I was trying to explain federated websites to a friend and she asked if there is a federated dating app. She recently went through a break up and the apps are dreadful as I’m sure many of you know.
It’d be hard to launch a dating system on the fediverse because it the type of service that relies heavily on network effects. People want to be on the dating app with the most people. However, I think there is an opportunity because the mainstream apps are so notoriously awful, monetized, and enshitified.
It could be a community within an existing network or it could be its own website. I don’t know, I’m just putting the idea out there.
We should recreate that old OkCupid matching system where users make, answer, and vote on the importance of different questions.
Already did it for https://cupid.careers/… I can easily port it to another site to make a dating Fediverse actor
I used to make accounts on OKCupid as a 12 year old, pretending to be 43, just so I could do the matching system—I used it as a personality quiz. Still enjoy that kind of thing today. Not sure how many fake users akin to myself you would get, making a profile that harasses nobody but also is totally useless and one more thing for people looking for love to have to scroll by, for a database to store information on.
Not sure how I found out about that matching system as a 12 year old not looking for love online. I think it happened at least in part because whenever I would search the internet for personality quizzes, OKCupid often had some quiz that matched what I wanted.
One way to catch me out would have been that I never interacted with anyone. No viewing profiles besides my own, no messages sent.