General News

Dating apps found their foothold with younger users. Tinder launched on college campuses in 2012, and 90% percent of its earliest users were aged between 18 and 24. It wasn’t chance; it was strategy.

“They thought if this product is successful among that young college demographic, who also happens to be the most social group of people on the planet [and] the least likely to need an app to meet people, it can [work] for anyone,” Tinder spokesperson Rosette Pambaki told Complex.

Tinder’s wager was right, and in the years that followed, it and other apps like it became explosively popular amongst younger users. But times change, and if a company is to survive, it must change with them. The Wall Street Journal reports that dating apps are now welcoming singles in their late 30s and beyond for one simple, but essential, reason: their money.

In the United States and Canada from Thursday, December 8th to Monday, December 12th you will get 3 additional months free when you buy a 6 month membership at eHarmony (eHarmony.com and eHarmony.ca). This promotion gives you more than $100 worth of free subscription months on one of the most popular matchmaking services online.

If you are looking for a long-term relationship then eHarmony is a service you should check out. They have designed and created a matchmaking system based on years of research into what qualities between two people makes a successful relationship last. Their profile questions are design to find out your personality traits so that you can be matched with people who have a compatible personality.

For more information on how this online dating service works, you can read our eHarmony review.

Since Tinder launched in 2012, new users have been given two options to describe themselves: male or female. For much of the population, the decision was easy. But for a significant portion, those two words posed a problem.

Transgender and gender non-conforming Tinder users had no way to accurately identify, and many experienced harassment as a result. When news of their troubling experiences reached company CEO Sean Rad, he decided the app was in need of an update.

New Tinder users are now presented with three options: 'male,' 'female,' and 'more.' Selecting 'more' reveals dozens of new terms members can use to describe their identity. The company partnered with media advocacy organization GLAAD to develop a list of nearly 40 auto-fill suggestions. Users can also type in their own perferred terms.

Though the US Presidential Election is over, the nation remains deeply divided along party lines. Many Americans have made jokes about moving to Canada in the past, but this week, the Canadian immigration website’s server broke down because of all the traffic from unhappy American voters.

Enter Maple Match, a dating app which matches Americans and Canadians for potential romance. The company took an opportunity to make lemonade out of political lemons.

Maple Match was beta testing its service earlier this year, and this month seized the opportunity to launch its new app to help Americans feeling less than happy with their country’s choices. The app's tagline is “make dating great again,” similar to the slogan for President-elect Donald Trump’s campaign.

Maple Match’s technology is straightforward. It offers the same photo-based profile that Tinder does, but there is no swiping. You indicate your citizenship and your desired citizenship, and then you can look through potential matches and start messaging whomever you like.

Some of October’s biggest dating news came courtesy of Hinge. The dating service announced a total overhaul, complete with a rebrand, an updated app, and a new advertising campaign. Two changes in particular made big news: Hinge was ditching the swipe and adding a $7 monthly fee.

The move was inspired by a Vanity Fair article called Tinder and the Dawn of the ‘Dating Apocalypse’. In the article, writer Nancy Jo Sales criticized the current state of the dating landscape, painting it as superficial and sex-crazed, and placing the blame on dating apps like Tinder and Hinge.

Justin McLeod, Hinge’s founder and CEO, was dismayed by the portrayal and resolved to take action. He announced that big changes were coming to Hinge in the fall, ones that realigned the company with its original, relationship-focused intentions. Then came the news about the swipes and the membership fee.

Is your date a stud or a dud? A new mobile app called Stud or Dud hopes to boost safety and transparency in the online dating world.

A 2011 study by the University of Wisconsin-Madison found that approximately 81 percent of dating site users lie about their height, weight, or age in their profiles. On average, the female participants described themselves as 8.5 pounds thinner in their profiles than they really were. Men only subtracted 2 pounds, but they lied by a greater magnitude than women about their height.