I'm not sure if the article author sees it as in scope, but an obvious problem here is the paradox of choice and the high absolute bar to getting a date. We're seeing numbers in the range of 100s of attempts to start expecting to find a partner. That seems high.
If we look back at a hypothetical 1900s village, I don't think people necessarily had 100 partners to choose from. It'd be things like "in the local church group, I can pick between these 10 people and I have a very clear understanding of my relative social rank". The decisions made themselves, a lot of people had so-so relationships and that was acceptable because the alternative was worse.
This article is suggesting a much, much higher bar to being in the game than that. A hypothetical dude needs to invest hours solely in finding dates, has to master app use, promotional skills, meet unclear shifting bars and have a good understanding of what signals in the discourse to glom on to and which to ignore as counterproductive. Then multiply that by hundred(s). Some grasp of statistics is recommended. There is a real chance of investing years into a relationship and just having it collapse because a better alternative comes along.
Dating has probably gotten harder. That is before even looking at the changing economics of what a relationship is.
As someone that's been on a good number of dates and had reasonable success, something I've thought about in retrospect:
Date yourself and invite others along. Find things YOU want to do / go to places you'd like to go, schedule it in your calendar and invite potential mates along or join a group of others e.g. a hiking group.
It's also a marathon, not a sprint, and dating is like Leetcode, the more you do it the better you get over time.
Try different things, try the apps, speed dating, grab a drink at a hotel bar, join groups of people, build a network, pay for a coach... The main thing is you try things and learn.
Yes it's effort, yes it costs money, yes you may need to go to the gym and work on yourself, but try to enjoy the process.
Also, don't subscribe to limiting beliefs and don't go marrying the first person you meet just because you think you can't meet anyone else. There are literally millions of people out there, and there are plenty of bald short guys that do just fine.
Lastly, it's totally OK to have standards - go for what you want and adjust and learn, and not everyone you like is going to reciprocate. The main thing is that you make an effort.
Lack of opportunities for casual social interactions has got to be a killer for the introverted who work in sausage-fest industries, especially remote workers. If you can find satisfaction elsewhere, the increasingly high hurdle of initiating a relationship in this day and age no longer feels worth it. It comes down to a cost-benefit analysis, not a binary decision about wanting or not wanting a relationship.
Lots of tech people seem to dislike Tinder. I want to present an argument in favour of the 'swipe and match' model: If your personality is 'stronger' than your appearance, in terms of attracting a partner, this model is actually highly optimal. Think of optimising a database query to maximise selectivity: You want to narrow the search space as quickly as possible. If finding a partner who is physically attracted to you is hard, then everyone who actually does match with you has cleared that hurdle. Lots of tech people seem to idealise OkCupid, but it's really a better use of your effort to swipe/match than sending personalised messages to many people on OkCupid, only for a large amount of recipients to reject you on account of your appearance.
> The full right way, of course, would be a revival of OKCupid.
> Here we have a product that me and essentially everyone else who has ever heard of it says was insanely great. If you put in the time on the questions, which was inherently fun, the people who match highly with you are almost always extraordinarily good matches, with very good response rates. My initial response rate was something absurd, and when I got unprompted inquiries they were great. Rather than play a numbers game, I picked my spots and fully customized my messages, and it paid off. Positive experiences abound. Everyone constantly complains that it is gone.
> So, what if we simply created it again, the way it used to be? Do not reinvent the wheel, unless the wheel is lost, in which case by all means go reinvent it, people need wheels.
I was one of those people who got into online dating just at the transition from "Only weirdo losers do online dating" -> "The only way to meet anyone is online dating".
So for about two years, I was there, on OKC as sooooo many brand new people discovered it, in a huge city, in my mid-twenties. It was an incredible time. I met so, so many interesting people, who were so similar to me. I couldn't believe it. It was all free, too.
No lasting relationships ever came from it. I met my partner of 10 years at work eventually.
I've never been on Tinder or any other online dating platform, but it sounds like the industry (it is now an industry...) has gone through the same cycle of VC-driven monetisation, removing all incentive for the platform to function correctly in the user's interest, much like any big platform nowadays.
So, I guess we'll need some kind of online dating fediverse to fix this. I'd recommend copying exactly how OKC worked. It was the best approach I've ever seen. But also the only one ;)
> removing all incentive for the platform to function correctly in the user's interest, much like any big platform nowadays.
People keep saying this, but it's just not true. Tinder does function in many people's interest. I had a lot of success using Tinder, and eventually met my wife on there. People keep implying there's some kind of hidden algorithm at play that somehow pairs you up with people who are "Okay, but not great" to keep you hooked on the app. How the hell would it manage such an amazing feat?
This proposed revival must constitutionally prohibit selling or sharing of the question response data in a way that an acquirer cannot undo. Match group, upon buying OkCupid, ended up providing question response user data to third-parties, which caused many people to immediately delete their accounts and never trust any product from Match Group ever again.
It's almost insulting how predictably this happened. I do wonder how much more money they made by selling information instead of just having a paid subscription model.
Speaking as a guy who doesn't want a relationship, every single instance of someone or something asking me to marry (eg: this article) only makes my conviction to refuse even harder.
I can't wait until I am naturally ejected out from the mating market I never even wanted to participate in.
Also, I do not appreciate the insinuation that I might be mentally ill. What is it with that, anyway? My conviction is the result of thorough deliberation; if anything, attempts at handwaving such as yours especially makes my conviction ever harder.
Hi that's me, not even trying, or at least that was me until about a month ago. I had a relationship that affected me horribly in college, that took me 2 years to get over. Whatever you're thinking of, it was worse, and totally ruined my trust in people.
Then I was like eh, fuck this shit because I was in early career and couldn't afford to get mentally messed up again like that. So that was another two years. Cue Covid where I was busy trying to get a startup off the ground and dealing with the simultaneous end of the world and then financially recovering from not getting said startup off the ground.
Then, I got into my groove again and now I'm doing superbly. In fact I am probably only really ready and able to date now. So we're talking 2016-2024, 8 years of singleness.
I was (honestly still could be) very content being single, it's pretty great. I do whatever I want, whenever I want. I have a few close friends for my support and a few more social acquaintances I do stuff with. I make a lot of money for a 29 year old, I have hobbies and workout regularly. Honestly, as a person I feel pretty complete. I don't strongly feel like I need another person to complete me, but I do want another person in my life now.
I suspect a lot of people have just had a lot of heavy shit going on for the last bit of time, and like, the responsible thing isn't to throw your heavy shit onto someone else. Aside from that it takes a lot of energy, focus and caring to grow a relationship and like that's really hard to do when you're busy picking yourself up off the floor or just trying to stay treading water.
Anyway, fast forward to the current dating scene. It kind of blows. Online dating is entirely asymmetric for guys, and interactions are low quality. I get like 3-5 matches a week which as I hear it is a pretty good rate for a guy. Of those matches the quality of conversation is non-existant. "You're cute, let's grab coffee." is what I've been defaulting to now because out of 20-25 matches in the last month I've had literally one engaging conversation. I totally understand why people self select out of that nonsense. I'm just starting to go to events now, because I have no issue walking up to someone and asking them out and at least this article shows that should be a way more sane way to date.
Readit News
If we look back at a hypothetical 1900s village, I don't think people necessarily had 100 partners to choose from. It'd be things like "in the local church group, I can pick between these 10 people and I have a very clear understanding of my relative social rank". The decisions made themselves, a lot of people had so-so relationships and that was acceptable because the alternative was worse.
This article is suggesting a much, much higher bar to being in the game than that. A hypothetical dude needs to invest hours solely in finding dates, has to master app use, promotional skills, meet unclear shifting bars and have a good understanding of what signals in the discourse to glom on to and which to ignore as counterproductive. Then multiply that by hundred(s). Some grasp of statistics is recommended. There is a real chance of investing years into a relationship and just having it collapse because a better alternative comes along.
Dating has probably gotten harder. That is before even looking at the changing economics of what a relationship is.
Deleted Comment
Date yourself and invite others along. Find things YOU want to do / go to places you'd like to go, schedule it in your calendar and invite potential mates along or join a group of others e.g. a hiking group.
It's also a marathon, not a sprint, and dating is like Leetcode, the more you do it the better you get over time.
Try different things, try the apps, speed dating, grab a drink at a hotel bar, join groups of people, build a network, pay for a coach... The main thing is you try things and learn.
Yes it's effort, yes it costs money, yes you may need to go to the gym and work on yourself, but try to enjoy the process.
Also, don't subscribe to limiting beliefs and don't go marrying the first person you meet just because you think you can't meet anyone else. There are literally millions of people out there, and there are plenty of bald short guys that do just fine.
Lastly, it's totally OK to have standards - go for what you want and adjust and learn, and not everyone you like is going to reciprocate. The main thing is that you make an effort.
> The full right way, of course, would be a revival of OKCupid.
> Here we have a product that me and essentially everyone else who has ever heard of it says was insanely great. If you put in the time on the questions, which was inherently fun, the people who match highly with you are almost always extraordinarily good matches, with very good response rates. My initial response rate was something absurd, and when I got unprompted inquiries they were great. Rather than play a numbers game, I picked my spots and fully customized my messages, and it paid off. Positive experiences abound. Everyone constantly complains that it is gone.
> So, what if we simply created it again, the way it used to be? Do not reinvent the wheel, unless the wheel is lost, in which case by all means go reinvent it, people need wheels.
So for about two years, I was there, on OKC as sooooo many brand new people discovered it, in a huge city, in my mid-twenties. It was an incredible time. I met so, so many interesting people, who were so similar to me. I couldn't believe it. It was all free, too.
No lasting relationships ever came from it. I met my partner of 10 years at work eventually.
I've never been on Tinder or any other online dating platform, but it sounds like the industry (it is now an industry...) has gone through the same cycle of VC-driven monetisation, removing all incentive for the platform to function correctly in the user's interest, much like any big platform nowadays.
So, I guess we'll need some kind of online dating fediverse to fix this. I'd recommend copying exactly how OKC worked. It was the best approach I've ever seen. But also the only one ;)
People keep saying this, but it's just not true. Tinder does function in many people's interest. I had a lot of success using Tinder, and eventually met my wife on there. People keep implying there's some kind of hidden algorithm at play that somehow pairs you up with people who are "Okay, but not great" to keep you hooked on the app. How the hell would it manage such an amazing feat?
I can't wait until I am naturally ejected out from the mating market I never even wanted to participate in.
Also, I do not appreciate the insinuation that I might be mentally ill. What is it with that, anyway? My conviction is the result of thorough deliberation; if anything, attempts at handwaving such as yours especially makes my conviction ever harder.
[1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39343631
Deleted Comment
Then I was like eh, fuck this shit because I was in early career and couldn't afford to get mentally messed up again like that. So that was another two years. Cue Covid where I was busy trying to get a startup off the ground and dealing with the simultaneous end of the world and then financially recovering from not getting said startup off the ground.
Then, I got into my groove again and now I'm doing superbly. In fact I am probably only really ready and able to date now. So we're talking 2016-2024, 8 years of singleness.
I was (honestly still could be) very content being single, it's pretty great. I do whatever I want, whenever I want. I have a few close friends for my support and a few more social acquaintances I do stuff with. I make a lot of money for a 29 year old, I have hobbies and workout regularly. Honestly, as a person I feel pretty complete. I don't strongly feel like I need another person to complete me, but I do want another person in my life now.
I suspect a lot of people have just had a lot of heavy shit going on for the last bit of time, and like, the responsible thing isn't to throw your heavy shit onto someone else. Aside from that it takes a lot of energy, focus and caring to grow a relationship and like that's really hard to do when you're busy picking yourself up off the floor or just trying to stay treading water.
Anyway, fast forward to the current dating scene. It kind of blows. Online dating is entirely asymmetric for guys, and interactions are low quality. I get like 3-5 matches a week which as I hear it is a pretty good rate for a guy. Of those matches the quality of conversation is non-existant. "You're cute, let's grab coffee." is what I've been defaulting to now because out of 20-25 matches in the last month I've had literally one engaging conversation. I totally understand why people self select out of that nonsense. I'm just starting to go to events now, because I have no issue walking up to someone and asking them out and at least this article shows that should be a way more sane way to date.