Types (Niche)

Technology companies frequently boast of “disrupting” their industries. But ask Amy Baglan, co-founder of online dating platform MeetMindful, and she’ll say technology has become disruptive in a negative way - at least where romantic relationships are concerned.

“Social media and technology in general has taught us that it’s okay to connect on really surface-level, quick ways, and that’s not how I think we’re wired as humans,” she told Dever publication Westword. “There is an underlying anxiety that it’s not enough, that something’s missing.”

That something, she hopes, is her very own dating startup. The earliest seeds for MeetMindful were planted in 2006, when Baglan was vice president of a New York City startup and turned to yoga and meditation to fill a void in her personal life. Four years later, she quit her job to pursue her own Eat, Pray, Love journey through Asia. Baglan experimented with various mindful living practices and immersed herself in communities dedicated to the integration of mind, body, and spirit.

Match Group has a new dating app called Crown, and to kick off its initial launch in Los Angeles, the company threw a party at the trendy rooftop bar EP&LP in West Hollywood.

The event drew more people than originally anticipated – the company received almost 800 RSVPs. This was an invitation-only event, but word managed to trickle out to L.A. singles. When we arrived, there was a line forming down the block just to get inside.

Crown strategists are positioning the app as a departure from the typical swiping apps modeled after Tinder, because of its intentionally game-like format. Much like you would approach betting on your favorite sports team, say for March Madness, Crown presents you with sixteen matches per day, presented in a bracket format. You pick the winner of each pair of potential matches, until you are left with the final four. When you crown the winner, you have twenty-four hours to message each other and see what happens next. The process starts all over again the next day with new matches.

Match Group, the parent company of popular dating app Tinder, has launched a new app called Crown which offers a game-like format for online dating.

It works like this: every day at noon, users are presented with sixteen total profiles, shown two at a time, and must choose only one “winner” from each group of two. Users go through a process of elimination, until you end up with the final four matches, at which point you choose one final winner to be “crowned.” That winner is then alerted he/she has won, but that doesn’t mean you start chatting right away - it’s up to the winner to choose whether or not he/she wants to message you.

The game element is an interesting choice by Match Group. By turning it into a process where there is a possibility to “win,” the idea is that more users would feel invested in the process, and therefore be more likely to reach out. On the other hand, some argue, users might feel more acute rejection if their “winners” choose not to interact.

This week, Match Group announced it has acquired dating app Hinge. According to the press release, the deal gives Match Group a 51 percent stake in the company. Match first started buying shares in Sept of 2017 and has the option to buy remaining shares of Hinge within the next year.

Hinge has spent the last few years revamping its image and features, creating an app that countered Tinder’s hook-up reputation, and aimed to create a space for more serious daters. This included dumping its initial Tinder-like swiping feature and allowing clients to build profiles more like traditional online dating sites. Interestingly, Match Group (which owns Tinder) initially invested in Hinge in the fall of 2017, soon after it debuted its new design.

Hinge is most popular among “urban, educated millennial women looking for relationships,” according to Match Group CEO Mandy Ginsberg. It has also grown its user base to “five times what it was a year ago,” according to an article in The Wall Street Journal, making it an attractive purchase for Match Group.

Singles in Europe and New Zealand just got a leg up in the romance game. Jdate, ChristianMingle, and Bumble - three of the biggest names in online dating - recently announced plans to expand their services abroad.

Spark Networks, parent company of Jdate and ChristianMingle, recently extended their services, languages, and local market support throughout Europe. Jdate is now available in German and Spanish, as well as English, Hebrew, and French. ChristianMingle is now available in French, Spanish, and German in addition to English. Both platforms will roll out Polish and Russian language support in the next few months.

Spark Networks attributes the expansions to user demand and says they are part of a broader initiative to further enable the global Jewish and Christian communities to try connect, communicate and find partners in their native language.

Dating app Her (orginally called Dattch), designed exclusively by and for queer women, is expanding its focus to bring women together in conversation as well as for dating. Its new Community feature provides a forum for users to get updates on news and exchange ideas, expanding the app’s purpose beyond forging romantic ties.

Launched in time for Pride month in June, Her’s new feature allows for users to connect with each other around certain topics of interest to the community. In other words, a place to gather around the watercooler, but online. According to website TechCrunch, the first set of community groups includes a space for queer women of color, one centered around mindfulness and wellbeing and another for news and entertainment. App creators plan to launch more groups in the future, including pop-up forums around specific events, or even user-generated communities.

Users would be able to follow a person’s feed or post messages to a community board.