Bumble is shutting down gay dating app Chappy, part of the suite of dating apps under parent company Magic Lab. Bumble will integrate the service into its own app, effective February 28th.

According to Culture Map Austin, Bumble is encouraging Chappy users to download Bumble and try it out, offering them a week of its premium service for free. Chappy is no longer displaying profiles so essentially the search function is turned off. By the end of February, all of Chappy’s user information will disappear from the app.

Chappy posted an FAQ about the closure on its website, stating: “We’re joining Bumble because we have the opportunity to take what we’ve built together here to the next level by creating a space for healthy and safe connections across the LGBTQ+ spectrum. Bumble is committed to fighting all kinds of inequality, and we’re excited to land our spaceship safely in the Bumble Hive.”

Grindr's Descreet App Icons

Image: grindr

Grindr is upping its privacy practices by giving users the option of hiding the app on their phones.

The Discreet App Icon allows users the option of replacing the Grindr app icon on their phone with another symbol, effectively to hide the fact that they are using Grindr if someone else gets hold of their phone. The feature is accessible in the security section of the app’s settings. Grindr first made the Discreet App Icon available in countries where gay, bi and trans people are in the most danger, and now is launching the feature for all users no matter where they reside.

According to a company press release, the feature was developed with London-based human rights organization Article 19, The Guardian Project, and Grindr for Equality to help keep users safe, not only within countries where gay rights are not sanctioned, but anywhere that people are threatened due to their LGBTQ or gender status. This is especially timely as gay, trans and non-binary rights are being threatened around the world.

MeetMe 3D Face Verification

Can you ever know, with complete certainty, that a match you’ve only communicated with online is who they say they are? Although the number of real singles using dating apps continues to grow, so does the number of bots, scammers, catfishers and other imposters of the digital world. The Meet Group hopes to thwart these scourges in 2020 by introducing ways to enhance authenticity across its portfolio of dating apps, starting with 3D face verification.

The idea of using images to verify a user’s identity is nothing new. Current incarnations of this concept often rely on users submitting selfies in certain poses or holding up a piece of paper that displays a specific code. Once these photos are submitted, a human employee compares the selfie to the uploaded profile photo to confirm the owner’s identity. This method is time-consuming and labor-intensive (and, as The Meet Group CEO Geoff Cook noted in a blog post, “not exactly foolproof”). 

Image: eHarmony

Sex. Politics. Equality. Mental health. Climate change. Commitment. These are the things on couples’ minds in 2020, according to eHarmony’s third annual installment of "The Happiness Index: Love and Relationships in America."

Eight-two percent of American couples say they’re happy in their current romantic relationships (down just slightly from last year’s 83%). Although there’s no exact science to creating a satisfying partnership, surveys like these offer insight into what makes successful couples thrive. Two factors at the top of the list are sex and quality time.

Couples in 2020 are more likely to prioritize sex than couples in 2019. This year’s Happiness Index found that 86 percent of couples who have sex with their partner weekly are happy. The 78 percent of couples who have sex monthly and 66 percent who have sex a few times per year are less happy than their counterparts. But it’s not just sex that matters — couples who focus on both sex and quality time with each other are happier (87 percent) than couples who focus only on sex (69 percent) or quality time (82 percent).

Image: @wongmjane

Dating app Tinder is testing more new features, one of which was briefly disclosed in an earnings call earlier this year by Match Group.

The new features are described as “conversation starters” to help initiate messaging between users and to keep them more engaged. One of the features is a conversational prompt, which encourages users to respond to a question or finish a sentence so that their matches get a better idea of who they are. The second feature allows users to post photos, looping videos and other content that can only be seen by their existing matches, according to Tech Crunch. This is also intended to strike up conversations in a more personal, unique way.

After a tumultuous year that involved an FTC lawsuit, a split from parent company IAC and the departure of CEO Mandy Ginsberg, Match Group has published its fourth quarter and full year financial results for 2019. Total revenue for the company exceeded $2 billion for the first time.

For the third quarter 2019, Match Group shared the following highlights:

• Total Revenue grew 20 percent over the prior year quarter to $547 million
• Average Subscribers increased 19 percent to 9.8 million, up from 8.2 million in the prior year quarter, and ARPU increased 1 cent to $0.59
• Operating income was $180 million, an increase of 19 percent over the prior year quarter
• Adjusted EBITDA increased 22 percent over the prior year quarter to $215 million