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Comment by peruvian | Hacker News Reader

> What I'm saying is a might as well have dated random people for a year, it would have been the same result. The dating sites sell you on 'matching.'

Dating apps sell you on showing you more people you otherwise would never meet. The chemistry and "good match" are left to the two people to figure out via chatting and a date.

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I think this is the right attitude (and correct description), but not everyone understands this. I have a friend who finally started using dating apps after I've pressured him for years. From my view, he is a decent guy who is reasonably good looking, but had no luck getting dates the "old fashioned way". He hasn't had any serious relationships success (i.e. anything greater then 6 months), but he is actually getting dates now. He still complains about the "quality" of the dates, but I honestly think a dating app can only match you based on so much, and from there you have to take over the work.

> I have a friend who finally started using dating apps after I've pressured him for years.

Dear God why would you do this to someone?

Loneliness sucks, and for some people it can be difficult to try to meet new people in “real-world” social interactions.

I'm one of those people, but dating apps only ever made things worse. I can't imagine why anyone would want to use them unless they literally could not live with being alone. Fortunately for me I have decades of experience at that.

> I can't imagine why anyone would want to use them

I'll tell you why: Why be content only meeting the subset of women I can meet face-to-face in my free time when I can complement my social life with a dating app that helps me meet more?

I can do both.

I can only understand your confusion if you have zero success on dating apps and assume nobody else has any success, either. And there are people obviously having success on dating apps.

> Why be content only meeting the subset of women I can meet face-to-face in my free time when I can complement my social life with a dating app that helps me meet more?

Show me the data that says meeting many more potential partners leads to happier more fulfilling relationships, because I certainly haven't seen it.

If the friend expressed that he wants to date, pressure/suggest dating apps make sense.

If that is not the case I agree with you.

Yeah, my attitude was always that I could filter out “definitely no” in the app, but there’s no way to tell a “maybe” from a “hell yes” until you meet in person.

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