30, 2020."
|
| Actually higher than I was expecting.
| cairoshikobon wrote:
| As someone with a heavy accent, I dislike dating apps...
|
| I can write and sound and look like a certain group, but when I
| meet people in real life my accent becomes an instant turn-off.
| That's why I decided to only ever go out with ones whom we met
| first in real life. Not to mention the privacy implications.
| Lookup stories of people whose photos were used by scammers in
| other countries on dating apps..
| whalesalad wrote:
| On a dating app you are selling yourself. If you are not
| selling yourself accurately, that is not something you can
| blame on others. Put it in your profile: I have a thick accent.
| the_only_law wrote:
| Yeah I'm really jaded in regards to online dating. Ofc, I'm
| jaded about most online interaction at this point. I've half
| way considered trying to seriously use one of these apps, but I
| usually just delete it within a week. I just don't think I can
| succinctly reduce my personality to an "acceptable" bio and a
| handful of pictures. Then again "online" has almost been the
| only place I've met people my age the past few years.
| terribledustin wrote:
| I knew Bumble was generating a lot of revenue but surprised by
| the not-far-off revenue of their app Badoo.
| permo-w wrote:
| If someone made a dating app where only men could message first,
| I suspect it wouldn't be allowed on the App Store
|
| Of course, it's your choice to use Bumble, and I support its
| right to exist, but it feels odd that it's largely seen as a
| progressive take on the dating app, when, to me anyway, it seems
| regressive and imbalanced, putting one gender in the position to
| pick and choose, and the other passively waiting for that choice
|
| However, I'm sure there are other meritorious perspectives on
| this, and I'd be pleased to hear them
|
| Edit: I'm seeing in other comments that mainly they have this
| feature for the purely cynical reason of getting female users on
| the app - and generating publicity. That makes sense, but I'm
| more commenting on the media reaction itself, than the ethics of
| the company
| balls187 wrote:
| How does Bumble scale, and not just end up a portfolio company
| for the Match Group?
| polote wrote:
| The same way the Match group scales. Bumble today belongs to
| the Badoo Network, and is showing strong growth mainly because
| the product is better and more respectful of girls than Tinder.
| As long as Tinder exists their number of users will increase
| balls187 wrote:
| > and is showing strong growth mainly because the product is
| better and more respectful of girls than Tinder.
|
| Precisely. Bumble got popular because Tinder was not
| successful in helping connect people for meaningful
| relationships. Tinder works exceptionally well for keeping
| you engaged, and for a subset of users, good at fostering
| some sort of connection.
|
| As you are aware, Bumble's _only_ innovation over tinder was
| requiring women to initiate the first message after matching.
|
| In their S1 filings, note they do not list any sort of
| relationship based metrics, rather all usage based.
|
| They are not in the business of helping people find love.
|
| As other products come on the market, users will eventually
| migrate away to services that are vested in creating long
| term partnerships.
|
| In my opinion, dating apps still have not solved the
| fundamental problem for straight couples--for a majority of
| women, they are overwhelmed, and for men they are lost in a
| sea of choices.
|
| But...that said, I have two dates this weekend from Hinge.
| Highly recommend Hinge over Bumble.
| tw04 wrote:
| At some point they can't and the question is: where are the
| government regulators? Honestly are there any other major
| players in the online dating space besides MatchGroup and
| Bumble?
|
| We've known for over a hundred years that capitalism doesn't
| work without competition and yet we seem doomed to keep
| repeating the same mistakes over and over.
| edmundsauto wrote:
| Facebook had a dating app before COVID that they were heavily
| promoting.
| tw04 wrote:
| I just spent the last week reading from all sorts of people
| how Apple/google/amazon/facebook/etc have too much power,
| and your solution to this problem is that they take over
| yet another industry?
| tgtweak wrote:
| I think part of the tactic is to go for more non-dating. If I'm
| reading this s1 properly however there doesn't seem to be much
| traction there and majority of activity seems to be on the
| dating side.
| xxpor wrote:
| Because the product makes no sense. Why would I use a swipe
| system focused on people's appearance to find new friends?
| The whole meet someone random and chat on an app is already
| super awkward for dating, but there's motivation to get over
| it for obvious reasons, and in that context at least
| attractiveness is a rational dimension to consider.
|
| At least something like Meetup pre-selects for fairly
| specific interests.
| fastball wrote:
| I've actually formed a number of long-lasting friendships
| via dating apps.
| xxpor wrote:
| Did you go into it expecting to be friends though?
| fastball wrote:
| I went into them hoping to meet and hang out with
| interesting people, and wasn't too bothered with whether
| it would end up purely friendly or veer romantic.
| [deleted]
| Goosee wrote:
| Bumble has been great to use as a college student, especially
| during covid.
|
| I know a lot of you are married so let me put this out here: I
| (and most young people) will not put their romantic life on pause
| cause of a virus. Every dating app got an influx of people due to
| bordem from lockdowns.
|
| I'm biased towards (investing in) bumble because it has
| anecdotally acted as the best dating 'middleman' compared to
| tinder/hinge. I've had only great experiences taking bumble girls
| on dates.
|
| Compared to tinder, bumble has more serious people looking to
| date. The system is set up so girls message first and matches
| will expire after 24 hr. When a girl messages you first, she is
| already more invested in getting to you know than when a guy
| using a cheesy pickup line on tinder.
|
| I've always loved the philosophy bumble took to the dating scene
| compared to the apps part of $MTCH.
| [deleted]
| actuator wrote:
| Surprising. Out of the three you mentioned I like Hinge to be
| the neatest one in terms of idea, although the worst app out of
| the three. The prompt/photo comments approach allows for a
| better conversation starter than bios IMO. Also, being able to
| see who is liking you by default is much better.
|
| Way back when I used Bumble, a lot of girls used to drop
| 'Hi!'(double standards), and never bothered to reply to my
| reply which felt very annoying to say the least.
|
| I would wish every dating app to add a simple feature, if the
| other person is active on the dating app and isn't responding
| to you, just unmatch the pair say after two/three days of the
| last message. I don't understand what's the purpose of just
| being a name/chat on someone's list.
| ralston3 wrote:
| > just unmatch the pair say after three days of the last
| message.
|
| This is a good point. However, some women (due to men
| spamming them) don't have notifications turned on, so
| genuinely don't get around to seeing a message until they
| have time to sit down and scroll through the pile
|
| Also (as I'm sure you know), anything that can be used as a
| "measure of cool" will be used as just that. And having a
| huge list of matches can be a huge self-esteem boost to some.
|
| I agree with your point though. It can be tiresome to have to
| periodically clean out matches every so often
| actuator wrote:
| > However, some women (due to men spamming them) don't have
| notifications turned on
|
| That's why I wrote "if the other person is active on the
| dating app and isn't responding to you, just unmatch the
| pair say after"
|
| > anything that can be used as a "measure of cool" will be
| used as just that.
|
| Agreed. I have been guilty of this as well, though I also
| do realize that it is still a human being at the other end
| and giving a closure by unmatching is much better than
| leaving it hanging.
|
| > It can be tiresome to have to periodically clean out
| matches every so often
|
| I think more than cleaning out the matches, if you were
| interested in someone and were having a conversation with
| them and suddenly they disappear, you don't know if that's
| just because of being busy. The delay might be just
| anxiousness for the other person.
| Goosee wrote:
| Yeah the two things I liked about using hinge: 1. You can
| comment&like a pic/prompt that the other person will see 2.
| Girls can 'invite you' to initiate the conversation
|
| Ultimately the types of girls to use bumble in my college,
| home town, and when traveling aligned with the types of girls
| I like. I know hinge is super popular in major cities like
| LA/NYC. But in the suburbs of SoCal 90%ish of hinge girls
| seemed socially awkward and I did not find their pics/writing
| prompts attractive.
|
| Yeah girls do tend to drop 'hi! :)' on bumble. You just have
| to be clever when responding to it. I treat it as she is
| signaling me to make the 'opening move' which sets the tone
| of the whole conversation.
|
| You can always unmatch (on any dating app) if the
| conversation stales. At least bumble unmatches if the guy
| does not respond to the girl in 24 hours.
| [deleted]
| paul7986 wrote:
| Per my experience..I agree about Bumble and I'll add Match as
| the only dating apps worth using! Apps where if both like each
| other there's a 80 to 90 percent chance you will actually start
| conversing, getting to know each other, talking offline and
| going on a date or dates.
|
| In my experience...Facebook Dating is just a like factory in
| which people aren't seriously looking rather boosting their ego
| or have a huge list to filter through even if they liked you
| the conversations doesn't go far(I only continue a conversation
| if she asks about me too). It's definitely not a dating app to
| find women who are serious about dating.
|
| Overall during Covid I've had more dates then usual. Women are
| out there looking and dating at least here in the
| suburbs/rurual areas of MD and PA; restaurants are open for
| outside and inside dining.
| tristor wrote:
| I haven't been in the dating market for over 3 years, since I
| met my girlfriend on Coffee Meets Bagel, but I used a lot of
| different dating apps prior and in numerous cities around the
| world. My experience was that Bumble was exactly like Tinder,
| except that on Bumble I had a lower match rate, but a slightly
| higher rate of matches resulting in an actual conversation. I
| found no difference whatsoever in the "seriousness" of the
| people involved. Most people were using Bumble for hookups.
|
| Maybe that's changed, but I honestly believe the only dating
| app currently available that's actually worth using if you want
| a relationship and not a hookup is Coffee Meets Bagel. I had
| more and higher quality dates, including meeting my now 3+ year
| girlfriend, on CMB than any other app.
| fasdf1122 wrote:
| From my experience, as someone who is very active in the dating
| scene - almost no guys I know use bumble exclusively or even as
| their primary dating platform.
|
| Most prefer Tinder/Hinge because it allows them more control
| over their dates/matches (i.e they can put in more time/work to
| get more dates) whereas Bumble is more of a passive experience.
| It's used as more of a "bonus" or "extra".
| tricolon wrote:
| I think it's highly dependent on where you are.
|
| This is my experience of the three...
|
| Hinge: I talk to people, and sometimes that leads to a date
|
| Tinder: I talk to people, but no dates happen
|
| Bumble: Nothing happens.
| vegannet wrote:
| I agree wholeheartedly that Bumble is the dating app for
| relationships -- and it's the app I recommend! -- but from a
| financials perspective: casual dating is much more profitable,
| Bumble will always be far behind Tinder on revenue -- so as
| much as I love Bumble, I'd question the room for revenue growth
| it has vs. tinder.
| 3327 wrote:
| So basically you are scoring and now Its covid so you can save
| the dinner money too!
|
| what is The company worth?
| verst wrote:
| > Compared to tinder, bumble has more serious people looking to
| date. The system is set up so girls message first and matches
| will expire after 24 hr. When a girl messages you first, she is
| already more invested in getting to you know than when a guy
| using a cheesy pickup line on tinder.
|
| This is an overly optimistic take that I cannot confirm.
|
| The first messages received on Bumble are either "hey/hi" or a
| GIF that is typically a waving bear with the word "hello". That
| is despite profile text and images with dozens of things that
| could spark a conversation or question. In fact, most people
| never read my thoughtfully crafted profile - there certainly is
| no investment in getting to know me. Instead my reply is
| expected to be creative/funny or the conversation will end,
| essentially making this conversation no different from Tinder.
| In my experience the typical Bumble user in major metro areas
| wants to date, but not with long term in mind. If that isn't
| important to you, fair enough. As an aside, I also find that
| Bumble has less diversity than other apps - racially,
| socioeconomically etc
|
| Given Tinder and Bumble I vastly preferred Tinder. Tinder has
| far more users of every kind of background with every
| imaginable kind of intention. The key is to be intentional in
| your profile or your first messages about what you are looking
| for and move on if it is a mismatch. I know how to identify a
| Tinder profile that is a good mutual match for me, but I
| definitely will get tendonitis from swiping left in the process
| of locating such a profile. If you save your free daily super
| like for that person and assuming you are introspective enough
| to accurately assess whether this person will be interested in
| you you have a high chance of being seen and matching.
|
| If you would like to date seriously without it feeling forced
| or desperate I highly recommend Coffee Meets Bagel (if you are
| in an area where this app is being used). It never takes me
| long to find someone wonderful there that makes me want to quit
| all apps.
|
| In my experience, no matter what you are looking for, Bumble
| isn't your best choice for any of those things.
| oxygenjoe wrote:
| In 2017 when I was single I got vastly more matches and
| responses when I changed my bio from actual information to a
| stupid joke about phil collins
| volkk wrote:
| yep. me too. i think it's a demographic thing, but i
| remember when i stopped taking it seriously is when i had
| the utmost success. i guess that's just the moral of living
| in general
| verst wrote:
| Dating styles are very informed by upbringing and
| culture. For example with my German upbringing but living
| in the US I am very long term oriented and do not shy
| away from addressing serious topics early. While this is
| considered "very intense" in the US, it is very common in
| many other countries.
|
| If your goal is dating to establish a healthy romantic
| relationship then number of matches isn't what you want
| to optimize:
|
| Accept who you are, how you think and feel. No need to
| hide the real you. No need to please the masses. You can
| find people who will appreciate you the way you are. And
| I can't emphasize this enough: *Respect the other person*
| - everyone is equally looking for (and entitled to find)
| what is right for them.
|
| With experience it gets easier to quickly identify people
| who think and feel like you, who share similar values and
| lifestyle.
| randycupertino wrote:
| Geeze man, you can't post this and then not tell us the
| Phil Collins joke!
| nikanj wrote:
| Their whole pitch is "Tinder, except women get to make the
| moves". Alas, it seems the most popular play for women is
| punting the ball back to the men's side of the field.
| elliekelly wrote:
| And what do you think the most popular opening message from
| men is? In my experience it's usually some version of
| "hey", "hi", "hello" if you're lucky. Or something
| _slightly_ more creative but crass /disgusting if you're
| not.
|
| I don't think it's fair to characterize it as "women
| punting the ball back" so much as it's just not usually
| worth the effort for a lot of people -- no matter their
| gender -- to think of something more original to say.
|
| I don't know why people complain about it though. It seems
| like the perfect way to really stand out in the crowd.
| Everyone wants to be recognized as a unique individual and
| when your inbox is full of "hey" all the way down then a
| message from someone who took the time to get to know you a
| bit is definitely going to be opened and replied to more
| often.
| raverbashing wrote:
| Men answer like this because of bots/spammers. Nobody is
| going to message something serious first
|
| And every conversation starts with a hello. Sure, if it
| gets boring after then it's a diff issue
| exolymph wrote:
| Women on dating sites are looking for reasons to disqualify
| prospects because there are too many. Men are in the
| opposite situation.
| conformist wrote:
| Yes, but the slightly increased effort for the woman still
| adds value in my experience, due to the weird asymmetries
| in average (western?) human behaviour. The male user can
| assume that she is at least somewhat interested and he
| doesn't need to come up with a spammy/funny line to elicit
| interest.
| polote wrote:
| > Compared to tinder, bumble has more serious people looking to
| date
|
| Not really true, Bumble engages in less shitty behavior than
| Tinder, so they don't prevent you to match with the people who
| are compatible with you basically. Which is more likely to
| create a serious relationships. But the 24hr thing for matching
| doesnt work anymore, that just eliminates girls who only want
| more followers on insta.
|
| But yeah overall the app works better than Tinder, because
| Tinder needs to capture as much money as possible from their
| user to be the most profitable as possible. Bumble doesn't have
| to, at least it didnt have to, now that they become public,
| they will become as bad
| adventurer wrote:
| Tinder is riddled with spam accounts for Insta and Snap. If
| you swipe through the women available you can then see the
| new accounts hitting the area. A lot of them are created in
| the middle of the night. Bio to Insta or being a FWB with a
| Snap account. The app stores should hold Match responsible
| for allowing them to lure dumb, lonely guys into fraud.
| bogomipz wrote:
| >"Not really true, Bumble engages in less shitty behavior
| than Tinder, so they don't prevent you to match with the
| people who are compatible with you basically."
|
| Can you elaborate on this? What is Tinder doing in this
| respect? How does preventing matching compatible people allow
| them to capture more profit?
| polote wrote:
| The more a user match with compatible people the more
| likely they will settle in an exclusive relationship, and
| thus quit Tinder, and thus quit being a paying customer.
|
| So if you want more recurring paying customers, prevent
| them to meet with compatible people ;)
|
| What they do ? Show you attractive girls but don't show
| your profile to them. Keep a 90/10 ratio of men to women on
| the app. Make you feel like there is an endless list of
| people to meet and all better than others. Tell you you
| have 99+ waiting likes (when in fact thats only the girls
| who liked you but you didnt like). Dont limit the number of
| guys that a girls can match. Dont delete matches that are
| inactive (push you to collect matches). Almost force you to
| choose a long term membership instead of a month, ...
| bogomipz wrote:
| Wow, that's pretty rotten. So has Bumble taken the
| opposite approach that although they will lose customer
| who have successfully met someone on the app those same
| people are also likely to recommend Bumble?
| e15ctr0n wrote:
| There was a reality TV show on Netflix where people were
| looking to matchmakers to help them find someone to marry. The
| only participant who did end up getting married found her guy
| through Bumble.
| llampx wrote:
| You're taking that as data? A reality show?
| snarf21 wrote:
| Bumble will be bought by PE and sold to MATCH. Anyone want to
| take that wager?
| tempsy wrote:
| lol it was already bought by PE and now going public
|
| Blackstone owns it.
| polote wrote:
| If this legally possible, that will happen 100%, the match
| group business is to buy any significant competitor, and they
| tried in the past to buy Bumble.
| kjakm wrote:
| >> I know a lot of you are married so let me put this out here:
| I (and most young people) will not put their romantic life on
| pause cause of a virus.
|
| Most people I know have put their dating lives on hold. Not all
| of course, but most. It's like any of the rules people have
| been asked to follow during the past year: most people have
| followed them, it's only a selfish minority that have not.
|
| Edit: My point is not to excuse shitty behaviour by pretending
| everyone else is doing it. Consider the world doesn't revolve
| around you and that occasionally people need to work together
| for the greater good, each making a variety of sacrifices.
| timr wrote:
| > it's only a selfish minority that have not.
|
| If there's one ugly thing about the Covid situation that I
| hope our society reflects on with great remorse in the
| future, it is this justification for moralizing the _private
| behavior of others._ Covid seems to have unleashed the self-
| righteous scolds of the world in a way that I haven 't seen
| in my lifetime.
|
| If two consenting adults weigh their own personal risks and
| choose to go on a date, it isn't your business to judge their
| behavior. Catching a virus is not a moral act.
|
| Obviously, people who interact with high-risk individuals
| should take special precautions. But if I am a healthy young
| person, live by myself and want to date _someone else who is
| in the same situation_ , you can take your judgments and go
| pound sand.
| jedberg wrote:
| > If two consenting adults weigh their own personal risks
| and choose to go on a date, it isn't your business to judge
| their behavior.
|
| That's fine if it was just a risk to them. But it's not,
| unless they decide to live together and never leave the
| house after their first date, or quarantine for 14 days
| after every date.
| closeparen wrote:
| If you both live alone, having each other as your only
| contact per 14-day period is actually pretty feasible.
| jedberg wrote:
| Sure, as long as you date each other exclusively for at
| least 14 days, then no big deal.
| timr wrote:
| > That's fine if it was just a risk to them. But it's
| not, unless they decide to live together and never leave
| the house after their first date, or quarantine for 14
| days after every date.
|
| The "miniscule risk to others" argument can be extended
| to _literally any_ intrusion on personal liberty, and is
| exactly why I hope society looks back on this trend with
| horror and regret.
|
| How far do you take this logic? Do I have to quarantine
| myself for 14 days after going to the park? Home Depot? A
| restaurant? If not, why not? I can catch Covid every time
| I leave my home. Must I lock myself indoors forever, or
| is it just for things that other people don't approve of?
| jedberg wrote:
| Because the risk of catching it from spending more than
| 15 minutes indoors, unmasked, is much higher than all
| those other activities.
|
| If your date is a walk in the park six feet apart, then
| great, you're probably fine.
|
| If your date involves touching, hugging, kissing, or
| vigorous sex in a small bedroom for more than 15 minutes,
| then you have a _much_ higher chance of spreading the
| virus.
| tedsanders wrote:
| I sympathize with your argument, but I disagree. Here's
| why.
|
| If you choose to raise your risk of catching COVID, a few
| things can happen:
|
| (1) You don't catch COVID
|
| (2) You catch COVID, and recover safely in the privacy of
| your own home
|
| (3) You catch COVID, and accidentally spread it someone
| else while pre-symptomatic
|
| (4) You catch COVID, get very unlucky and have to be
| hospitalized. The hospital's ICU beds are full, and they
| prioritize your young life over someone else's old life,
| and that old person dies.
|
| If the only possible outcomes were (1) or (2), I would
| agree with you that it's a private decision that no one
| should scold you for.
|
| But as the likelihood of (3) and (4) rise, your actions
| increasingly impact others. At a low likelihood, it's not a
| big deal and we can probably round down to zero in our
| moral calculus, just for convenience. But when R is above
| 1, and the average person is likely to pass on the disease,
| it's very possible that your infection on average leads to
| dozens or hundreds of infections over the next year. The
| expected value of quality adjusted life years lost at this
| point is not negligible. Tens of thousands of people are
| dying every day, and it's only going up[1]. ICUs are full
| in a non-negligible fraction of US hospitals [2].
|
| I get that all of our actions impact other people, and it
| would be hassle to constrain your freedoms by that fact
| alone. But when it comes to COVID, your actions affect
| others by a much larger degree than other everyday choices.
|
| Incidentally, this is why we as a society have made
| speeding a crime and not a 'personal choice.' Driving very
| fast is usually safe but occasionally hurts others, and
| we've decided that that risk is large enough to be worth
| restricting your freedoms over. Not all externalities meet
| that threshold, but some do.
|
| So if one unnecessarily risks catching COVID and passing it
| along, then scolding seems ok to me. People who recklessly
| pass on COVID are why millions are dead and dying.
| Countries with much better adherence have much lower death
| tolls.
|
| I personally have curtailed my dating life this year to try
| and save lives. I encourage others to do so as well.
|
| [1] https://ourworldindata.org/covid-deaths?country=~USA
|
| [2] https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/us/covid-
| hospitals-...
| timr wrote:
| All four of those possibilities exist at any other time
| in human history. This is not the first year where I can
| catch and spread a disease that can kill someone else.
|
| Likewise, how far do you extend this logic? I can catch
| and spread Covid _literally any time I go outside_. Do I
| have to avoid all other human contact, or is it just the
| things that a tribunal of strangers on the internet
| thinks is unnecessary?
|
| > So if you take dumb risks and raise your odds of
| catching COVID and passing it along, then I am happy to
| scold you. People who recklessly pass on COVID are why
| millions are dead and dying.
|
| I made a comment about two consenting adults, who live
| alone, taking a calculated personal risk. I am not sure
| who is being reckless here, but at the least this is an
| exaggeration.
| realityking wrote:
| > Likewise, how far do you extend this logic? I can catch
| and spread Covid literally any time I go outside.
|
| I don't know how things are where you live but here
| (Germany) it's been severely restricted why (and how) you
| can do things. There's actually a defined list of reasons
| under which you're allowed to go outside. Now that list
| is pretty generous and include exercise, shopping, etc.
| but it exists. Any store that doesn't serve a basic need
| is closed and at best can do "Click & Collect"
|
| Likely this weekend things will go further here in
| Berlin. The airport will be shut down and you won't be
| able to go further than 15km outside the city limits.
| Again there's a defined list of reasons why you can go,
| just as en example visiting your spouse is ok. Visiting
| your parents or adult children is not unless you're a
| care giver.
|
| I say this in so many words not to say look at us, we got
| it so bad. But because what you said is true, _anytime_
| you go outside you can catch and spread COVID. That's why
| we have restrictions on when you can go outside.
| [deleted]
| closeparen wrote:
| With a monogamous relationship as your only close
| contact, you're pretty unlikely to do (3).
| notJim wrote:
| Except that in doing this, you are increasing the
| likelihood of spreading the virus to other people you
| interact with. So you are evaluating risks for yourself,
| but the impact is on society as a whole. It's like that
| superspreader wedding in Maine, where the people who ended
| up dying were people who didn't attend the wedding.
| Instead, they spread the virus to each other, and then to
| others they interacted with.
|
| It's more like drunk driving. I may evaluate that after 4
| beers I'd still be comfortable with the risk of driving.
| It's my life to lose after all. Except I'm not the only one
| affected by it.
| dang wrote:
| Please make your points without flamewar rhetoric. Your
| comment would be just fine without that ending.
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
| [deleted]
| usize wrote:
| > it's only a selfish minority that have not.
|
| It's rather entitled and judgey to imply that people who
| still have some human contact are bad. Assuming the worst of
| people basically.
| closeparen wrote:
| I'm a nonessential worker with no dependents. It would be a
| slight boon to the receptionist and the Instacart delivery
| worker, and not much else, if I were to die in my sleep
| tonight. In the past I would have taken this very seriously.
| But now I'm feeling something like, "come here and kill me
| yourself." Selfish? Absolutely. But I don't think this is an
| entirely terrible development. At some point people have to
| care about their own well-being.
| [deleted]
| tomp wrote:
| > most people have followed them, it's only a selfish
| minority that have not.
|
| Most people who have followed the rules are people who
| believed fake propaganda. Now even the staunchest supporters
| of lockdowns, e.g. NYC and Chicago mayors, are coming out
| against them.
| shoguning wrote:
| It's not selfish to be out and about if you are young and
| healthy. The recovery rate for 20-30 YO is 99.99%+, and if
| you are healthy it's likely higher[1].
|
| It's on the same order of risk as driving. Many young people
| die driving every year, yet we still do it plenty, with
| reasonable precautions. If you take reasonable precautions,
| are young and healthy, it is a risk worth taking to many.
|
| [1]
| https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-020-2918-0/figures/2
| MereInterest wrote:
| From your statistic, I would conclude that it is not self-
| destructive for young people to be out and about. Whether
| it is selfish is another matter entirely. Taking an action
| that is beneficial to oneself, but harmful to others, is
| typically described as selfish.
|
| Edit: To be fair, the same argument can be made in reverse
| as well, that it is selfish for older people to insist on
| universal lockdowns, which primarily benefit themselves. To
| that, I would argue (1) that death is not the only negative
| result from covid-19, and (2) that the relative magnitudes
| of benefits and harms need to be compared.
| tedsanders wrote:
| We also outlaw speeding because speeding increases the odds
| that you kill someone else. Catching COVID, even if you
| recover, increases the odds that you kill someone else
| through a chain of infections. Remember that R is above 1
| in most locations in the world right now. Tens of thousands
| of people are dying a day right now because not everyone is
| taking the precautions they have been asked to take. In
| countries with high compliance, death rates are very low.
| Mass death is not inevitable.
|
| Note that the OP said it was selfish to be out and about,
| not against self interest. So your statistic is irrelevant
| to the point made. Selfish means you're benefiting yourself
| while harming others. That's exactly what happens if you
| catch COVID, pass it on, and then recover. You're fine.
| Others may not be.
| shoguning wrote:
| > We also outlaw speeding because speeding increases the
| odds that you kill someone else.
|
| We could go further and outlaw cars that don't have speed
| governors. That would save lives. Lower speed limits
| would save more lives as well. Now we have a balance
| between freedom and safety.
|
| > Tens of thousands of people are dying a day right now
| because not everyone is taking the precautions they have
| been asked to take.
|
| That was true during the flu season of 2018 as well. The
| excess deaths from COVID are higher, but not orders of
| magnitude higher (more like 3x) [1]. The response is off
| the charts, economically and culturally devastating. Not
| the right balance.
|
| https://www.euromomo.eu/graphs-and-maps
| tedsanders wrote:
| The reason excess deaths are only 3x higher is because of
| our precautions. If we let it burn through the US,
| millions would die and the ratio would be more like 100x
| (30,000 vs 3 million). Obviously depends on some hard-to-
| model assumptions. Your conclusion might be right, but
| your argument is terribly misleading.
|
| (Plus, letting it burn through the whole population comes
| with downside risks of more mutations.)
| shoguning wrote:
| > The reason excess deaths are only 3x higher is because
| of our precautions.
|
| It's a hard case to make. Sweden for example has had less
| excess death than harsher lockdown countries like Spain &
| UK.
|
| Lockdowns have done little if anything in US states. New
| York and Florida have similar stats (worse in NY if
| anything).
| scarmig wrote:
| On the other hand, it has a very high number of excess
| deaths compared to Norway, Denmark, Finland, which are
| perhaps more comparable countries.
| [deleted]
| [deleted]
| jnwatson wrote:
| I've agreed with most of the societal restrictions so far,
| but, imposing celebacy on a large subset of the population is
| a step too far. It is completely and absolutely unrealistic.
|
| Trying to suppress life's prime imperative is always a losing
| battle.
| actuator wrote:
| Although I agree with the sentiment, it is harsh to say this.
|
| I am in my 20s as well and can see where he is coming from. I
| have not gone out on dates this past year and it feels bad.
| 20s are the prime dating years, it feels like a year was
| taken out where I aged but my life hasn't moved.
|
| To make things worse, the whole staying at your home thing
| has made the desire of having a relationship even more strong
| as the alone periods do hit you hard.
|
| Though to put things in perspective, a lot of people had it
| way worse than just their dating life/travel being disrupted.
| philsnow wrote:
| > 20s are the prime dating years, it feels like a year was
| taken out where I aged but my life hasn't moved.
|
| So yeah there are people who are choosing to go on dates,
| gather, party, etc. Those people are very visible. I get
| it, there can be FOMO. Why should you sacrifice when
| they're having fun?
|
| Does it help to consider that there are lots of people
| (dare I say a majority) your age who are making the same
| sacrifice you are? If/when things return to the old normal,
| you'll have some sense of solidarity and shared maturity
| with them. Selflessness is a good quality in a potential
| spouse.
|
| (Of course, unlike the "I voted" sticker, there's no "I
| stayed home" sticker, so in two years you're not going to
| be able to tell who did what now.)
|
| > To make things worse, the whole staying at your home
| thing has made the desire of having a relationship even
| more strong as the alone periods do hit you hard.
|
| I get this. My wife passed away 9 months before the
| pandemic hit full swing and I'm lonely af. I don't get to
| see adult friends really at all anymore.
|
| > Though to put things in perspective, a lot of people had
| it way worse than just their dating life/travel being
| disrupted.
|
| Exactly this. Every time you choose not to go to a party or
| whatever, you could be averting the death of a family
| member (yours or a friend's, or friend-of-friend's, etc).
| scarmig wrote:
| The issue as I see it is that a kind of social contract
| has been broken. The government executing a real
| quarantine for two months would be totally reasonable:
| everyone would have been back to relative normality long
| ago. But few governments committed to that: moreover, the
| most vociferous opponents of real lockdowns weren't the
| young, but the relatively old.
|
| And so we've pretty much burned a year of life for
| everyone. I know many, many people for whom 2020 has been
| the worst year of their life, in large part due to the
| lockdown. The people who have suffered least are the
| people who are basically at home anyway; professionals
| established enough in their careers to thrive during WFH;
| the already coupled; and those with kids. Although
| inconvenienced, they can still progress with their lives.
| But for many singles in their 20s or 30s, this has been a
| lost year. And that's very costly: particularly if you
| want to raise a family, losing a year or more of dating
| and socialization from your late 20s or 30s is incredibly
| damaging to those chances.
| kjakm wrote:
| I understand - I'm also in my 20's. It sucks. A lot. But
| we're not the only people having to sacrifice and hopefully
| things get back to normal soon! It's tough but I don't
| think anyone will regret doing the right thing and
| hopefully we'll appreciate life a bit more afterwards.
| ndiscussion wrote:
| Imagine sacrificing the lives of our youth for 1% of
| boomers. Morally intolerable if you ask me, but
| obviously, we all have our biases.
| soledades wrote:
| I guess if you had everyone rate the relative worth of
| each year of their lives and the effect of lockdown on
| that value, the maximizing strategy would be probably be
| no lockdown.
|
| The thing is though that those later years of people's
| life are often worth very much to those around them.
|
| For instance, what about a four year old whose primary
| caretaker is their grandmother? Four is a precious year
| with an outsize effect on the trajectory of someone's
| life. The calculations are not so simple then.
| philsnow wrote:
| It really looks like you're comparing the lives of human
| beings to young people having fun. What's the exchange
| rate?
|
| Should we remove the laws about driving while
| intoxicated? That's just another form of reckless
| endangerment that leads to loss of life.
| jdminhbg wrote:
| > It really looks like you're comparing the lives of
| human beings to young people having fun. What's the
| exchange rate?
|
| It's the Quality-Adjusted Life Year:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quality-adjusted_life_year
| tomp wrote:
| Should we be driving at all? After all, every second
| spent driving a car is equivalent to you killing someone
| with a low probability.
| notsureaboutpg wrote:
| Driving has productivity benefits. Dating doesn't.
| Actually marriages are stronger in societies where people
| don't date to find partners
| ndiscussion wrote:
| Certainly not. This isn't about fun. This is about giving
| our youth a normal life.
|
| I hate using this term but we're going to see a huge rise
| in incels, and that will probably lead to massive
| bloodshed.
| dsr_ wrote:
| Imagine sacrificing the fun of our youths in order to
| prevent them from acquiring and carrying a disease which
| is currently infecting half a million people per day in
| the USA and has now killed more than 330,000 people. Long
| term effects on people who get it but survive are not
| known... but may include heart/lung damage and, hey,
| erectile dysfunction.
|
| (New Zealand, you go ahead and enjoy yourselves. Remember
| to use protection.)
| actuator wrote:
| Yeah, I agree. I think we are going to see changes in
| dating attitudes after this. At least in my circle of
| friends and extended circle, I have seen the desire for
| serious relationships go stronger in this period. Also,
| the appreciation for family for those who were able to
| live with them.
| semistrict wrote:
| From the levels of spread in southern CA it's clear most
| people are not abiding by the stay-at-home order.
| jariel wrote:
| There's no reason ladies can't message first on Tinder.
|
| The mechanism is still there.
| [deleted]
| neurobashing wrote:
| > I know a lot of you are married so let me put this out here:
| I (and most young people) will not put their romantic life on
| pause cause of a virus.
|
| I'm Gen X, I came of age the last time there was a virus going
| around that had potentially lethal repercussions if you got it.
|
| We didn't stop dating. We took reasonable precautions. To be
| blunt, you didn't raw-dog someone you just met.
|
| Only fools expect you to abstain for years. Only fools look at
| a person and think "well they _look_ healthy, I'm probably OK."
| Goosee wrote:
| Exactly, thank you for this. I should have been more clear. I
| view this as risk vs reward. I minimize unnecessary
| interactions so I can for example, go on a date and not be
| worried.
| ryanlol wrote:
| Tinder on the other hand has been completely ruined in big
| cities thanks to this free "tinder passport" thing.
|
| Browsing Tinder in Westminster with the search distance set to
| the lowest possible, half the people you see are 1000s of miles
| away.
| tomc1985 wrote:
| What is even the point of tinder passport?
|
| Unless you're ready to hop on a plane and go fuck your match
| halfway across the world why even bother? Is it for all the
| people hoping to hook up when they arrive at their vacation
| spot?
| nikanj wrote:
| At least on my Tinder:
|
| 1) A small number of desperate people in poor countries
| trying to score a way out. Marriage is one of the rare ways
| for unskilled people from the 3rd world to get legal
| residence in the 1st world
|
| 2) Tons and tons of crypto scammers. So many crypto
| scammers. "I'm actually in Hong Kong right now. I made tons
| of money investing in $ponzi, and now I'm a free agent. You
| should make an account too, then we can travel together!"
| randycupertino wrote:
| Per my single friend, there's a lot of people on there
| looking to cheat on their partners while they business
| travel. She's gotten so many hits from men visiting SF on
| business trips claiming to live there full time and/or be
| single and then sees their families on facebook. Kind of
| soured her on online dating.
| WildGreenLeave wrote:
| I matched with a girl and am dating her. She lives in
| Amsterdam while I am on the other side of the country. Why?
| Because I am planning on moving there so why would I try to
| find a relationship at my current location.
|
| Furthermore, I've used it plenty of times before traveling
| to set it to a country where I will be going. I am very
| clear about not wanting a hookup and just meet up with
| locals and that has been working quite well.
|
| Not everything is about having a hookup.
| rootsudo wrote:
| Bumble is badoo. Interesting.
| [deleted]
| lwansbrough wrote:
| Just a little market research for the folks in here: what would
| you think of a dating app that forced you sign up with a
| counterpart of the opposite sex/gender (if you're straight) (ie.
| a friend) and then required you to talk via phone call (no video
| chat, no texting) to your matches.
|
| There is two goals here: the first is to ensure the dating pool
| is relatively unbiased towards one sex (I call this Tinder's "sea
| of dicks" problem), as well as creating a bit of implicit social
| validation (this person is on the app essentially because they
| had a friend of the opposite sex who was willing to vouch for
| them) and then the other is trying to attack the problem of
| overly-polished conversation: people who are charming via text
| when they have a moment to think of a response, and decidedly
| less clever when speaking in person (this is something I'd like
| to change about myself, personally.) But the advantage here is
| that this is true for a lot of people, and puts some humanity
| back into meeting people online.
| orange_tee wrote:
| Any dating app that adds friction (compared to Tinder) is
| doomed to fail, because women have no reason to bother with it.
| polote wrote:
| That's not true, women who are really interested at finding
| people they like, will bother with it.
|
| But any way for the OP, the technology for matching people
| who like each other is already there. The only piece missing,
| is to create an app which doesnt have has a goal to make a
| lot of money. A bit like Signal is free and rely on donations
| while all others texting app rely on ads
| fuzzer37 wrote:
| Wouldn't that at least prove that their potential partners
| were more dedicated to the app?
| immy wrote:
| The first part of your sentence is true. As a marketplace,
| dating apps need as many users as possible.
| Apocryphon wrote:
| At TechCrunch Disrupt 2019 there was a Bumble booth that offered
| makeup for headshots to the convention-goers. Turned out that
| Bumble was getting into the HR discovery of job applicants for
| recruitment, but with a dating app-style matching interface. Is
| Bumble still in the LinkedIn business now?
| ed wrote:
| The feature is still in the app, but not popular for the same
| reason you don't go to McDonald's for salad.
| jldugger wrote:
| That was such a cringe pivot.
| scarmig wrote:
| I've had two recruiters and even a company founder reach out to
| me both on OkCupid (back in the day) and on Tinder (more
| recently) to see if I'd code for them.
| jpswade wrote:
| Their homepage says "We're not just for dating anymore Bumble
| Date", it looks like they have a product called "Bizz".
| rcavezza wrote:
| They also have a "Bumble BFF" mode where you can try to make
| friends in a new city on the app.
| mkr-hn wrote:
| That sounds useful. The problem I had on Tinder was most of
| the guys used it to look for friends, so I'd get a match and
| see pictures of someone clearly in a relationship and no
| indication they were looking to add anyone to it. And the
| women all had bible quotes for bios, so I didn't have any
| basis for starting a conversation.
|
| I heard they added a way to select nonbinary as a gender, but
| still force you to pick one or both of the binaries for
| interests.
| fourseventy wrote:
| I don't understand dating apps as a business because the better
| your product is the less people need to use it.
| Rebelgecko wrote:
| That's the thing, they make it so that the results aren't _too
| good_.
|
| For example bumble promotes profiles that are new in an area.
| In theory that sounds good, if you move somewhere it gives you
| a little help meeting people. In practice, this means that a
| huge number of profiles I see are just people at the airport.
| It also means that I get most of my matches when I'm traveling.
| This way Bumble gives me the dopamine hit of getting multiple
| matches per day (which never happens at home for me), while
| reducing the risk I'll get into an actual relationship and
| leave their service.
|
| That, plus their shady handling of user email addresses, has
| gotten me to prefer other apps
| arcticbull wrote:
| This is tangentially related, but hilarious, so bear with me.
|
| Consider that Bumble was started by Whitney Wolfe Herd, after she
| left the company she co-founded, Tinder. Tinder of course was
| acquired by Match Group, and went public in November of 2015.
|
| The Tinder CEO at the time was, uh, unfamiliar with how quiet
| periods are supposed to work in IPOs, and, I want to say
| interviews in general. As such Match had to amend their S-1,
| filing a free-writing prospectus, to include this absolute
| dumpster fire of an interview given _during the quiet period_. If
| you 're having a tough morning, at least remember that you're not
| responsible for the only instance of the word "sodomy" on the SEC
| website. [1]
|
| I'd _highly_ encourage you to read the whole thing.
| He continues: "Apparently there's a term for someone who gets
| turned on by intellectual stuff. You know, just talking. What's
| the word?" His face creases the effort of trying to remember. "I
| want to say 'sodomy'?" Rosette shrieks: "That's it!
| We're going to be fired" and Rad looks confused. "What? Why?"
| I tell him it means something else and he thumbs his phone for a
| definition. "What? No, not that. That's definitely not me. Oh, my
| God."
|
| I can't imagine why Whitney left Tinder lol.
|
| On that note, a big congrats to Whitney, huge step for a great
| company!
|
| [1]
| https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1575189/000110465915...
| baccheion wrote:
| Some woman. Is the reason the gender skew was realized on
| Tinder. Paving the way for the dating situation (and large vs.
| normal pool of incels) among youths today.
|
| Then Bumble. By the same woman. Targeting women (first), but
| then better for males actually. As the skew is less via
| attracting more women.
|
| Funny.
| blueline wrote:
| what?
| cheriot wrote:
| America, like most countries, has slightly more women than
| men (51.1%). The "incel" phenomenon seems more about men that
| don't know how to have a healthy relationship with a women.
|
| Ironically, the term "incel" was created by a women before it
| was coopted https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-45284455
| baccheion wrote:
| There are twice as many males on Tinder compared to women.
| Further, women swipe less often. 1 out of 2 people are at
| least unattractive, 1 out of 3 are outright attractive, and
| 1 out of 5 are hot.
|
| The top half is typically seen as viable by males when they
| stretch (and women explicitly seek the top 20%). That is,
| all viable 50/100 women are gobbled up by the top 50/200
| (ie, 25%) males. Not even out of "attractive" males and the
| viable women are already gone. The top 20% of males then
| end up being enough due to the swipe skew.
| symlinkk wrote:
| You can't just dismiss it as "oh these guys are emotionally
| immature".
|
| The average woman on dating sites gets hundreds of
| messages, and the average guy gets tens. That is a MASSIVE
| imbalance in favor of women.
|
| It's not hard to imagine that this could cause problems
| that would lead to a group like incels being created.
|
| I think we need to look more into the cause (why are men so
| devalued on dating sites) and not the symptom (why are men
| getting bitter and becoming incels).
| cheriot wrote:
| Just like a woman walking down the street getting far
| more attention than men do. The only difference online is
| that it's more quantifiable.
| reducesuffering wrote:
| I think most people would agree with what the cause is as
| it's quite intuitive based on how most societies in the
| world are structured. I would be surprised if the main
| cause ended up being different than this collective
| intuition.
|
| Men are generally lauded by society for casual dating and
| "spreading their seed," while women receive the opposite
| treatment. They are still generally honored for being
| very selective in their dating and only engaging in a
| monogamous relationship with the best mate. Hence, many
| men end up trying to sleep with most women on Tinder,
| while not committing to a monogamous relationship. While
| more women are trying to find the best mate that will
| commit to a monogamous relationship.
|
| Note: The above only applies to hetero dynamics. I'm ill
| informed on lgbtq+.
| iamatworknow wrote:
| >Men are generally lauded by society for casual dating
| and "spreading their seed," while women receive the
| opposite treatment. They are still generally honored for
| being very selective in their dating and only engaging in
| a monogamous relationship with the best mate.
|
| Anecdotally I don't believe this to be the case anymore.
| A good quarter or so of the women I see on dating apps
| pretty proudly claim they're polyamorous.
| istorical wrote:
| are you in the bay area? I have found that the prominence
| of poly seems to be a hyperlocal phenomenon in certain
| metro areas but especially the bay.
| iamatworknow wrote:
| Nope, Atlanta suburbs.
| amznthrwaway wrote:
| Incels are people who have trouble with social
| relationships, and have decided that it is easier to
| blame society and others, than to introspect. They meet
| other people who feel the same way, and radicalize each
| other, making themselves less desirable as they do so.
|
| Your post contains such nonsense, where you paint
| yourself as a victim of being "devalued on dating sites"
| which is nonsense.
|
| My advice to you is to stop being a weak, whiny,
| worthless little loser. Stop pretending you're a victim.
| Grow the fuck up.
|
| Or don't, I don't care if you die alone, hating women and
| society, and blaming everybody but your sad little self
| for your problems. You pathetic fucking loser.
| oneoff-54529 wrote:
| >The average woman on dating sites gets hundreds of
| messages, and the average guy gets tens. That is a
| MASSIVE imbalance in favor of women.
|
| Not sure that's necessarily a massive imbalance. It
| depends on the quality of the guy sending you those
| messages, and maybe on the actual message that they send
| (but it's more important that the guy is hot than that
| what he says is funny or something).
|
| For example, I get a ton of emails from spammers about
| penis enlargement methods, and I rarely send my own
| emails asking if they have any penis enlargement methods
| available. Does that mean there's a massive imbalance in
| favor of me? It's not like I'm at a huge advantage
| because of all this email I'm getting.
| pcbro141 wrote:
| The trope that most messages women receive from men are
| lewd and that's why women are more selective in their
| swipes is way overblown. The majority of men are normal
| and cordial in their approach. I don't doubt that most
| women will experience sexual harassment at some point,
| but that doesn't mean most men sexually harass women.
| It's a minority of men doing the d*ck pics and sexual
| harassment, so it's a non-sequitur as to explaining why
| women tend to be more selective in swiping and have more
| matches/messages online.
| oneoff-54529 wrote:
| Agreed, that does sound overblown
| reducesuffering wrote:
| It's a bit more nuanced than that. While there are more
| woman than men, that's because of women outliving men by
| many years. All of that abundance is due to women in their
| 50's and up. For people of a more typical dating age, under
| 50, there are more men than women.
| mikeyouse wrote:
| I don't think that's necessarily true either - Young men
| have _much_ higher mortality rates as well - up to 3x in
| some age groups:
|
| https://www.statista.com/statistics/241572/death-rate-by-
| age...
|
| Primarily from accidents and violence if I recall
| correctly.
| reducesuffering wrote:
| While true, that's still data that is secondary to the
| main point. These are the real stats that reflect the
| disparity.
|
| https://www.statista.com/statistics/241488/population-of-
| the...
| cheriot wrote:
| Yep, age is a big factor here. The gender ratio reaches
| parity around age 40[1]. After that there's more women
| than men. The point being that gender ratio is not a
| viable explanation for incel communities.
|
| [1]
| https://www.census.gov/prod/cen2010/briefs/c2010br-03.pdf
| Flowsion wrote:
| That was a crazy read. Thanks for sharing.
| arcticbull wrote:
| I saw it go out back then, and frankly it I can barely
| contain my laughter every time I'm reminded of it. I'm legit
| crying lol.
|
| It's hard to even imagine how many missteps and failures had
| to line up just right for us to wind up with this FWP.
|
| I'm sure there's a lesson in there somewhere.
| faitswulff wrote:
| There are roughly ten results for "sodomy" with the search
| modifier "site:sec.gov" but it seems like only one of those is
| there because of sheer stupidity
| arcticbull wrote:
| Maybe it's been a while since I last ran the search haha.
| Noted!
| __s wrote:
| The word he was looking for was sapiosexual
| santoshalper wrote:
| And yet he came up with sodomy. Freud would say there are no
| accidents.
| nknealk wrote:
| Anyone else notice the Adam Newman style loans to the founder in
| the footnotes?
|
| " (ii) cash proceeds to our Founder in an amount of $125 million,
| (iii) a loan to an entity controlled by our Founder in an amount
| of $119.0 million, as described further below under "--Loan to
| our Founder," (iv) certain transaction expenses and (v) the
| contribution of $87.0 million to the balance sheet of the
| surviving company of the Merger."
| kippinitreal wrote:
| Can't speak to this specific case, but often this is done to
| help founders exercise shares/pay taxes on gains. Still a kind
| favor, but it's usually not a Nuemann-esque private jet
| purchase.
| nknealk wrote:
| The loan was collateralized by shares, not used to purchase
| shares. Also the founder got a sweetheart deal on the
| interest rate.
|
| " The loan [to our founder] accrues interest at a rate per
| annum equal to the long-term federal rate established
| pursuant to Section 1274 of the U.S. Internal Revenue Code as
| in effect on November 8, 2019 (which was equal to 1.93% per
| annum), is secured by our Founder's Class A units in Bumble
| Holdings and any net cash proceeds of such pledged units to
| the extent received by Beehive Holdings III, LP, and allows
| for repayment at any time"
| throwawayosiu1 wrote:
| Honestly, I've had way more success with Bumble when it comes to
| getting matches, continuing conversations and meeting IRL.
|
| That said, IMO the market for Tinder vs Bumble is quite different
| even though they are in the same space.
|
| Anecdotally, my friends use Tinder for FWB / Hookups etc. while
| Bumble is more-so for casual or serious relationships.
|
| I also find the risks interesting. Not a ton of people are paying
| for dating (which is opposite to the advice given on Reddit for
| example).
| fvrghl wrote:
| I didn't realize they were private. It's crazy to me that "start-
| ups" are sponsoring NBA teams:
| https://www.nba.com/clippers/bumble-and-la-clippers-announce...
| scarmig wrote:
| Interestingly:
|
| > According to OC&C, within the North America freemium market,
| Bumble has approximately 30% more female users for every male
| user compared to the gender mix of users in the market who do not
| use Bumble.
|
| The phrasing itself is interesting, as they don't ever reveal the
| actual ratio of male users to female users AFAICT. But going with
| the typical 2:1 ratio, that suggests a ratio closer to 3:2.
| Goosee wrote:
| What I find interesting is that before mainstream dating apps,
| VCs were worried about churn (if dating apps succeed in their
| goal, users would delete it and never come back).
|
| Realistically dating apps just need to attract females and
| provide a safe space for them to meet people online. The males
| will follow.
| jonplackett wrote:
| I wonder, are Bumble struggling right now because no-one can meet
| for a real date? Or are they doing well, because no-one can meet
| for a real date?
|
| Or maybe it's irrelevant and no-one is doing lockdown properly
| anymore anyway.
| hardwaregeek wrote:
| Does seem like it's growing during the pandemic:
| https://www.marketplace.org/2020/11/24/love-in-the-time-of-c...
| RandallBrown wrote:
| Seems like they'd be doing better since other ways of meeting
| people for dates (bars, events, etc.) aren't happening.
|
| Most of my single friends still seem to be dating.
| iamsb wrote:
| I paid for bumble during the pandemic mostly to meet people
| closer to me who were looking for lock down buddies. Not a
| romantic or sexual relationship, but a platonic one using the
| BFF mode it offers. I did meet few interesting people around
| with that.
| polote wrote:
| Bumble business model is not related to people going on date,
| rather to guys matching more girls. And both things are very
| poorly linked
| hammock wrote:
| Probably inversely linked!
| monksy wrote:
| .
| monksy wrote:
| (That's a joke about the most common first message. The app
| requires the woman to make the first move to reduce spam and
| bad messages... turns out they can't change their user's
| behaviour/expectations)
| polote wrote:
| The most common first message is :wave: , because it is
| suggested by Bumble on the UI
| subjectsigma wrote:
| Back when I used Bumble nearly every first message I got
| was 'hi' or 'hey'. It got to the point where I decided that
| if a girl was going to open like that I would just respond
| in kind, and as a result the number of conversations I had
| per week on the app quickly hit zero.
|
| It's so stupid how one of Bumble's main differentiators
| from Tinder, the one they advertise as 'empowering women',
| is the feature women seem to enjoy the least.
| polote wrote:
| It's crazy how they talk of a bunch of risk to their business,
| but don't talk about their main risk. The more people are able to
| find interesting people on their app, the more they will loose
| their paying customers.
|
| So basically the better they do their job, the less revenue they
| make.
|
| At least they never advertise or tell in their S-1 than they want
| people to find exclusive relationships. But they are not alone
| Tinder neither advertise themselves like that, they always use
| tricky expression like "Bumble empowers users to connect"
|
| Today their product is great compare to Tinder (Tinder is more
| profitable mainly because their product prevent guys to match
| with girls, don't forget that dating apps, the less people match,
| the more you make money) so they are gaining users. But I bet in
| 2 years, they will have the exact same profitability that Tinder
| has today, and their product will be as bad.
| tedsanders wrote:
| This argument strikes me as shortsighted, because it could
| apply to many products & services.
|
| Consider a company that sells dishwashers. Most people only
| need one dishwasher, so as you soon as you buy a dishwasher
| from that company, you're out of the dishwasher market. At that
| point, the company no longer will get revenue from you, so they
| might as well sell you a dishwasher that doesn't last and
| breaks down. And yet, we see that some dishwashers are actually
| fairly functional and long-lasting. Why is this? It's because
| (a) you might need another dishwasher in a few years, so it's
| good to give you a good experience, (b) if you have a good
| experience you'll recommend this dishwasher to other potential
| customers, (c) you might be the type of customer who buys many
| dishwashers in volume and this good experience will cause you
| to buy more here. All three mechanisms incentivize selling a
| quality dishwasher.
|
| Similarly, a dating app that achieves good outcomes for its
| users may, in the short-term, deplete its pool of users. But in
| the long-term, those satisfied users may (a) come back, (b)
| tell others the app is good, or (c) continue using the app.
| polote wrote:
| There is no membership to buy dishwashers. And there is
| planned obsolescence which mimic this behavior. Compare that
| with clothes, the whole economy of fashion is built on people
| not wearing what they buy. Same with gym membership. There is
| nothing new.
|
| And there is no monopoly in the dishwasher market. Match
| until 2019 owned almost all the popular dating apps.
|
| This article for more info : https://marker.medium.com/what-
| i-learned-about-the-business-...
| raziel2701 wrote:
| I wonder if like many games with microtransactions most of
| their money comes from a few whales? You raise a good point
| that if people quickly find a partner they won't pay.
| nightowl_games wrote:
| ~50% whales, 50% 4.99$ spenders
| purple_ferret wrote:
| I used to use Bumble when I was single years ago, and I just
| looked at their pricing and it seems they've massively jacked up
| the prices of Boost and added a ton of more expensive things. If
| you're using multiple dating apps and paying for premium, you
| could be paying, what, over a $100 a month easily?
|
| I remember when paying for dating apps was considered taboo. I
| don't envy single people...I don't doubt they intentionally make
| it difficult to get a date now if you're not paying.
| yowlingcat wrote:
| > I remember when paying for dating apps was considered taboo.
| I don't envy single people...I don't doubt they intentionally
| make it difficult to get a date now if you're not paying.
|
| I wonder how sustainable the boost dynamics are. It does make
| things a bit pay to play. You sell out the integrity of your
| game long-term in order for short-term gains. It might take
| people a while to move on to something new, but they eventually
| will. OkCupid eventually lost mindshare to Tinder and Bumble.
|
| With pay to play is that the players who pay aren't necessarily
| the best players, per se. They're just the whales most
| financially and likely psychologically involved. The more I
| describe this, the more disturbed I am thinking about how the
| Bumble and OnlyFans attention economies really work. The whole
| thing just seems like a skinner box designed to psychologically
| and physiologically prey on humans in isolation. To harvest
| their sexual instincts and sell it back to them with interest.
| It's cruel.
|
| Nevertheless, as they say, there's nothing novel about human
| nature going on here, and none of the fundamental dynamics are
| really changing. Maybe the most disturbing part is how little
| has actually changed.
| Goosee wrote:
| Lifetime boost on bumble is $124 last I checked. So if someone
| only wanted to allocate $100 towards dating apps, bumble would
| be the best economic decision if their area is active with
| bumble users they find attractive.
|
| I like the idea of that one time fee compared to the monthly
| IAP through tinder/hinge.
|
| However I can't provide any anecdotes on the paid stuff, I
| prefer not to spend money on those things.
|
| Ya I feel like it was until recently that dating apps attracted
| normal people. Now references to 'swiping right' are common in
| pop songs.
|
| I know many girls that will share their dating app experiences
| with their parents, which I find odd.
| dcolkitt wrote:
| > If you're using multiple dating apps and paying for premium,
| you could be paying, what, over a $100 a month easily?
|
| In the scheme of things this seems like a relatively small
| price to pay. People in relationships tend to enjoy
| significantly higher life satisfaction than single folks. I
| don't have the numbers in front of me, but I believe the gains
| are on par with an extra $20,000 in income. (Not to mention all
| the actual savings that go with consolidating two people into a
| single household.)
|
| If premium dating boosts increase your chance of a relationship
| by even 5% per annum, then $100/month probably is worth it.
| 8f2ab37a-ed6c wrote:
| A few thoughts as a power user of Bumble and other dating apps
| ("personal marketing spend" of around 300-400$/mo), having been
| an online dating user for over 15 years:
|
| * The experiment of making women go first failed, it's simply not
| something most women want to do. It worked well as marketing, but
| from a product perspective, it's a gimmick. It's a classic
| product management error of not separating what users say they
| want to do, what they think they want to do, and what they
| actually end up doing.
|
| * I commend Bumble on being among the first, if not the first, on
| having implemented verified profiles. This is a huge issue on
| apps like Tinder where, at least in big urban hubs, bots can
| often make up 50-80% of the profiles you're displayed. Knowing
| that you won't be wasting $2 to Super Swipe a scammer is a
| relief.
|
| * I appreciate that most apps implemented in-app audio and video
| calls. That's a game changer for people who do not like the idea
| of sharing their phone number with a total stranger.
|
| * I still don't believe they've done much to expunge inactive
| profiles from the site. It might have gotten better recently, but
| historically you could spend way too much money on Super Swipes
| on profiles that haven't logged in months and had no plans of
| doing so. That doesn't feel amazing as a user, it feels scammy at
| best.
|
| * All dating apps are commoditized at this point. It's
| fundamentally the same feature set, with the only difference
| being the pools of users, and even those mostly overlap. Being on
| multiple apps at the same time gives you the chance to match with
| someone who swiped left on you on a different app, and gives you
| access to a slice of the pool that you didn't have on a different
| service. Having "opportunity 2, 3 and 4" to match again with
| someone on a different service is typically worth the extra cost
| in subscription and time spent swiping.
|
| * I'm surprised they haven't allowed men to pay more to get
| ahead. Tinder has been on that road for a while now, culminating
| in $10 boosts and $40/mo pricing tier. Men are eager to deploy
| their resources in being successful at mating, and would be happy
| to spend more if that meant better results. I suspect that app
| makers simply can't think of anything else they could monetize
| for a higher price.
|
| * I wish companies did more to encourage people to actually
| interact once matched. As of right now, once you match, often the
| male has to message the female for days before hearing back at
| all. It ends up being similar to the Rule of Seven in sales. It
| would be much better to have the app shut the conversation down
| if it's obvious that it's going to be one-sided, but why would an
| app voluntarily reduce user in-app time? Perverse incentives.
|
| I don't know if there's a way to make online dating great as an
| experience, at least in the heterosexual space. Like with job
| searches, there are lots of resumes submitted into black holes,
| not hearing back from hiring managers, being in the middle of the
| process for a role that's about to be filled by someone else, the
| company suddenly pivoting right after you join and so on.
|
| I suspect that there's much, much more that these apps can do to
| make it a win-win environment for their users, but they also need
| to keep the cash flowing. I don't know if there's a way for the
| app to make more money, while also increasing the quality of the
| matches that their users are receiving, that actually turn into
| real dates and real relationships down the line. My hunch is that
| these two drives are not easy to align.
| polote wrote:
| > The experiment of making women go first failed,
|
| Completely wrong. The goal, again, is not to make people meet,
| is to get the more users as possible. By making girls making
| the first move, you empower girls, you prevent them to get a
| insulting message from all your matches, you make them feel
| they decide. Girls are happy of this environment and stay on
| the app. More girls means more guys. Overall it means more
| users. And one day it will means more money
|
| > I'm surprised they haven't allowed men to pay more to get
| ahead.
|
| That's not their goal their. Their goal was to grow in term of
| users. Now that they become public, and they focus on
| profitability, don't worry for them, price will go up
|
| > I wish companies did more to encourage people to actually
| interact once matched.
|
| Not going to happen, the more people interact, the more they
| meet and the more they quit the app.
|
| > I suspect that there's much, much more that these apps can do
| to make it a win-win environment for their users
|
| As long as dating apps founders want to make money thats not
| going to happen. You will always make more money by addicting
| your users to your app. That doesn't mean there is no solution.
| Actually one of my life goal is to create that kind of app, but
| I need at least $50M to create it. So you will have to wait a
| few years
| 8f2ab37a-ed6c wrote:
| > By making girls making the first move, you empower girls,
| you prevent them to get a insulting message from all your
| matches, you make them feel they decide. Girls are happy of
| this environment and stay on the app.
|
| Respectfully, that doesn't make sense. All you did is
| introduce another step before the male sends them an
| insulting message. Previously they would get the message
| right away, now they get it after saying "hi" and pressing
| the Send button. I still see the "women go first" as pure
| marketing, with no real empirical backing of being
| empowering.
|
| Maybe the genius of this is that it forces the woman to re-
| examine the profile of the match one more time after the
| swipe to see if this is someone they would actually want to
| talk to. It forces a second sanity check of the match. I
| could see that argument, but I'm not fully buying it.
| polote wrote:
| Yes, what is the percentage of match that become
| conversations? less than 50%? that's already a win of a
| factor 2, plus what you described.
|
| But I don't think it was designed as a genius move, that
| was just the idea at the beginning and it ended up being a
| positive workflow
| 8f2ab37a-ed6c wrote:
| Let's grant that's the point of the feature.
|
| I don't mean to take this into a culture wars direction,
| but, this sounds less "empowering" to me and more along
| the lines of "Hey female user, we know you already
| expressed interest in this male user by swiping right,
| but are you really, really sure you actually want to talk
| to him?".
|
| That's a pretty far stretch for the term "empowering".
| polote wrote:
| I should have said, make girls feel empowered, my
| mistake.
| m4tthumphrey wrote:
| > "personal marketing spend" of around 300-400$/mo
|
| huh?
| 8f2ab37a-ed6c wrote:
| Meaning, spending $300-400 per month on various dating apps.
| Dating apps are effectively places to put your ad up, hence
| thinking of it as ad spend. It's a combination of paying for
| the subscription, the premium swipes, the boosts. Over the
| duration of the month that adds up, especially if you're on
| 3-4 apps at the same time.
| scarmig wrote:
| I wonder the optimal way to allocate ad spend is here:
| which platforms and which features result in the most
| conversions to dates per marginal dollar?
|
| Spamming Super Likes on Tinder has worked well for me, but
| I'd be curious to hear others' experiences.
| blovescoffee wrote:
| That's a pretty decent chunk of change to spend every month
| on dating apps. Do you find it's worth it?
| random5634 wrote:
| A few notes on this.
|
| The experiment has not failed.
|
| If you are an attractive, reasonable man in your 20's to 30's,
| you are going to have some very good dates with relatively
| serious girls on bumble.
|
| If you are not honest with yourself about where you are in the
| dating pool, bumble is not so good. In particular, money
| doesn't really move the needle on bumble that much for initial
| contact.
|
| If you are looking for hookups, tinder is where it's at, but
| the site is filled with scammy / scummy types as well as a
| result (women looking for men for fan pages, men super swiping
| desperately trying to get laid, bots etc).
| the_jeremy wrote:
| I got a handful of matches on Bumble (5?). No one actually
| messaged me, so it was both a waste of time and ego-crushing.
| Tinder was the crap-shoot you expect it to be for a long term
| relationship.
|
| I only had good luck (LTR 3 years and counting) on Coffee Meets
| Bagel, which limits your matches each day for both genders to try
| and make things less of a numbers game.
| fossuser wrote:
| I do think there's probably an interesting opportunity again in
| the dating app market that's unfulfilled.
|
| Something that is remote first (but regional), group based, and
| shared activity based. Like playing a board game or among us
| style game with audio or something with two groups of 3.
|
| Might be too short lived with vaccines on the way.
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