Contributed by: kellyseal on Wednesday, August 14 2024 @ 12:34 pm
Last modified on Wednesday, August 14 2024 @ 12:38 pm
Gay dating app Grindr crashed in Milwaukee during the Republican National Convention due to a spike in user activity on the platform.
According to Down Detector, over 1,000 users in Milwaukee reported the app being down around 4:00pm on Tuesday, July 16th. When the report came out, ex-Congressman George Santos posted a video on X saying that Grindr executives were calling the RNC convention the “Grindr Superbowl,” though media outlets have yet to confirm this is the case.
The Daily Mail reported that there was also an increase in traffic on the dating app during CPAC (Conservative Political Action Conference) outside of Washington D.C. last year. There was also an increase of users on its platform during the 2020 Democratic National Convention.
According to The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel[*1] , during the 2016 RNC in Cleveland, Vice reported that the area around the convention’s main hub saw user activity on Grindr increase by 66 percent. Vice compared it to other summer hotspots that drew crowds at the same time, like Times Square, Capitol Hill, Disneyland and South Beach, but saw no increase in activity in these areas.
The DNC convention in 2016 saw a 148 percent spike in activity in 2016 around Philadelphia’s Wells Fargo Arena where the convention took place.
This year’s outage has made headlines during the RNC because of the hardline views the political party has taken against the LGBTQ+ community, including with its new agenda dubbed Project 2025. The new plan is to legally reverse the legal strides made on behalf of the LGBTQ+ community, including rolling back gay marriage, adoption and other rights.
According to The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, one Grindr user told the media outlet that he’d noticed an influx of anonymous users during the week of the RNC. "On any given day, you'll go on there and see a headless torso or blank profile," he said, asking that his name not be disclosed.
He added that the headless photos indicate that the user is looking for a hookup, and he usually counts about 10 a day. During the RNC however, he said he’d stopped counting when he reached 50 headless profiles in a day.
Reports of Grindr crashing increased by over 90 percent in the first 48 hours of the convention, according to The Journal Sentinel. The stats were noticed and reported by Down Detector, a digital platform that tracks service issues on apps. Grindr’s website however reported no incidents during the month as of Friday, July 19th.
Grindr experienced more outage issues on the last day (Thursday) of the convention, as well as in Chicago, Los Angeles, and New York City.
For more on this service, check out our Grindr dating app review.