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Dating app BLK, a dating and lifestyle app for the black community, has launched a series of profile stickers in time for Pride Month to celebrate the LGBTQIA2S+ community. In addition, the company launched the #BLKVoices social media campaign to educate and dispel misconceptions surrounding the letters of the spectrum.

The profile stickers were designed by Brooklyn-based artist Thaddeus Coates, who goes by the name Hippy Potter, and are available exclusively for BLK users, according to news website Atlanta Daily World. Each sticker represents a letter from the LGBTQIA2S+ spectrum, and users can add them to their profiles to display their identities and spark conversation. The intention behind this offering is not only to connect people romantically, but also to foster engagement among users who might not know what certain letters stand for.

The idea came when BLK conducted a survey among its users and found that 40 percent of LGBTQIA2S+ individuals were unfamiliar with the meaning of every letter in the spectrum, according to Atlanta Daily World. Since so many members within the queer community on the platform were uncertain, the company wanted to raise awareness and dispel false assumptions among all users.

Muzz, a dating app for Muslim singles, is hosting a series of in-person events in major cities around the world, most recently in New York. About 250 of the app’s users attended.

The event was held in a halal Italian restaurant in Brooklyn and included religious observances, such as prayer mats set up in an outdoor dining tent for Maghreb, one of the five daily prayers for Muslims. The dating app has also recently held events in Toronto, New Jersey, Baltimore, London and Dubai in the last couple of months.

According to Indian Express, at the beginning of the Brooklyn event, attendees were anxious and worried that they looked “desperate” for attending. At the start of the event, women mingled with other women and men spoke with other men, even though it was intended for mingling between sexes. (Muzz does not currently serve the LGBTQ+ community. Founder and CEO Shahzad Younas told Indian Express there were no current plans to expand its app for inclusion, noting: “We’re still at a stage where the premise of our app, even for the straight market, is considered taboo.”)

A new user survey from Hinge found that memes were fast becoming the best way to show affection for a match, as well as to display your personal sense of humor.

Almost three-quarters of the 2,000 users Hinge surveyed said they used memes to find out if they share a sense of humor with a match, and 60 percent said they want to get a sense of someone’s “meme humor” before going on a date, according to Mashable.

A vast majority – 93 percent – say that memes reveal a potential partner’s sense of humor, and almost as many consider a shared sense of humor an important factor in a relationship. And if you are worried about what meme to send or what someone’s sense of humor is like, don’t stress: 36 percent of daters said they feel more interested after receiving a meme from someone, even if they don’t think it’s funny.

Dating app Tinder announced it will be removing social media handles from user profiles and has revised community guidelines to prevent users from advertising and self-promoting. It will also request that users not share private chats in public settings.

The dating app company said in a press release: “Tinder is not a place to promote businesses to try making money. Members shouldn’t advertise, promote, or share social handles or links to gain followers, sell things, fundraise, or campaign.”

Self-promotion has become an issue on its platform according to Engadget. To curb this kind of behavior, the company said it will be removing social handles from public profiles and prohibit the sharing of other promotional information such as links to online stores or websites.

Image: Bumble

Bumble has launched a suite of new self-care badges and prompts in time for Mental Health Awareness Month.

The new Profile Prompts and Interest Badges help people highlight and talk about their mental health and self-care practices, according to the company’s press release. The Profile Prompts are available in Date Mode, and users can select from two: “My mental health game changer was…” and “I’m prioritizing my mental health by…”

The new Interest Badges are intended to highlight what self-care is important to a user, and potentially spark further conversation. These include badges for Therapy, Mindfulness, Deep Chats, Nutrition, Sleeping Well, and Time Offline. These badges can be removed or switched out at any time for other interests, and users can add up to three at a time to their profile, according to Bumble's release.

Tinder has announced the launch of its new Photo Verification feature, which includes an AI-powered update and video selfie requirement.

According to Tech Crunch, the new Photo Verification is to help users prove they aren’t a bot or catfisher on the dating app by taking video selfies that can be analyzed by AI against their photos. Previously, users were required to take a selfie as instructed by the app to compare against a profile photo, but Tinder is strengthening its process even further by requiring the video selfie, so there is no room for error.

The process for verification requires the user to complete a series of videos responding to questions or prompts, and then the AI tool scans the videos and compares them to the photos the user wants to include in their profile to see if they match. The AI tool uses 3D mapping of facial geometry for both the video and photos, according to Tech Crunch.