Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook's CEO, announced that Facebook will launch a dating feature for its app. Zuckerberg claims that the addition will not be just for hookups, but for "building real long-term relationships."
In the wake of the Cambridge Analytica scandal, Zuckerberg emphasized that Facebook has the privacy of its users in mind. The feature will be opt-in, and users' friends will not be able to see their dating profile.
After Facebook announced its dating feature, shares of Match Group, the parent company of Match.com and Tinder, dropped 22 percent. However, executives of the Match Group and Tinder do not appear phased by Facebook's entrance into the dating app market.
The LA Times article's analysis mentions that Facebook has trouble attracting the same age group that dominates dating apps. Additionally, the dating feature may be a tactic to get users to spend more time on Facebook, making it more essential to people's lives.
Connection to Econ principles: Since we are reviewing material this week, I will make a few connections to themes from this past semester. Overall, I believe demand for dating apps is high among young adults (ages 18 to 30?). People are starting to get married later in their lives than in previous years and are taking more time at establishing their careers. Thus, they opt for the often instant gratification of dating apps while in their younger years. However, Facebook's approach at hoping to build long-term relationships may be the downfall of its success. I believe people who use dating apps on a daily basis, like they use Facebook, are not exactly looking for those types of relationships. Therefore, online daters' tastes may not align with Facebook's goal. Since the general demand for dating apps is high, there are many buyers in the market, especially with Facebook's more than 1 billion users. But like the LA Times pointed out, those buyers in the market may not be looking to use Facebook's dating feature.
Questions:
Do you think Facebook's decision to make a dating feature is smart? Why?
How do you see dating apps in general being used in the future? Will they become more integral in matchmaking?
In the wake of the Cambridge Analytica scandal, Zuckerberg emphasized that Facebook has the privacy of its users in mind. The feature will be opt-in, and users' friends will not be able to see their dating profile.
After Facebook announced its dating feature, shares of Match Group, the parent company of Match.com and Tinder, dropped 22 percent. However, executives of the Match Group and Tinder do not appear phased by Facebook's entrance into the dating app market.
The LA Times article's analysis mentions that Facebook has trouble attracting the same age group that dominates dating apps. Additionally, the dating feature may be a tactic to get users to spend more time on Facebook, making it more essential to people's lives.
Connection to Econ principles: Since we are reviewing material this week, I will make a few connections to themes from this past semester. Overall, I believe demand for dating apps is high among young adults (ages 18 to 30?). People are starting to get married later in their lives than in previous years and are taking more time at establishing their careers. Thus, they opt for the often instant gratification of dating apps while in their younger years. However, Facebook's approach at hoping to build long-term relationships may be the downfall of its success. I believe people who use dating apps on a daily basis, like they use Facebook, are not exactly looking for those types of relationships. Therefore, online daters' tastes may not align with Facebook's goal. Since the general demand for dating apps is high, there are many buyers in the market, especially with Facebook's more than 1 billion users. But like the LA Times pointed out, those buyers in the market may not be looking to use Facebook's dating feature.
Questions:
Do you think Facebook's decision to make a dating feature is smart? Why?
How do you see dating apps in general being used in the future? Will they become more integral in matchmaking?
What do people lose and gain on meeting people through an app, compared with meeting people in person?
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13 comments:
I don't think the dating feature is smart. Facebook's strategy always been to do everything: News, Video, Images, Family, Games, Messaging, Logins, VPNS, etc. A Dating app within Facebook is simply a continuation of this strategy.
The success of Instagram and (pre-update) Snapchat among younger generations tells us that the exact opposite strategy will work in the future. Teens and 20-somes want streamlined apps that perform specific tasks and perform them well. I feel that simply adding features to apps for the sake of adding them leads to a bad UX.
We'll see though. WeChat is a Chinese messaging app you can order a cab and manage your finances from - "all in one" apps might pick up here even though I personally don't like them.
I think there is a distinct difference between dating apps versus websites such as Match.com: apps seem to be used for/associated more with casual hookups than they are for LTR's or marriage, and I think Tinder is to thank for this general association. No, Facebook is not primarily an app, but I still think that people will more consider it for hookups than for a long-lasting relationship. This being said, I think "dating" apps will continue to be used for hookups rather than relationships because of the Tinder-related notion.
People miss out on important aspects of an individual when the first time they interact is over social media. Somebody can be smooth as butter online, but in real life they may be rather reserved and awkward. There's nothing wrong with being those things on a first date, but my point is that it's easy to fake a personality in an online chat than it is in real life. Also, FaceTune is a thing that exists. It's hard to truly "see" someone over pictures, especially on a dating app where people may want to (falsely) portray themselves in a positive way.
I agree that Facebook's tactic of doing everything in one app takes away from each of its individual functions. To me, adding a dating feature to Facebook seems to only convolute the app's purpose, whereas more streamlined dating apps like Match.com and Tinder have a clear and coherent purpose. Hence, I don't think that Facebook's addition is smart, but I don't think it'll help nor hurt Facebook. I do think that dating apps will continue to grow in popularity because they are an incredibly efficient and almost impersonal way of meeting others, qualities that are more valuable especially for the younger generation. However, as previous commenters have said, since it is so easy to create a sugarcoated or even falsified image on dating apps, people lose the complete image of a person on a dating app.
As excited as I am to be matched with the Russian bot of my dreams via Facebook, I have to agree with most people on this site when I say that this is an unnecessary feature of Facebook that just seems to be another dead cat bounce for Facebook's long decline.
First of all, Facebook proves that they misunderstand their primary target audience when they released this feature. People who use Facebook are past their thirtieth or even fortieth birthdays-most likely, married with children or even grandchildren. Facebook collects revenue from their younger demographic using Instagram, which is a far more popular service for young people. So for Facebook to release a dating feature for Facebook proper reveals that Facebook is out of touch. Secondly, I'm not sure what exactly Facebook is going for here. This past year has been a bad year for Facebook presswise. Facebook should definitely be on the defensive in this case, and their reveal of a dating feature belies that they are out of touch with their demographic and their timeline.
While I do agree with everyone that this dating feature to Facebook is quite unnecessary and takes away from the actual function of Facebook, from the standpoint of Facebook, I think this is a smart step for them that will get them even more demand and recognition. I think that instead of downloading individual apps such as Tinder and going to online sites to find a date or hookup, many people will start using this feature in Facebook solely because of its accessibility since many people are on Facebook anyways.
In response to your second question, I personally hope that dating apps will not become a big part in our society because as Alaina pointed out it is very easy to miss important characteristic of a person when seeing and talking to them online. I think that dating apps will continue being used for more casual hookups rather than meeting your potential partner.
I feel that the dating feature still falls under Facebook's vision. The function of Facebook is a platform for social media and social networking. It is simply connecting people from different parts of the world. I think that this new dating feature is unique in a way that you are able to connect beyond your friend circle on Facebook. The concern as of now is whether the person on Facebook is real or a bot. This is an issue that even Facebook is trying to tackle. Hopefully in the near future, they are able to identify the bots from actual people on Facebook. I feel that dating apps make it a lot easier to get you a mans. It also helps you find a mans who is similar to you in hobbies, foods, etc. Dating at its finest.
I do not see a huge problem for Facebook adding new features since it covers many topics in general. I think its okay for them to start a dating feature since many people use the app everyday to connect with friends, so this might actually work for dating too. This might benefit the older demographic since their primary audience are in their 30s and above, but only time will tell.
Maybe Facebook's new dating feature will bring a new demographic to the dating app experience. While it is currently true that dating apps are dominated by young adults, maybe this is only true because the "older" generations have not had access to a dating app that they feel comfortable using. Facebook is dominated by people in their mid 30s to mid 40s and has a higher percentage of people in the 50+ age group than any other comparable social media (according to pew research center). This is not the demographic that is known to be using dating apps, but maybe, since they seem comfortable using Facebook, if dating coming to Facebook, they will embrace it as well. Facebook's new dating feature could be a complete failure, or it could be one of the biggest break-through in dating app history, bring the feature to a whole new demographic of people.
I think Facebook is smart for adding a feature that may be popular in the future. I do agree, however, that dating apps are generally used for short-term relationships. It will take a while for a feature to get popular, and I think it is also possible that the app will just be used how other apps are being used. But Lydia does bring up a great point. Facebook is popular among older generations, so giving them an opportunity to use such an app could also produce results and popularity.
I agree with others that it is smart for Facebook to add this aspect, however, I'm not sure if it will actually increase people's use of Facebook, or increase the younger demographic to join Facebook. There are so many dating sites already available, even ones that do give the persona of trying to build "long-term relationships." There are dating apps for hooking up, for christians, etc. However, I also think this could possibly increase people's use of facebook because it is nice to have one app or one interface that has everything (ie- twitter, snapchat, instagram, e-harmony). For example, when instagram added their insta stories, it did decrease people's use of snapchat by 33% and increase instagram's use by 25%. So if Facebook is able to combine all of these popular social media apps into it's one app, people may see it is more useful and ignore their other apps.
I don't think it's such a bad idea.. If people want to meet each other easily Facebook is perfect. At its beginning, Facebook was intended to meet significant others as well as communication with people everywhere. I think they just decided to add what Facebook was first intended for. If people get to meet other people and be happy with this new feature then who are we to judge it as a bad feature. Having the feature does not mean you have to use it. It just means it's there if you want to use it. I don't think it would change anything to the app, whether it's who uses it, or how it looks. If anything maybe more young adults would start using it because of that feature since the app is primarily used by older people or young teenagers.
As others have stated above, Facebook is trying to do it all. WeChat is a very popular example of this type of app. However, most people do not even use all of the applications that exist on the interface, and instead download additional apps that offer better features. For example, even if WeChat has a ride-sharing feature, a lot of people opt for a different app. Similarly, Facebook tried implementing the feature of stories. However, most people don't post or watch these and look to Snapchat for that. Therefore, I'm a bit skeptical as to how successful Facebook will be in adding this feature. I do believe online dating has widened social circles and allow you to meet people you could not have before. It really depends on the people to make that relationship last or not. No matter what, even if you meet online you will eventually have to meet them in person and truly decide on your relationship so I see no problem with changing communication. These apps have helped people connect who have similar interests, and I think it will continue to be in popular use. I just am not sure how successful Facebook's version will be.
I think that Facebook adding an extra feature, is an attempt to boost it's popularity, as it is becoming less and less popular with the younger generation. This is an attempt to attract more people onto the app. I think it is a good move for them to use to get more users back onto the platform. I think in today's society, dating apps and technology will always be relevant. Different people meet people in different ways, so not one way can be integral, but in my opinion, it will always be relevant. Meeting people online is easier and more assessable, but people do not get that in person experience.
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