Dating

Image: Grindr

Grindr has shut off the explore option on its platform for the Olympic Village in Paris to protect the identities of athletes who are staying there to compete.

According to Pink News, the gay dating app has blocked global visibility for the Village area. Social media posts have shown that when you search for people in the Olympic Village, no profiles are offered.

According to Grindr’s announcement about the move, it said: “We're turning off features like "Explore" and "Roam" within the Olympic Village. The ‘show distance’ feature will also be turned off by default, but users can share their approximate distance if they decide to turn it on.”

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.

Tinder has launched its new feature Photo Selector, an AI-based tool that helps users choose the best photos to use in their profiles to generate the best match results.

According to Tech Crunch, the new feature uses facial detection technology. When a user uploads a selfie on the app, the AI detects the unique facial geometry to identify the person’s face and pulls up matching photos from their camera roll. The feature then curates a collection of ten photos that will perform best on the person’s profile.

Photo Selector is intended to help users through what can be a time-consuming process of sifting through camera roll photos. According to a recent survey by Tinder, 68% of participants expressed that an AI photo selection feature would be helpful, and 52% reported having trouble selecting profile images. 

Bumble has announced a new reporting feature for users to alert the app if they suspect a profile of displaying AI-generated photos and videos.

“Fake Profile” allows users to flag and report accounts that they think are AI-generated and being used to deceive other app users. According to Tech Crunch, people using AI to beef up their profiles is creating a new problem on dating apps (aside from the typical bots, spam accounts, and safety issues that have been around for a while) – and that is whether or not to believe that the person in the profile they are seeing is actually that person, or an AI-enhanced version of them.

For example, someone could generate a photo of themselves to make them look more like Taylor Swift, or alter their bodies to show muscles they don’t have in real life, hoping to attract more matches through deception. In other words, they are gaming the system with AI.

Hinge and Grindr are two standout dating apps as they continue to grow in a tough market; powerhouses Tinder and Bumble are seeing more users leave their platforms.

In general, dating apps have had a rough couple of years, with the coveted Gen Z market looking to other options besides dating apps to meet singles, including in-person events, running clubs, and social media platforms like LinkedIn.

“Online dating trends have continued to decelerate industry-wide, showing minimal relief from the recent struggles,” wrote Morgan Stanley analysts Nathan Feather and Brian Nowak in their research, according to Quartz.

Netflix is debuting Japan’s first same-sex reality TV series called The Boyfriend starting July 9th.  Japan is the only country among the world’s wealthiest democracies that hasn’t recognized same-sex marriage, so producers of the series are hoping to change mindsets.

According to The New York Times, the show will feature nine men ranging in age from 22 to 36 living in a luxury beach house outside of Tokyo, a similar setting to Japan’s most popular romantic reality show Terrace House.

The contestants will operate a coffee truck together by day and cook dinner together at night, and occasionally go offsite for dates. This is a cultural shift in perception for Japanese men, who typically aren’t expected to cook and clean, leaving those duties for women. The show wants to highlight that the men participating enjoy cooking and seem to be pretty good at it.