Month: June 2016

Review Of People Rating Apps

Posted on June 21, 2016

Peeple stroovy luluREVIEW-WEEKLY – June 20 – People love reviews. We're seeing the rise of a new breed of review apps: apps with the purpose of letting users review individual people.

  1. Peeple – The first "Yelp for humans" app. Users have privacy concerns. There are reviews about people without their consent.
  2. Stroovy – Stroovy requires the person being reviewed to have an active dating profile visible to the public. Stroovy requires users to submit a full review on someone before that user is allowed to search reviews of anyone else.
  3. Lulu – Once a platform for women to review men on dating sites, Lulu is now a retooled Tinder clone. This people-reviewing app was recently sold to Badoo

Stroovy's approach appears to be the most respectable. Only allowing reviews of people currently "putting themselves out there."

See full article at Review Weekly

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Summarized by the Courtland Brooks team

Skout Launches In Danish

Posted on June 20, 2016

Skout logoPRNEWSWIRE – June 20 – Global dating app Skout is now available in Danish. Over the past two years, the number of connections made by Skouters in Denmark has grown by ~50%.

See full article at Internet Dating Newswire

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Summarized by the Courtland Brooks team

Challenging Conditions Hit WhiteLabelDating.com

Posted on June 18, 2016

Venntro logoINSIDERMEDIA – June 10 – Annual revenues have plummeted by ~£10m at Venntro Media Group, the umbrella company behind Global Personals and the White Label Dating. Venntro reported turnover of £35.2M for the year ended 31 August 2015, a significant drop from £44.3M a year earlier. Former CEO (now Chairman), Ross Williams, said the online dating industry experienced "a number of seismic shifts" during the 12-month period that left "even the most well established companies facing major challenges".

by Muhamad Aldalou
See full article at InsiderMedia

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Summarized by the Courtland Brooks team

The Creator Of The First Online Dating Site Is Still Dating Online

Posted on June 18, 2016

Ffn andrew conruMOTHERBOARD – June 16 – Andrew Conru started Web Personals, the first online dating site, in 1993. The idea struck him in his dorm room as a way to kickstart his love life after a breakup. He tried newspaper personals, and video dating. It was "a very manual process," Conru recalled. But Web Personals featured large photos and a whole page of text per profile. Web Personals took two months to build. It was written in C++. In the 18 months Conru ran the site, there were 120K sign ups. He later sold it to Telepersonals for $100K, and launched FriendFinder.com. FriendFinder had users posting nudes, so Conru created AdultFriendFinder.com. Penthouse bought FriendFinder Networks in 2007 for $500M, filing for an IPO in 2008. They hoped to raise $460M but only had $220M by 2010, which Conru bought back and has been the company's chairman since 2013. He has been dating online for 20 years and has never been married. He has no plans on settling down. "I'm still single, which is the irony of all this," he said.

by Nadja Sayej
See full article at Motherboard

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Summarized by the Courtland Brooks team

Matt David Joins Match Group To Lead Global Public Affairs

Posted on June 16, 2016

Match group matt davidPRNEWSWIRE – June 15 – Match Group hires senior political and media strategist Matt David as VP, Public Affairs. David's responsibilities will include media relations, corporate communications, policy initiatives, and marketing and PR strategy. David comes to Match Group from Outside Eyes where he was managing partner focused on public affairs and corporate positioning.

See full article at PRNewswire

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Summarized by the Courtland Brooks team

IAC CEO Levin Sees Huge Opportunities In Online Dating

Posted on June 16, 2016

BLOOMBERG – June 16 – Joey Levin, IAC's chief executive officer and Vimeo's interim chief executive officer, discusses the growth potential for online dating sites.

by Emily Chang
See full article at Bloomberg

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Summarized by the Courtland Brooks team

Bumble Is Partnering With Spotify

Posted on June 16, 2016

Bumble spotify partnershipTECH CRUNCH – June 15 – Bumble users will have the option of connecting their dating profile to their Spotify account so it can include the top artists they listen to the most. While some may think music preferences aren't a big deal, Bumble is betting that they can be significant enough to influence whether or not you decide to swipe left or right on someone.

by Fitz Tepper
See full article at Tech Crunch

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Summarized by the Courtland Brooks team

MeetMindful Raised $820K

Posted on June 16, 2016

Meetmindful logoBUSINESSDEN – June 13 – MeetMindful, a dating app for people who are into meditation, yoga and spirituality, has raised 820K. The app was founded by Amy Baglan in 2014 as an offshoot of YogaDates, a yoga speed-dating event series she founded.

by Amy DiPierro
See full article at BusinessDen

This post also appears on InternetDatingInvestments.

Summarized by the Courtland Brooks team

Lovoo Founders Swindled 1.2M EUR Out Of Its Users

Posted on June 14, 2016

Lovoo profileHEISE.DE – June 12 – Dresden based dating service Lovoo created ~477 fake female profiles to lure male users into paying membership fees. It is estimated that Lovoo made ~1.2M Euros using those fake profiles. Lovoo founders were arrested last week.

See full article at Heise.de

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Summarized by the Courtland Brooks team

Former Saint Releases Online Dating Safety App

Posted on June 14, 2016

Stroovy logoGAMBIT – June 8 – Former New Orleans Saints wide receiver Quinn Early and Rebecca Isner, a woman he met through a dating site, co-founded Stroovy, an app to review dating site users. "Rebecca Isner came up with the idea", he says. "She's the type of person that reviews everything." The app will remain free till the end of the year. Then they are planning on introducing premium features.

by Zayn Abidin
See full article at Gambit

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Summarized by the Courtland Brooks team