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It has always been like that on Tinder. My phone number can't create a new account for example (never receive the confirmation code). That's called shadowban in the case of OP. Bumble started doing the same practices a year ago (which makes sense as they have the same founder)

But they are not 100% wrong, Tinder is not here to make people meet each other. They are here to make money and people don't pay because they get more matches, they pay because they are frustrated. Tinder needs a way to keep girls active on the platform, and for that to works they have to prevent boys to have a negative behavior. That's why they shadowban guys easily, as soon as they detect non standard behavior they shadowban, people keep seeing profile and keep paying. Girls don't see those profiles and have a better experience overall and stays longer, which makes guys stays longer because FOMO of matching the one.

This has nothing to do with Big tech. If you want to meet people don't use Tinder, that used to work well in the past, it very rarely works now.

EDIT: And FYI if you want to exit shadowban on Tinder, it is pretty well documented on r/SwipeHelper, you need to change: phone, phone number, Facebook account, Credit card, pictures and don't login from the same IP




> as soon as they detect non standard behavior they shadowban, people keep seeing profile and keep paying

That's called "fraud" in most countries. If you believe that fraud is "not 100% wrong" then I don't know what to say to that.


I was saying it is not 100% wrong to ban people. The fact that the banned people are still paying and dont get their money back clearly look like fraud (even if this is more complex, as Tinder is very smart about how they communicate, they never make you pay to get matches, they make you pay to be able to like more).

But yeah Match group is a fraud company, I've wrote some posts on the topic in the past


> That's called shadowban in the case of OP.

I’d call that fraud. If you pay for a service you get to use the service.


Does their ToS say they can terminate it without notice?


Terminating without notice is one thing. Shadowbanning and continuing to take your money is a completely different thing.


No, banning someone from a paid service is not fraud.


Banning + refund for the remainder credit, sure. Scummy, but sure. Shadow banning, taking peoples money while they still think they get a service, not even banning at the end of the billing cycle, without giving notice, nah, that’s definitely fraud.


It is if they silo you off without notifying you and make sure no one else can see you and keep taking your money. Now I don't know if tender is doing that provably, but that was the thesis.


It is if you keep taking their money and pretend that they are not banned.


Colloquially and technically "ban" and "shadowban" are different things; I have no idea what happened in OP case but "shadowban" means that you leave someone in a system but silently block all of their interactions.

e.g. ban: you try to log into HN and it gives you a message: "You can't log in, you are banned"

shadowban: you log in to HN with your account, you post comments and vote on stories but unknown to you nobody else on HN can see this. Eventually you start to wonder why you never get replies anymore.

It's definitely an ethical issue if you are doing the latter without telling someone, and additionally charging them for the service you aren't providing.

With a dating app it might be hard to tell for a while; how are you to know that you aren't getting any replies/engagement because of the way such sites work, or because the people you contacted never saw the likes/messages/whatever.


Will be interesting when they all switch to biometric login.

"Hey Doc, I need a new face."

"Mafia? Witness protection?"

"Tinder."


>This has nothing to do with Big tech. If you want to meet people don't use Tinder,

As I said in my comment up-post, Tinder has a near-absolute monopoly in my area. If you're not on Tinder you basically don't exist on the local dating market.

Yes, the future sucks.


OK, I've been married for a long time and never had any luck with any dating service before that, but I don't think that's necessarily as true as you think

You're within 2-3 degrees of separation of dozens or hundreds of single people you can date, so if you just start putting the word out among your friends, family, etc I think they'll start introducing you to people


Ugh. This sucks. I cant imagine deciding to date or even meet someone whom I only know by their app profile.

Glad my dating days are over.


"Sorry, you're shadowbanned, guess you'll die alone. The Algorithm has spoken." Its damn kafkaesque.


As a woman, Tinder is fine if you wanna find a fuck buddy and don’t take it seriously. I see a lot of people (men and women) get wrapped up in the swipe game and that’s really not how it works. You can’t take anything that happens on that platform personally.

Unfortunately, rule #1 on tinder is “be physically attractive”. If you want tinder to work for you consistently as a man, get your personal hygiene in order and hit the gym. That’s the main reason I swipe left; well, that and conservative politics.


> rule #1 on tinder is “be physically attractive”

For guys it used to be right, now rule #1 is more "be super attractive" or "be attractive and don't have standard"

For girls rule #1 is "be a girl"


too true, I once had a conversation with a friend of mine. She was saying to just use tinder. As we were about to get in the car, I told her: I'll do nothing but swipe till we get there. if I get a match, I'll pay for lunch when we arrive, otherwise you pay.

She said yes.

easiest free meal I ever got


What does "super attractive" look like?

> For girls rule #1 is "be a girl"

Not at all. Women can have just as much of a hard time as men, especially for certain ethnicities.


> What does "super attractive" look like?

Basically be a model

> Women can have just as much of a hard time as men, especially for certain ethnicities.

Can't find the study, but black women are actually having a tougher time than all others women to get matches on dating apps. But this is still nothing compared to the attention guys get



Sorry, but you really gotta lose this attitude man.


Also below 15% body fat and quite high income will help. Women expectations are completely unrealistic these days. Their desire went to the global sexual market. Their hypergamy and narcissism is stimulated to no end.


It's funny how raw red pill truths get downvoted here. Some seem to prefer to send technical brutal honesty about the current state of sexual market under the rug.


It could be the app, or it could be that women can easily smell the scent of desperation, entitlement, and resentment wafting off of you.


I don't know where did you take that from but Tinder's data show is actually women.


Or maybe people just don’t want to fuck you. And maybe you aren’t entitled to anyone fucking you.


I find your interest in my sexual life as inappropriate as distracting while I'm learning this new shibari binding as my main sub girl is asking me to use it on her this weekend. Oh god, how she loves when I use rope on her. What were you saying?


Maybe thinking about sexuality as a market is your first problem. If you’re not physically attractive, just don’t use Tinder; it’s not the only way to find someone to date.

Shouldn’t be a surprise that someone who blames “women” as a whole for his problems would have a hard time meeting women.

And as a corollary, I’ve dated super hot guys before and frankly a lot of them have a hard time with relationships because it was so easy for them to hook up when they were younger they don’t know how to put the effort in to make someone feel desired.


I'm not asking anyone about my case not seeking advice as I do great already in both online and offline. You seem in a hurry to assume other people's position and problems and providing unrequested advice that only validate your assumptions. Have you ever observed that in yourself?

Regarding to that corollary, you're assuming top guys even want to invest in relationships in the first place. Not the case of many I know. The strategy is more like: enjoy the party until one of the girls is so mindblowing feminine and submissive and good person that is worth giving a chance to some investing.


This is only really true in north america (especially if you're of Indian descent). Women have much more realistic expectations once you get out of that cesspit


Enjoy while it lasts because social media will spread their ambitions. In any case, woman desire for fit men is culturally universal so all should hit the gym and diet for its own good. Hard. Good luck making your game to the next level!


I'm currently in a relationship so It doesn't affect me anynore. as far as hitting the gym, I agree. its one of our favorite activities together.


Rule #1 *for a man.

That's just how the dating market is :)


Why is that rule unfortunate? Why would someone date or hookup with someone they're not physically attracted to?


Not the OP, but attraction is a complicated, multi-dimensional beast and the unfortunate thing about Tinder and similar apps is that they reduce all of this to a 2D, possibly doctored, photo of the user.

In real life, people who do not look gorgeous can still sweep you off your feet by their smile, laughter, gestures, tone of voice, scent, the way they move, talk, react, fall into daydream...

Of all my previous lovers, ending with my wife of 16 years, I wouldn't choose a single one based just on a picture. But I was strongly attracted to all of them in real life.

Human magic cannot really be distilled into an algorithmic system. Not yet, anyway.


This kind of thing is what they're talking about.

> It was determined that the bottom 80% of men (in terms of attractiveness) are competing for the bottom 22% of women and the top 78% of women are competing for the top 20% of men

[1]. https://medium.com/@worstonlinedater/tinder-experiments-ii-g...


So, this guy set up a fake profile and interviewed women who matched with him, without disclosing he was doing research? Ethics aside, he doesn't discuss his methodology at all. How did these interviews turn into a Gini curve? How could they, without some heroic statistical assumptions?


It's been studied a lot, I just threw that up as example since it was posted here a couple of days ago. Here's one of OKCupid's own studies [1]. You can search for others that confirm the same thing over and over again.

1. https://www.gwern.net/docs/psychology/okcupid/yourlooksandyo...


That study shows the exact opposite of what you're claiming. The third figure shows that the vast majority of women's messages go to men they rate as less than 4/5 attractive. The last figure shows that even the least attractive men still got replies to their messages 22% of the time.


You shouldn't be taking pareto claims on a sample size of n=27 seriously

There are apple flavored flat earth medicine studies with stronger statistics


It's been shown plenty of other places, including by OKCupid, which why I qualified with "kind of thing." It's common knowledge at this point.


There's lots of common 'knowledge' in social psychology including studies done by serious reputable researchers that turns out to not be so. This is a big enough issue that it's termed the "replication crisis". So, yes, maybe. Maybe not.


Being shown by a lot of studies means its been replicated a lot.


only the ones with valid statistics count

some guy dug up a bunch of studies done on abductions by satanists in the 1990s. remember that, from 60 minutes?

the punchline was there had never actually been such an abduction, but there were 30+ studies.

and that's replicated a lot.

the quality of the replication matters.


Alright, keep that goal post moving then. In the meantime, I'll go with the best we got.


There's no goalpost moving. It's the same thing I said originally.

You shouldn't be swayed by inappropriately small sample sizes. Your response was "well what if I had a lot of them?" My answer was "still no."

.

> In the meantime, I'll go with the best we got.

This isn't even close to the best we've got.


My original claim is that something like that was true and what someone else was referring to and I gave you a lazy link, and you complained about the guys terrible methodology and replication. I told you that there are dozens of studies and data analyses (some are on huge data sets [1]) out there and your response is that oh no they have to be quality. That's a goalpost move from "this is bad" to "all those (that I haven't even seen) are bad."

> This isn't even close to the best we've got.

If you've got that then show me and I'll have a look. Until then I'm going with that studies I've seen that all seem to say roughly the same thing (despite widely varying sample sizes and quality of methodology)

1. https://medium.com/@worstonlinedater/tinder-experiments-ii-g...


> Until then I'm going with that studies I've seen that all seem to say roughly the same thing (despite widely varying sample sizes and quality of methodology)

There are none with acceptable sizes. You're just talking.


I guess because in real life, even if you dont look super attractive, you can still charm partners by the way you talk and act. You can be funny, come across as trustworthy etc.

You can not do that on tinder.


Yes, this. If you’re trying to find a partner on a platform where matches are determined solely by physical attraction, you’re gonna have a hard time if you’re not physically attractive. Know what Tinder is, and be self-aware enough to know if it’s not for you.


The attractive types will also have it difficult. The matches will likely be attractive physically, but that hardly guarantees a true match. I know lots of attractive people that struggle to find a partner (and instead move from one one night stand to another). I think at some point it must get pretty depressing and toxic.


That’s it’s whole own thing; people who are incredibly attractive can move on really quick because they know they can get something else. Then they hit their 30s and that all dries up, and they don’t know how to have a real relationship that lasts longer than a few months.

Obviously not everyone who is hot is this way, but it’s one of the “types” you’ll find if you date around a lot.


I would disagree with this. You don't have to be that attractive. Average will do fine. Just make them laugh. I am from Europe and Tinder works pretty good (at least for me) and I am just an ordinary dude.

Also, don't stop just with Tinder. Use Bumble, happn, OkCupid, Badoo. I've got dates from all of these.


polote: "I got banned!"

wayoutthere: "If you want tinder to work for you consistently as a man, get your personal hygiene in order and hit the gym."

Did you just blame GP's getting banned on him not having personal hygiene or not being fit?


I know a woman who got banned on two apps, including tinder.


That’s hot


> This has nothing to do with Big tech. If you want to meet people don't use Tinder, that used to work well in the past, it very rarely works now.

EDIT: It seems I misunderstood this statement. I read it as "If you want to meet people don't use Tinder, [not using twitter] used to work well in the past, it very rarely works now"

I don't understand your reasoning here. You're suggesting that tinder is a vital service for some aspect of life now(I agree, unfortunately), but also saying it's not a problem with big tech? This kind of thing is exactly why big tech needs to be regulated.


Is Bumble big tech ? No, still they have the same tactics than Tinder.

I'm not saying there is no problem (I have wrote several article criticizing Match group and the app dating market), I'm just saying this has nothing to do with big Tech. Any dating app (and some do) can do the same as Tinder


I'm not familiar with Bumble (I've never used Tinder either). My point is if you are controlling access to "the market" then a user being excluded could be a real disadvantage, and should be treated with care.


> You're suggesting that tinder is a vital service for some aspect of life now(I agree, unfortunately)

Tinder being a "vital service" sounds absurd.


They stated " If you want to meet people don't use Tinder, that used to work well in the past, it very rarely works now.", which if I understand them correctly means that it's hard to meet people without it. Perhaps you don't need to meet anyone, but for someone who does I don't think it's that absurd.


> which if I understand them correctly means that it's hard to meet people without it

It means it (Tinder) no longer works. I says nothing about difficulty of meeting people outside of Tinder.


So a missunderstanding then I read it as:

If you want to meet people don't use Tinder, [not using twitter] used to work well in the past, it very rarely works now.


ah, if you wanted to say it that way in English, you'd say

"If you >don't< want to meet people don't use Tinder"

the way it's phrased means (unambiguously) that Tinder sucks, and Tinder doesn't work


Do you not think that reproduction is a basic need?


That’s a deep question about the semantics of “basic need”, and highly subjective. I do not think that reproduction is a basic need of the individual in ordinary language, but it may be deemed a basic, I.e. survival, need of the species or tribe


>> That's called shadowban in the case of OP. Bumble started doing the same practices a year ago (which makes sense as they have the same founder)

Not arguing with the point you're making, but Bumble and Tinder founders are definitely not the same.


The founder of Bumble is one of the founders of Tinder. But others founders of Tinder are not founders of Bumble, this is true. Also we could argue that Bumble has two founders, but this is insignificant anyway


Maybe they confused Bumble with all the other apps / services that are under the Match branch: Tinder, Match.com, plentyoffish, OkCupid ...




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