Why I deleted Dating Apps from my phone

So I’m posting this after the Christmas and New Years holidays. With little success in meeting someone from dating apps, I decided to delete them from my phone. Why? Because I found myself obsessing over trying to meet someone. So much so I was waking up and immediately checking my dating apps, checking them every few hours while I was taking a break or had nothing to do (alternative to Facebook I suppose), and then before I went to bed at night. In total I would say I was spending anywhere between 4-6 hours per day. That is crazy!!

I so want to meet someone that I found myself addicted to checking the apps. Concerned that if I didn’t that I could potentially be missing out on finding someone. Let’s be honest, while the world of dating apps has opened up more opportunities to meet someone, it has also opened up to becoming more competitive to attract someone.

Initially, with POF, I tried the Bumble approach asking for girls to contact me. I had a couple of messages, but none from girls I was compatible with. Then I tried adding them as favourites to attract them to check out my profile. I had views but no messages. I then went to the standard approach which is messaging girls I was interested in. This resulted in messages being unreplied to, with the very rare courtesy “Thanks, but no thanks” reply message.

While I didn’t resort to the cringe worthy single word ‘hi’ message, I came close to some. Why? Because I was finding that there were a number of profiles that simply had the About Me section with very little information. Some only had “Ask me”.

Girls want guys to message them first. Guys, after reading the girls profile, sends the girl a message asking about her and referring to parts of her profile, asking questions. Girl receives numerous messages from guys, many of whom they’re not interested in. Girl sends a polite ‘Thanks, but no thanks’ reply. Guy is frustrated and replies with a verbal tirade. So now the girl doesn’t reply to all the messages, just to those she is interested in. Guy who doesn’t receive a reply back sends more messages to girls, but as the girls don’t reply, he doesn’t go to the effort of a genuine message as these remain unanswered. So the guy sends an incredibly brief message, potentially only ‘hi’, so the girl will check out his profile. The guy may only provide a brief message because there simply isn’t much in the girl’s profile to actually reference for conversation ie I enjoy family, I like to travel, looking for someone to start out as friends. So he not only sends messages to only specific girls, but sends them to a lot of girls to increase his chances of a response rate. Now the girls are being bombarded by not just a few messages from guys, but numerous messages from guys (or perhaps this is what the girl needs for validation, I know guys who do the same on Tinder!). Not only are the messages from guys they’re not interested in, but there only content is ‘hi’. Girl get frustrated with POF because she is being bombarded by messages from guy’s she is not interested in. Guy is getting frustrated at girls not messaging back.

Why don’t girls just message guys they’re interested in first. This removes this whole issue!

Also, are we all waiting for something better? Do our expectations exceed reality? Are guys seeking out Scarlet Johanson and girls Channing Tatum? I replied to girls I wasn’t interested in saying that I was happy to meet for a coffee, but only as friends. Am I as guilty as everyone else of this?

The end result is through obsession, addiction perhaps, of finding someone, I was spending too much time on dating apps. I need to get my time, life if you will, back from this easily accessible electronic cupid cocaine.

Bumble App- from a guy’s perspective

So I just started using Bumble. This app has been around since 2014. While very similar to Tinder, it comes with one unique difference.

The girl HAS to make the first move. The girl is given the power to message you only. And they can’t just sit on it, they have to message you within 24 hours.

Benefit of this for the girls is no more unwanted messages from guys. If you both match she has to make contact with you. So this means guy’s aren’t sending cut and paste messages to girls (or worse ‘hi’). The onus is on the girl to message if she is interested.

Has the Tinder feel. Pictures still form a big part of the app. You still swipe left and right if interested or not. Location still is a part of the app functionality. The info about you is limited to 300 characters.

I think they need to still put a bit more emphasis on the info section of the app. This will improve compatibility for those genuinely seeking a relationship. Being an app where women are in control, I found this a let down that it still focuses on looks.

Incomplete profiles. Many girls I found were not completing their profile. This leads on from the previous Tinder feel comment.

I would have preferred, being a female oriented app, that there was a requirement of a limited number of character entries into the profile. This will also help guys sort out those girls who are only setting up a Bumble account to check it out.

Visible/Hidden setting. Non existent.

Meaning you are either visible or you need to close your account to no longer be seen. I know other apps don’t allow this to ensure their user statistics to be always growing, making them greater then they actually are. It seems Bumble has followed on this.

What this means is you may be saying you like a profile that is no longer active! Making the app a potential time waster, for guys and girls, if the majority of profiles are no longer active users.

Message timer is 24 hours. Both you and the girl are notified of a match. But if they don’t send a message within 24 hours then the window to send a message closes. As a guy you do have one time extension per day to allow a message to be sent within 24 hours. Likewise, every message has to be sent within 24 hours of one being received.

I fell initially into the trap of waiting for a message when I matched. Don’t! Like other dating apps, the girl still has plenty of choices. I haven’t yet used the time extender. The girl is in control to message, so if she is interested, let her message you within the 24 hour window.

6 Picture limit. Unlike Tinder, the number of photo’s is limited to 6. I have also noticed a bit of a connection issue at peak times (Sunday night) meaning the pictures take a while to load.

Occupation and Education. As the app connects with Facebook, it picks up on where you work and your education from your Facebook profile.

While you have the ability to reset your occupation to a selection of preset occupations, I am not overly happy with the inability to change where I studied. I don’t have the ability to reset this from the name of my educational institution ie ABC University to just ‘University’ or ‘Degree’.

BFF search setting. You can set your search to just looking for friends.

I found this a particularly annoying factor on other dating apps, where women were using it to find friends. I am not against using technology to meet new people with the intent of friendship only, I am a big fan of Meetup! But when you are using a dating app, you have the expectation others are on there for the same purpose, to find a possible relationship. Bumble resolves this with the BFF setting!

Spotify add. You have the ability to connect your Spotify account to let girls see your music preferences and yours theirs.

I don’t get it?! For a dating app so light on information, yet goes so specific as connecting to Spotify for music preference it can only mean one thing… a source of revenue or data collection. I mean, if your partners preference in music is not one of your top priorities, then I don’t see how this is any use to either a guy or a girl in finding someone.

Overall

For those wanting to look more at compatibility than just looks, Bumble is a let down.  In addition to this, being limiting to 300 characters doesn’t allow for creating much info about you.

Is Bumble a hookup app for girls? If they are only looking for pics, then yes. If you are more serious about who you are looking for, Bumble may just be a girls alternative to Tinder. I would still rank other apps more highly then Bumble where information is more significant, such as POF or RSVP.

Where Bumble wins out is the girl is not bombarded by messages from guys, meaning girls will not be message fatigued. As a guy this means no more sending unwanted messages.

A message from a girl means she is interested. I have heard more positive comments about this app from guys saying the quality of contact from girls is better than that of Tinder.