

How About We Disrupt Online Dating - g0atbutt
http://thestartupfoundry.com/2011/04/21/how-about-we-disrupt-online-dating/

======
mattdeboard
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
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.

------
Goladus
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
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=...](http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/20/business/20ignite.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all)

------
safarimong10
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
I think you're right.

------
fossuser
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.

------
rguzman
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.

------
amccloud
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.

~~~
Goladus
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
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).

~~~
Goladus
In the case of ethnic and religious sites, a fairly promising and probably
reasonably accurate description is given. In the case of adult sites, that's
just fraudulent and flat out lying to people can be an effective way to get at
least some registrations.

