Features

Tinder has already rolled out its new premium paid service Tinder Plus in the U.S., and among the new features are some protections from spammers.

Tinder Plus includes a new feature called “Unlimited Likes,” which seems counter-intuitive since users of the free app already have the ability to swipe left and right without limits. Unfortunately, spammers have taken advantage of this feature by creating spam bots which swipe right on thousands of profiles simultaneously, increasing users’ match potential.

Tinder has dealt with increasing abuse of its service from spammers. Chances are if you’ve downloaded Tinder, you’ve also come across a fake profile or two that are actually staged to sell you something or obtain personal information, (violating Tinder’s terms and conditions), rather than to make an actual connection with a real person.

Tinder sees its paid service as a way to reduce spamming, as the rewards for this kind of power matching wouldn’t be worth the cost. Apps capitalizing on users’ penchant to say yes to all their potential matches have cropped up, too – like Tinderoid (now labeling itself as “Tools for Tinder”), which enables users to “like” en masse. 

The roll-out of Tinder Plus has already happened in a few other countries, and so far limiting the number of likes has not been received kindly by users who are used to unlimited swiping. According to reviews in the UK’s app store (which dropped the service to only one and a half stars in its rating), Tinder has prevented quite a few users from swiping endlessly unless they pay for the premium service, and they are not happy about it.

Tinder however, says that regular users of the service should not be affected (as opposed to the tiny fraction that swipe right on every single match they can as frequently as possible).

“That behavior happens with a very small percentage of our users, and they usually find that the experience isn’t very good and self-correct on their own,” Sean Rad, the company’s cofounder and CEO, told Tech Crunch.

The algorithm Tinder has set up to block spammers analyzes a few things before it is triggered: namely, the number of swipes, whether the user is only swiping right, velocity, time spent looking at a profile, etc. According to Tinder, a user can swipe through as many as 500 profiles and still not be blocked or prompted to upgrade to Tinder Plus, so long as the user spends a certain amount of time looking at each profile instead of mindlessly swiping.

Tinder launched Tinder Plus in the U.S. this month. For more information about this app, please read our Tinder review.

Once upon a time, we dated by meeting someone at a bar or through friends. Then we graduated to speed dating. Then online dating. Then mobile dating.

It's been a long, strange road – filled with stigma and scandals and, yes, success stories too – and it's about to get even stranger. Now that online dating is old news, and dating apps have been tried by pretty much everyone with a smartphone, we're ready to tackle a new frontier.

That new frontier is “wearables.” For those unfamiliar with the buzzword-y term, wearables are miniature electronic devices that are, as the name states, wearable. Think smartwatches and fitness trackers. These devices integrate with the user until they practically become a prosthetic, and can be used an extension of the wearer's mind and/or body.

Welcome to the future. It sounds like a gadget from a sci-fi flick, but it's happening now. Towards the end of last year, Match.com launched its first wearable app to be used with Android smartwatches. The app is designed to make it even easier for singles to date on the go by focusing on quick, easy to view features. The list includes:

• Messaging: Notifications for all winks and messages are sent straight to your Android wearable. To reply, simply swipe to read an incoming message and respond using the app's voice command feature.
• Daily Matches: Daily Matches appear first thing each morning. Swipe to view their full profile, then rate each match Yes or No.
• Location Functionality: Since mobility is the point, the app locates singles in the area to find matches nearby. When one appears, it's easy to tap, speak, and send a message.

Match.com isn't the only one exploring the brave new world of wearables. Lunar, a San Francisco-based design studio, created jewelry-like devices to help wearers overcome dating anxiety. One is a pendant that gathers information from your social networks, Netflix habits, iTunes playlists and more, then vibrates when there is a compatible partner in the vicinity.

And let's not forget about Google Glass. Similar wearables are bound to follow, and no doubt they too will change the way we go about meeting and mating.

Newsweek has speculated about what else we might have to look forward to on the wearables front, and it's a fascinating mix of cool and crazy. They predict a biological approach to dating, in which your body's signals are used to register responses to your dates.

“There will be contact lenses and ear inserts,” Newsweek writes, “all capable of measuring our pulses, our body temperature and other physiological reactions to determine whether or not we are attracted to someone. Those signals will be fed into the dating sites, with their databases and algorithms, all the better to help us find true love.”

And after that? Well, microchips, naturally, and the transition “from humans to cyborgs” will be complete.

For more information on the dating service please read our Match.com review.

With each new dating app that joins the crowded market comes new promises to revolutionize dating. Every app swears it solves the problems of its predecessors, but one by one they all fall short.

We're patiently (or not so) waiting for the real developers to invent the perfect app, but in the meantime, Mic has taken a stab at solving one of the 21^st century's biggest problems. They've invented a Super App – one app to rule them all.

According to Mic, if one app could solve all the worst parts of online dating, it would need to:

1. Filter out lame opening messages. The Super App would have a built in communications rater so you never have to see another one-word message again. Bristlr, a new social network for bearded men, is currently testing a similar feature. Users can rate the quality of the messages they receive and those who are consistently rated highly get a badge on their profile.
2. Block copy-pasted messages. Everyone has either received a copy-pasted message or been guilty of sending one. Either way, it's not cool. Bristlr is also trying to solve this problem, by automatically sending a notification when a message you've received has been sent verbatim to other people.
3. Prevent men from overwhelming women with unwanted advances. Who hasn't, at least once, thought “I could really use a stalker blocker?” A lot of women are turned off by online dating because they feel overwhelmed by the number of unwanted (and sometimes downright creepy) messages they receive. Tinder changed the game when it limited messaging to people who had mutually indicated interest in each other. It doesn't eliminate the issue completely, but it's certainly a step in the right direction.
4. Make sure there's something else you're judged on besides looks. Deep down, we know we're all guilty of making snap judgments based on appearance. Enter dating app Talk or Not, which lets users slowly reveal pieces of their profile photo as their conversation with someone progresses. Looks factor into the process eventually, but not before charm, intelligence, and humor.
5. Weed out the creepers trolling for sex. It's not that there's anything wrong with casual sex between consenting adults, it's just that it gets frustrating to only be approached for sex if you're looking for something more. Mic suggests “A feature that would prominently note that the user in question is looking for a relationship versus strictly hoping to score,” in order to “prevent misunderstandings early on.”
6. Send you matches directly so you don't waste hours swiping though terrible profiles. Because no one wants carpal tunnel. The Super App would take the Coffee Meets Bagel approach and send matches so you don't have to waste time searching and swiping.
7. Keep your profile hidden from people you don't want seeing it. Family, exes, co-workers – none of those people need to know what you're up to online. The League allows users to sync LinkedIn with the app so that you never have to worry about someone unwanted peeping your profile.

Let us know what you'd like to see in the perfect dating app, and for more of Mic's suggestions see the original post.

It was only a matter of time before a Denver-based app developer would take advantage of the city’s new legalized pot industry. High There! - a new dating app specifically for weed lovers, launched this month for Android and will be debuting in the iTunes store soon. In addition to the mile-high city, the app is also available in 23 states that have legalized medical marijuana laws.

High There has been described as “the Tinder of pot smoking,” although instead of matching according to proximity and age preferences, the app asks for your weed preferences, such as vaping or smoking, and what your energy level is when you are imbibing – “low energy couch potato or high energy explorer,” according to a report on Mashable.

The design of the app is similar to Tinder, with photos as the main feature and the ability to accept or reject a match by swiping left or right. Besides how you consume your pot, a few extra questions are added to enhance your profile, including what you are in the mood for – “go out, stay in, or chat?” and your interests (“culture, outdoors”).

CEO Todd Mitchem says he was inspired to create the app after his date called it quits when she found out he smoked pot. It wasn’t the first time it had happened, so he decided he’d rather only date pot smokers – but needed a way to meet them. He wanted to build a community around people who might otherwise feel shunned for their habit. He told Mashable that the app “can also act as a kind of social network for smokers who are seeking recommendations on local dispensaries, to share tips or just make friends with other like-minded folks.”   

High There however is not the first dating app to cater to this particular clientele. My420mate launched last year, and 420Singles has been offering their pot-friendly app for a while as well, though High There seems to be getting a lot more attention in the press.

So far, the reception to High There has been mixed, according to reviews in the app store. The main reason for users’ frustration is that they download the free app and then can’t use it because of the marijuana laws in their particular cities. (If it isn’t available to purchase legally in your town, you can’t use the app.) Many people complain that they do have medical marijuana cards from another city, but can’t use the app because of the legal status in the city where they live.

High There is free and available for Android users, and will soon be available for download from the iTunes store.

Let's talk about the Tinder problem.

On one hand, Tinder has been great for mobile dating. Tons of people are on the app, meaning no one is judging you for using it and your pool of potential dates is huge. On the other hand, there are so many people using it that it's difficult to find the needles in the undateable haystack. It's easy to dismiss the entire app as useless once you've swiped left on enough losers.

A new app called The League is hoping to solve that problem – by admitting only the most successful and ambitious users, and keeping everyone else out. Basically, it's Tinder for elitists, although founder Amanda Bradford prefers to say The League “curates members.”

"The best universities curate students. Employers curate their employees. Work and school are the top places where 20-somethings meet each other. So it makes sense for a dating community," she told Business Insider.

The target user is interesting and motivated, passionate and working towards achieving a dream, a young professional who is looking for something more than a hookup. So far the app skews slightly female. Users tend to be in their late 20s and have advanced degrees. All have successfully passed through The League's are-you-cool-enough algorithm, which Bradford says relies more on LinkedIn than Facebook.

If accepted, users are shown a handful of matches each day. At 5pm, a new batch of matches is available. The League ensures you aren't shown first connections or current co-workers, to minimize the potential for awkward encounters.

Accepted users also receive a “ticket” to give to another single friend. Others are put on a waitlist until they’re deemed worthy of entrance into The League. Admittance doesn't guarantee you a spot forever – if you fail to measure up to The League's exacting standards (by responding poorly and earning a bad “flakiness score,” for example), you will be deemed a “low-quality member” and ousted.

Bradford was initially hoping to raise $750,000 from investors, but interest in the app was so high that it's now raised $2.1 million in seed funding. For now, The League is limited to 4,500 beta users in San Francisco. Since November, the app has been responsible for pairing 20,000 people and 19 successful couples. Bradford is focused on growing her small team and expanding to New York City, where there is already a sizeable wait list.

Following NYC, Bradford hopes to conquer London and work her way through more of the world's most interesting cities. The League currently has no plans to come to America's smaller towns, where it's unlikely to find its hyper motivated, career-focused target market.

This month, Tinder began rolling out its new premium service Tinder Plus in select European markets, and the feedback hasn’t been good.

The popular dating app surged to the top of the online dating market when it launched in 2012, attracting users who had never thought of signing up for an online dating site. Its easy-to-use format and free game-like service offered more entertainment than dating stress, and users flocked to check it out.

But in an effort to make money from this hugely successful endeavor, it was only a matter of time before Tinder’s owners developed a paid model for the app – opting for a premium service over adding distracting in-app advertisements. (Although the company has strategically lent its brand to marketing campaigns, like Gillette’s facial hair survey and Domino’s Pizza Valentine’s Day campaign.)

But Tinder Plus has not been greeted favorably, at least in its initial roll out – and the free service is suffering as a result. Although Tinder Plus is not set to launch in the U.S. until March, and prices are still to be determined, the company needs to find a new strategy - considering the backlash it has gotten in markets where the roll out has already taken place, such as the U.K. Tinder users who are not opting to pay for Tinder Plus and want to stick to the old free version of the app have been leaving bad reviews in the iTunes store (enough to drive the free service’s rating down to one and a half stars).

The problem has to do with new restrictions to the free service. Once a user has swiped a certain number of times, they are blocked for 24 hours from seeing any new profiles, unless they want to pay for the new Tinder Plus service. Since most users log in to Tinder multiple times a day to swipe through matches, this puts a serious hindrance on Tinder’s competitive advantage. Other dating apps that have restrictions on the number of profiles a user can see per day – like Hinge - have been easing up on their requirements, and seeing a surge of new downloads as a result.

With all the promising new free apps coming on the market, such as Bumble (started by an ex-Tinder employee), Tinder will need to think outside the box to keep its market share. After all, any online dating app or site’s currency is their user base. If Tinder loses theirs, then they stand to lose a lot more than the revenue from the premium service. Perhaps they should stick to advertising deals, or instead of taking away features from loyal users, offer more enticing new features.