I have been working inside a dating app for a few months and there are a lot of interesting things. This article is going to be without any structure as there are many things to say. I will mostly ignore homosexual interactions. Not because they don't exist, just because it …
The problem is that they are optimizing for the wrong values. They are looking at retention, but the ideal dating app should have bad retention! You get a couple of matches, you chat, date, exchange real numbers and you’re inactive on the app!
Yeah, that’s what it should do if matching was central to the product. From the app owner’s perspective, optimizing for retention makes sense if they’re trying to pad their users numbers, e.g. if they’re raising funding. I’ve also seen filters hidden behind a paywall, which made navigating some a time sink.