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Oh God yes.
Look me and my wife met on a dating site. No shame in this. We both had pretty detailed profiles with lots of photos and luckily for us we were living fairly close by in the same stages in life. Our first date we both kinda knew what we were about. At the same time neither of us had real social media accounts so yeah no weird stalking games.
Now, me and her dated for three years until we moved in together. That was enough time. Time to see each other as people, warts and all. We have our share of embarrassing memories. I remember the time she got wasted and threw up BBQ squid and wine on me on the train. She remembers the time my card got declined at dinner. We had seen each other frustrated, failing at something, ill, broke, in the morning, drunk, out of work, and all the other downs real humans have. Both of us decided we were okay with that and well we are still together today.
Now I see the black mirror like horrorshow that is tinder from my younger friends and hear them say things how they consider it sus if you aren't on Instagram. I see them acting like a date is a job interview. Gameification and weird cryptic terms like "high value". Long lists of must haves and must nots.
Mother of fuck how and why would anyone want this? I felt like we had it pretty well figured out when in my early 20s. You could meet someone the traditional way or you could use a dating site and find someone who has the same fun hobbies as you. Oh they aren't exactly who you normally date? Ok. See what happens.
Gameification and weird cryptic terms like "high value".
Oh man have you seen that ad that is all about how it's a dating site only for "high value" people called like Elite Singles or some bullshit.
Literally they make it seem everyone is literally some Sherlock type when most people that think they are, are much more likely Lastrade except hyping crypto more.
I think everyone is just looking for a way to pretend harder that nothing is wrong and if they grind their face against the wheel a little harder they will be finally able to be good enough off to not think about it all. It seems miserable.
"High value" is also a term used in the FemaleDatingStrategy community, which is a community of women who advocate for traditional chivalry, abstinence until commitment, and strongly opposes BDSM under the belief that it's essentially abuse.
I'm not sure if that has any bearing on the emptymology of the common usage of the term.
FemaleDatingStrategy community,
I think I will tell my wife right now how much I love her.
They're flipping the Pickup Artist concepts on men, so that particular concept long predates app based dating and the FDS community. "High Value" is definitely a specific phrase used in discussing attracting women over 20 years ago.
Good to know!
Haven't seen it. I do remember when I heard about Raya wanting to bury the human race in a pit of acid however.
We both had pretty detailed profiles with lots of photos
Same with my wife and I who met online a couple of years back. Even back then, lots of other men would complain about having a hard time getting matches, being poorly treated on dates, etc. which did happen to me, but just as often I'd make a promising connection.
I think part of the reason I was relatively successful despite not being terribly attractive is I treated online dating a bit like online shopping, whereas I think others treat it like a virtual version of bumping in to someone at a bar.
To give you an example of a profile I might skip:
My idea of a great first date: Just about anything!
Likes: food, traveling, and probably your dog
Dealbreakers: pineapple on pizzaFirst prompt tells me nothing about you besides you're easy going. That's a great opportunity to share something you like doing, squandered.
Second prompt is the same likes that everybody writes in their profile, and doesn't lead to naturally staring a unique conversation. Everybody likes "travel and food" so, "Where have you travelled," and, "What's your favourite food," are well-trodden and tired topics IMO. Either share something specific about food or travel, or mention something else entirely.
Third prompt takes another opportunity to save us both some time by stating an actual deal breaker, squandered into a cliche joke.
A better version of that profile could be (just winging it off the top of my head):
My idea of a great first date: I love to ride my bike! Let's ride some trails and then get a dessert. I know the best spot in town for croissants!
Likes: blunt communication and lots of personal space to get to know someone
Dealbreakers: if you still live with your parentsFirst prompt tells me that you like biking which could be a conversation breaker about which trails you like, what type of bike you ride, and we could also talk about that croissant place, or our other favourite desserts.
Second prompt is useful as someone approaching dating you, and could be a deal breaker for potential suitors.
Third prompt states a real deal breaker which could save us both time, and it's not something (religion, political affiliation, hair colour) which is usually covered in the profile and filterable in your preferences, or in photos.
In my opinion, there were a lot more of the former type of profiles, but I found it easier to break the ice and connect with the latter type of profile. The former profile is fine if you're both just looking for a hook up and the prompts are secondary to the eye candy, but if you're looking for a long lasting connection, it's all about the prompts.
My question to those who are dating just a couple of years later: how have things changed?
whereas I think others treat it like a virtual version of bumping in to someone at a bar.
Little to do with your point, but I think it's worth mentioning here.
I read this whole thing about how it's absolutely nothing like bumping into someone in a bar which is part of why it's so bad.
The jist of it is that in a bar, your options are limited. So even if someone doesn't visually meet your ideal, you often get over the hump quickly and get to know them as a person which might all of a sudden make them attractive to you.
On an app, if they don't meet your visual ideal, the next candidate is just a figurative swipe left and so there is zero chance to get over that hump.
Plus, in an app, you don't see the group of people surrounding the most attractive options, whether they are trying to filter through them or have fun with each one they like.
Also, you can lower your tolerance of the less fun stuff because it feels like there's always more options available. Like someone but they aren't available on a free day you have? Someone else might be available on that day, so just pivot to them. Or try both at once, or keep the other on the backburner, only to discover they could read the sudden adjusted level of interest and aren't as keen themselves anymore.
It happened once to me in RL. I met one girl at a bar one night, hit it off with her well. Then, that same week, she wasn't able to come to another bar I was going to and I started out wingmanning for a friend by talking to the friend of someone he was interested in so he could talk to her and ended up going home with that friend. I couldn't handle having two girls being interested and ended up screwing it up with both. But that's what it almost always feels like with online dating, and I bet it's even worse for women who get way more matches.
And on top of that, I know that Tinder makes more money if someone wants to find a partner but fails to. I know they have incentive to hire people (or bots) to match, chat for a bit, then flake out. Or independent scammers looking to chat and take money. I have a paid sub and had what seemed like a great match right as renewal was coming up, then she flaked before a date could happen. Who knows if she was real or not, she could have been but at this point it's hard to get excited about meeting anyone, which makes it harder to engage genuinely, and I hardly feel anything even when I do match with someone that I think I'd really like.
I'm glad I'm generally content being single or this would be pretty depressing.