Ask HN: Idea for a new dating app | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Idea for a new dating app

2 pointsalphagrep1234512 comments

The issue with Tinder/OkCupid is that, in general, girls get too many likes and they need to spend a lot of time on the app evaluating/replying to people. Guys get very few likes and they need to spend a lot of time just to play the numbers game - i.e., like a 100 people hoping that at least 10 would like you back. The time and effort spent in converting a 'like' to an actual date is significant. This is also the case with people who appear good (in a traditional sense)/have good photos vs people who don't appear good/have good photos. I’m thinking of an app where you enter your details, details of what you're looking for in a date, your interests, and hobbies. The app would set you up on a blind date with someone based on your interests and personality.

You’ll have the ability to list out free time slots, and a budget range. Once the app decides that a particular set of people could be good together, it automatically reserves a table at a restaurant that works for both the parties, is in the said budget range, and inform either party. Every person on the platform needs to verify his phone number, social profile, and scan his driving license/passport for safety reasons. We'd also enforce a 1 date max a week policy so that the chances of spamming or fake profiles is lower.

Looking for thoughts and suggestions.

You will have very low buy-in from women for an app like this because scanning IDs doesn't take care of the biggest trust issue: blind dating means you can't filter out sleazeballs (or bad matches that aren't picked up by algorithms). Harassment, stalking and assault are significant factors here. And then there's the redpill guys who will neg you, the casually sexist guys who will talk over and dehumanize you, the guys who can't deal with their feelings who want you to be their therapist, the dudes who feel you owe them something for going to dinner.. on and on. Likes will "convert" to dates at higher rates (and can we talk about how gross it is to talk about human connection that way?) when users feel safe and confident. It's about reducing harassment and low-quality messages on the platform.

Why don't you build a straight dating app that incentivizes women to send likes and incentivizes men to hold back messaging but perk up their profiles? Like a digital Sadie Hawkins? Maybe men aren't able to send the first message but can only reply, for example. If you reduce the number of high-quantity, low-quality messages men send, women won't have to filter so much. And if you free up women's time and empower them to send likes, they can share the burden of initiation. Everyone wins when we stop trying to "play numbers" and focus on genuine matches with people we hope we will truly enjoy spending time with.

The things you mentioned completely makes sense. People won't be confident to go out on a dinner with a complete stranger. I think 'bumble' is more of a digital Saide Hawkins but that suffers from the problem of scouring through hundreds of profiles.

What if instead of a completely blind date, we just match two people based on parameters and let them talk? This is a bit like other apps where people talk to each other before meeting them in real life. (And you also get only 1 match a week to encourage people to take things seriously)

If you seriously pursue this, I wish you the best. The issues you describe are definitely real and I’m sure a market exists if you can address them.

I’ve been tossing around another dating app idea for a while. Rather than focusing on matching in the app, I considered an app like Meetup which can propose activities in your area for like minded people. Maybe a game night at a local bar. 10 people show up and have a nice night. If you like someone, you could “swipe right” on that person after the event. If there’s a match, you can talk.

As a shy guy, I would appreciate something like this. I can be social and meet people and when I’m too shy to ask someone out in person, I have some recourse.

Thanks. There are a lot of speed dating/singles only meetup groups that do the same thing you've described. Did you try attending them? As the event is created to ask people out, you might be more comfortable.

> "scan his driving license/passport"

I don't think a lot of people are going to trust an unknown web site with this kind of information.

People have been managing to meet for dinner with strangers for a long time without having to swap IDs with each other, let alone registering their IDs with a third party.

Also, what exactly do you intend to do with this ID information?

Just to make sure we're thwarting off fraudsters.

I would add a "going Dutch" and a no "1st date sex" option on all profiles. I've known of women or men who just accept a date to get a free meal or just are trolling for quick sex. It's human nature but it brakes the whole model long term. If they want that tinder, does a good job for that.

These things are not enforcible. The app can 'recommend' Going Dutch but 1st date sex is too personal and I don't think I have any right to dictate for/against it.

Seems like a feature that an app at scale could build into it if they wanted to and I’m sure they’ve all thought about it.

My guess is that none have tried because they don’t want the liability of facilitating harassment or worse if something goes wrong. I think you’d also have a lot of no shows.

I'm sure this idea would've crossed the minds of several people but it's the antithesis of several of their core values. It's not easy to incorporate this into tinder as an addon - it's because tinder's sole selling point is to make a quick decision based on looks. And this feature doesn't pay much heed to looks.

Regarding liability - I too thought of it but not sure if that's a minor/major issue. What if instead of a completely blind date, we just match two people based on parameters and let them talk? This is a bit like other apps where people talk to each other before meeting, but you don't have to scour through hundreds of profiles. (And you also get only 1 match a week to encourage people to take things seriously)

I’d say don’t do it. All idealistic dating apps seem to fail. At the end of it, the mating game is vain, sexual, and primal. No way around it.

OkCupid, CoffeMeetsBagel are a bit idealistic but they seem to be running well. It's just that different kinds of people are attracted to different kinds of things - flings, short term commitments, long term commitments etc.

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