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Comment by sfmz | Hacker News Reader

My dating app idea is this: Men can only message 1 woman per day, but they get 1 more message coupon if they microblog about their day based on the premise that women are more interested in how men operate in the world than just good looks. If women don't respond after like 40 messages, then boot them off the platform because they are just using it for an ego boost with no intention of dating.

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I think that (in general) is a good way to be thinking about it.

I have a friend who is interested in using settlements of either real or phony money to offer incentives and change people's behavior in online settings and I'm going to talk with him about applying this to dating tonight.

Some of the reason why it is easy to meet people when you are in school is that you are not just doing it one on one but you are in a group of people that share activities and interests and couples can break off but they have the support of the group from before they meet all the way to the wedding and beyond.

A site that builds a real community could capture all of this. Another thing to think about is habit change. I've written about a recent experience I've had and I've been thinking about what I can do to right now to help it develop and I know I need to get practice in showing gratitude, giving complements and doing little nice things because I'd like to be able to show my love.

On today's online dating sites on the other hand you are feeling ugly or harried or angry or frustrated and none of those those feelings are going to help you give and receive love.

I like the idea of having limited but higher quality interactions.

Another way to encourage this I think is making it a paid service. Filters out anyone just using it to look at pictures or waste time.

I liked the bumble founders idea of having LLMs trained on peoples texts/social-media activity and having them talk to each other and then matching people based on that. Might be a good way to determine that one daily match.

So instead of human matchmakers, next step: AI-arranged marriage?

I mean, you don't have to marry who they suggest, but it seems like a good first step for someone you talk to. At least a little bit stronger of a data-point than "I liked her face and 140char bio"

I understand the desire for asymmetry in a heteronormative context, but I think the only real solution is one that just encourages all users to feel more invested in forming genuine connections (e.g. microblogging or whatever).

I think Hinge actually had a pretty good system when I was using it a few years ago. It had a strict bio format, which required every used to answer exactly 3 questions (of their choice) - this format allowed me to identify people who cared about genuinely meeting someone, and had the depth of character to communicate well with me. The incentive to over-share is gone, because you're limited to 3 answers. The incentive to under-share is gone, because you know everyone is also sharing so you're not going to look desperate. People who couldn't or wouldn't give 3 interesting and honest answers were easily ruled out and a lot of the alluring "mystery" of those under-filled profiles was stripped away.

In nearly all cases, a profile, blog / whatever is of little value the first thing that happens is they check the profile photo and that is it for the most part

I don't know if this is exactly it, but your idea for designing a system that encourages fewer but much higher-quality interactions is a good one.

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