Bumble

Recipient
Bumble

The Editor's award for Top Pick - Innovative goes to Bumble for 2019. Bumble is a female friendly dating service that has gone through a lot of positive changes in 2018. For example they reached a milestone of over 40 million users since they had launched in 2014. Their apps also reach more countries (160) and in more languages (the latest being Hindi). The Bumble dating service is also now accessible directly from their website, so no apps are required to be downloaded and installed.

As far as new features are concerned... Bumble members can now use a snooze feature and put their profile to sleep for any length of time they require. Members can also now connect their Instagram account and allow matches to scroll through their photos. Interaction between Bumble Date, Bumble BFF, and Bumble Biz has been expanded including the sharing of new matching filters.

Bumble New Search Filters

Image: Bumble

Female-friendly app Bumble has added another new feature aimed at pleasing users and monetizing its offerings: the ability to filter matches not only on its dating platform, but also for its networking apps Bumble Bizz and Bumble BFF.

The Filters feature allows users to sift through potential matches using a specific set of criteria, according to website Tech Crunch. One of the filters for Bumble Dating is by astrological sign, political leaning, or relationship type, and for Bumble Bizz you can filter by industry, for example. Users will be allowed to access two filters for free; they must pay for any additional filters.

The new feature is aimed at saving users time in their searches by limiting their choices to those who are most relevant to what they are looking for in a match, according to Tech Crunch.

Dating app Bumble announced that it will be sponsoring the seventh annual Prohibition NYE in downtown Los Angeles. The popular New Year’s Eve party has a “Roaring Twenties” theme against the backdrop of the historic Union Station.

The event is organized by McCullough and Ross in partnership with KCRW, and features world-class DJs, a live jazz ensemble, burlesque, and an open bar for guests. Live acts include local artist Classixx and Lyndsay and the All Nighters, according to the event’s PR. To help guests ring in the New Year with appropriate festivity, a ball will drop from the famous art deco ceiling of the train station.

Bumble users will be able to get into the event by showing an active profile on their phones, so if you’re interested in attending, be sure to download the app and set it up before arriving to the yellow-carpeted entrance. There will also be a photo booth, so it’s encouraged to dress for the occasion.

Bumble made headlines this year when it announced plans for an expansion into India. Though the Indian market is large and tech-savvy, western dating apps have struggled to find a foothold. India’s traditional approach to courtship has raised concerns about whether online dating has a place in a society with a history of arranged marriages, class divides, and parental oversight of relationships.

A recent survey by Indian dating app Woo reveals the ways centuries of conservative values continue to affect singles in the country. According to the data, the gender divide on dating apps is immense. Only 26 percent of users are female, while 74 percent are male - in other words, there are nearly three times as many men as women on online dating platforms in India.

For comparison, women are slightly more than 40 percent of the user base on dating apps like Bumble and Tinder in the United States. Users in the US also differ from users in India in their reasons for joining dating services. Many Americans are comfortable openly using dating platforms for hookups and casual dating, but in India, dating app users say they have more serious goals.

Facebook has reportedly given personal data of its users to an exclusive roster of preferred companies such as AirBnB, Netflix and Lyft, even after claiming it had limited this data-sharing practice. One of the companies Facebook shared information with was dating service Badoo.

According to The Daily Beast, the British Parliament released 250 pages of documents, including internal communications between Facebook employees, regarding the secret data sharing practice. This potential scandal comes in the wake of Facebook’s launch of a new dating platform. Critics have been skeptical of whether or not people will feel comfortable joining in light of the privacy issues, and the latest news doesn’t look good for Facebook.

Facebook changed its data sharing practices with third party apps back in 2014 to restrict access, which affected many small app development companies like Six4Three that mined Facebook user data. The developer claimed in a lawsuit against Facebook that the social media giant favored lucrative companies and was willing to share data with them.

Bumble has a lot on its plate these days, including a potential IPO, expanding its service to India, and becoming a content creator as well as building a “kind social network.”

The Wall Street Journal interviewed Bumble CEO Whitney Wolfe Herd about the female-friendly dating app, which has recently styled itself as a social media platform that promotes safety and helping women build relationships.

Bumble has been in the news lately because it’s rumored to be eyeing an IPO before the end of the year, with a $1.5 billion valuation. This could mean big news for the app, which competes with behemoths Tinder and more recently Facebook. Still, Bumble has managed to grow to 40 million users, up from 12.5 million in February 2017, which is significant growth compared to its competitors.