How About We Disrupt Online Dating

http://thestartupfoundry.com/2011/04/21/how-about-we-disrupt-online-dating/

by g0atbutt • 15 years ago

9 12 15 years ago

I know OkCupid got bought by Match.com, but by totally omitting any mention of OKC it's hard for me to see this article as anything other than marketing/PR dreck. The guy seems pretty breathless about How About We, but doesn't even mention OkCupid? If anyone disrupted the online dating service market it was them... for years.

Then I see the author is something called the "chief advocate" at a company who offers "entrepreneur advocacy" services. I'm not 100% sure what that is but I'm pretty confident it's just a marketing and/or PR firm that pitches itself to startups. Nothing bad about that per se, but let's keep pg's "Submarine" article in mind here.

http://www.paulgraham.com/submarine.html

If startups are paying for this kind of work, then it tells me the "PR & marketing services for startups" is the REAL industry that is ripe for disruption.

sbisker• 15 years ago

I can say from experience that startups definitely are paying for this kind of work. The more upscale firms will make the lines they feed the media a little less obvious, and make sure you at least get the time of day with the TechCrunch's of your choice.

Crowd sourced news like HN is already starting to disrupt that industry. In many ways, this is a win-win - the existing HN content evaluation makes the more content-filled submissions rise to the top, and blogs can just pluck the ones they want and report it as news to a wider audience. That said, there's definitely still a lot of stupid money floating around that space for people willing to make something new and interesting.

safarimong10• 15 years ago

I honestly think the future of online dating lies in recommendations from networks...be it social or professional. I'm surprised someone hasn't come up with that yet.

pandres• 15 years ago

I think you're right.

amccloud• 15 years ago

Disrupt online dating is something i'm trying to accomplish with http://cupick.com/ (I haven't officially launched it yet)

One of the issues I had with sites like Match or okCupid was gender bias. Men get few messages from women and women get overwhelmed with the messages from men. My solution to this was to add a moderator (the public) to recommend and filter potential matches and who you can message.

Goladus3• 15 years ago

Interesting idea, but it's highly unlikely that people will get involved with a dating site when registration is a requirement for even seeing the site.

true_religion• 15 years ago

Most "adult" dating sites are like that---populating their splash pages and galleries with fake profiles, and only allowing you to see the real thing after registration.

Also, marriage oriented or dating sites for single ethnic groups often do the same (or have no gallery at all till registration).

rguzman• 15 years ago

online dating seems pretty ripe for disruption, but FB integration is not the way to do it.

for better or worse, there is still some social stigma attached to finding people to date online. the crowd who decides that's not enough to stop them is on match and okc. the new-comers that the article wants won't come, at least in part, due to that social stigma.

grubwith.us is the right answer here: make dating not about dating, but only one instance of what the product does: help people find other people to hang out with in a cool, non-committal way. i'm sure there are other concepts similar to grubwith.us worth exploring.

Goladus3• 15 years ago

If you really want to disrupt online dating, abandon the one-on-one, profile-oriented, high-pressure, arrange-a-dinner-date approach and focus on getting groups of singles together in real-life social situations.

curtis• 15 years ago

This is the model behind Ignighter. Apparently they've had a lot more success in India than the United States. The New York Times ran an article about them back in February: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/20/business/20ignite.html?_r=...

gonehome• 15 years ago

I have a site idea I'm working on that I think can disrupt online dating. Current online dating sites don't solve a problem. Even OkCupid which perfected the current implementation of dating sites only provides what are essentially just profiles.

My idea uses a more social approach, have people tag those they're already interested in (friends or acquaintances) and notify both parties if and only if there is a mutual interest (both groups tag each other), otherwise wait.

This method is 'rejection free' and solves many of the problems associated with dating in a way that incentives users to reveal their true interests.

I want to localize it to colleges only at first so there already exists a somewhat 'trusted' community. I think this idea solves a lot of the problems commonly associated with dating.

How About We Disrupt Online Dating

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