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Comment by tsotha | Hacker News Reader

It's kind of a stretch to call Tinder a tech company. It's a hook up site, basically, and they want to charge less attractive people more money for the same reason fat people can't find stylish clothes - too many unattractive people will hurt your brand.

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I don't think that they're using age as a proxy for attractiveness.

Rather, I think they're trying to profit from an asymmetry that they believe exists: that there is a significant population of people over 28 who would really like to hook up with people under 28, and are willing to pay for the privilege.

They may also believe that they will be more attractive to their core demographic if there are fewer older people in their system.

They may even believe that they will be more attractive to their core demographic if their older demographic skews richer.

No idea whether they're right, but they presumably have a pretty good data-set to work from.

The problem with your argument is that basic tinder is still free and tinder plus gives you almost no competitive advantage.

It gives you undo, which is a minor advantage, and it gives you passport which can be accomplished for free on any unrooted Android phone or any jailbroken IPhone.

In the future it will prevent you from needed to see ads, but I imagine that will also be a minor advantage.

It presumably affects people on the margin.

What potential effect and margin are you thinking of?

Marginal utility of Tinder probably increases for premium users, and I presume that marginal use also increases for those users.

Marginal use of Tinder probably decreases among people who feel excluded by the price discrimination and do not buy into it.

Marginal utility of Tinder probably increases for the college-aged target demographic if marginal use of Tinder by older (especially poorer and older) users declines.

At least, that's what I think Tinder is hoping will happen.

We know that tinder's long term goal is to become a method of social discovery method for anything. That is why I don't think that their goal is to decrease any usage of their product as long as that usage is not "incorrect" in their minds.

I don't know that, actually -- I'm sure that Tinder has said something along those lines at some point, but founders of companies saying that their company is going to move into some ultra-broad undefined space that they have little demonstrated competence in is not exactly rare.

But in any event, even if they were going to move into "social discovery of anything" as a technology company, it does not follow that the current Tindr app and accounts is going to be used for "social discovery of anything," because it is obviously absurd to imagine that people want to use a hook-up app for "social discovery of anything." There is no market for people who are like, "Hey, I want to find the perfect drapes for my living room remodel and also at the same time look for casual sex."

That's true, but I think it is very likely they will start suggesting movies, bars and restaurants for dates.

The demographics of tinder have changed over the past year. Many people on it are not looking for hookups.

In this case tinder is not charging unnattractive people more. Tinder has an algorithm that shows (mostly) only attractive people to other attractive people. That part is free!

Age is not a good discriminator of looks, particularly starting at 28.

I'm not sure I agree. And it's not just about looks. It's about youth and the hook-up culture. College students are more likely to be into that sort of culture than older working professionals, which means they're more valuable to Tinder as users.

That said, I don't agree with this pricing strategy.

"youth and the hook-up culture"

I agree that age is probably a good indicator on that. I still think any tech associated company that brings in age is just asking for trouble.

Yes it is, particularly for women.

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