Dating apps – the modern way to date. Media portrayal of “when dates go wrong” has taken isolated incidents and made them the norm, so the likelihood of meeting somebody in a bar and starting something new is now very small. People just don’t trust each other.
Dating apps make dating safe and easy. Scrolling through profiles and choosing whether you like them or not has never been easier. It’s like shopping for your soulmate and you get an entire aisle to pick one from. All of them are different in their own way, but a lot are the same in many ways too.
I have been using dating apps for over a year, have had my own degree of success, but am now just using them to people watch and for entertainment – yes that’s right entertainment! I use Plenty of Fish, Tinder and Bumble. Let’s explain a little about each one first:
Plenty of Fish (or PoF) –
this is the most complex of the three. You input a lot of information about yourself, likes and dislikes, what you are looking for and personality, there is even a “Chemistry Test” to complete for compatibility (although I am yet to see a profile with this completed). You then add photos of yourself, in the hope of attracting that one person, and write a detailed “About me” description. You are shown photos of potential matches in your area and when you click on them you are taken to their profile.
There is then lots of information allowing you to decide whether or not to make contact. PoF also has a “Meet Me” section, which is a quick swipe where you decide based on one photo whether or not you would like to meet somebody – this is however a paid section and as such nobody uses it!
Tinder –
this is the famous dating app, where users swipe left or right depending on whether they like the look of the person in the photograph. Right for yes and left for no.
Tinder allows you to view all of their profile photos, which can range from 1 to 8 images. If you like the look of the person and want to learn more, then you can tap on the bottom of the photo for their description – some people use it and others don’t. When a match occurs, the onus is generally on the male to make initial contact
Bumble –
this dating app is similar to Tinder, but laid out differently. On Bumble, the user scrolls up page by page to view details of the person that they are looking at and their additional images, but like Tinder it’s a left or right swipe depending on whether you are attracted to that person.
Unlike Tinder, when a match occurs, the onus is on the female to make the first move, in fact the male cannot send the first message and the lady has just 24 hours to send that first message. If you particularly like your match then you can use a function to extend that 24 hours to 48 hours.
All sounds very complicated, but it really isn’t. I have found that the best “quality” ladies use Bumble, then Tinder and bottom of the pile are users of PoF. Bumble users tend to be professionals who enjoy “the finer things in life and world travel”, Pof users are less likely to be professionals and mostly enjoy “watching tv, going to the pub and family time”.
I have decided to write this, with a view to pointing out, from a man’s perspective, why the women on these apps become unattractive, despite how they may look. I also want to point out where women have their information wrong, when it comes to the male users of these apps.
I know some men do not read the description that is painstakingly laboured over and go purely on looks, but there are many female users who do exactly the same thing.
PROFILE DESCRIPTION
Let’s look at how the profile is viewed when read.
There are many ways that profiles are written and the majority are very negatively composed, others are amusing and others are very sensitively and intelligently put together.
By “negatively composed”, I mean that they are an endless diatribe of why the user is hacked off with dating apps and men in general and what a potential match shouldn’t do, shouldn’t say in the first message and a very tight description of how they should look! They use phrases such as “just jog on” if a user is looking for something particular such as “one night stands”, “a skinny supermodel” or even “doesn’t like children”.
These are all things that put a potential match off when they read your profile – it comes across as aggressive and being written by somebody with “attitude” and a dislike of men in general… I mean if you dislike men so intensely then why are you looking for one?
Sizeism is rife – I once read one lady’s profile and it simply read:
“What do you call a man under 6 feet tall? A friend”
How is this conducive to finding a match? OK it made me smile, but also made me realise what I was facing – I am 5 feet 8 inches and in the dating game, considered a “short a**e” and therefore not worthy of a date.
Why limit your options to finding a good man, who can satisfy your every requirement, because he is an inch or two shorter than you when you have your heals on? It all seems to be about appearance, which immediately is a left swipe for me, because it shows how shallow these “beauties” are.
