Month: January 2017

Top 10 Internet Dating Reporters (2016)

Posted on January 10, 2017

Typing on keyboardOPW – Jan 10 – Each year we rank the top reporters who reported on the Internet dating industry and made the cut on OPW. We only list the news that is of most importance to the dating industry executive. i.e. news that has strategically inspirational or sensitive coverage. Here's our Online Personals Watch Internet dating top ten reporters list for 2016. 

Jordan Crook (see story summaries), Tech Crunch
First place, second year in a row. Still with Tech Crunch, still writes about internet culture, social networks and consumer-facing technology. This year, we used 10 of her articles on OPW. She wrote even in 2016, mainly about dating apps news, i.e. she covered the recent changes in Hinge app.

Nathan McAlone (see story summaries), Business Insider
Nathan joined Business Insider in 2015 as an Editorial Intern and later Tech Reporter, he's an Associate Tech Editor now. He focuses on the future of entertainment and media, apps and startups generally. He wrote about various dating apps, mostly about Tinder and Hinge last year and we used 7 of his articles on OPW. He also wrote about the dating industry even more than in 2015, which gets him in at second place.

Fitz Tepper (see story summaries), Tech Crunch
Another Tech Crunch writer on the top ten list. Fitz joined TechCrunch in 2015 and writes about a wide range of topics, including i.e. hardware, payments, social apps, legislation and more. He wrote about Bumble a lot last year and we used 6 of his articles.

See the rest of the list on Courtland Brooks blog.

Post by Courtland Brooks team

Match To Open Singles-only Coffee Shop

Posted on January 10, 2017

Matchcom coffeeeEVENTMAGAZINE.CO.UK – Jan 10 – Dating site Match will open a singles-only pop-up coffee shop. The 'Espresso Yourself' coffee shop will be open on 19-20 January, and will be located in Boxpark, Shoreditch, in London. Guests will be able to choose from drinks such as 'Chappuccinos', 'Femmericanos' and 'Selffees' while they search for their perfect match. The brand has installed a 3D printer onsite, and coffee will be served with the profile pictures of Match members engraved in the foam. While drinking their coffee, they can get to know more about their potential date by reading the outside of their coffee cup. If they like what they see, guests can follow a link printed on the cup. To create the 3D printed images in the coffee foam, Match teamed up with Coffee Ripples.

by Hannah Ellison
The full article was originally published at Event Magazine, but is no longer available.

Mark Brooks: There's always been a natural affinity between coffee and dating. Yahoo Personals tried a coffee partnership with Starbucks in 2006 where they gave out gift cards to new members. Match has teamed up with Starbucks a couple times, and had a program in 2015 where users could display a Starbucks logo on their profiles and plan to meet dates at Starbucks.  

See all posts on Match.com

Summarized by the Courtland Brooks team

MeetMe CEO To Keynote At iDate Miami

Posted on January 10, 2017

Meetme geoff cook jan 17BUSINESSWIRE – Jan 10 – Geoff Cook, CEO of MeetMe, the public market leader for social discovery, will be keynoting at the iDate (Internet dating conference), taking place this month in Miami. He will talk about current trends with the online dating business and publicly traded stocks. For more information about the conference and to register, please visit the website http://date2017.com.

See full article at BusinessWire

Mark Brooks: I interviewed Geoff Cook about the Skout acquisition in August 2016, and about mobile chat in 2014, and about their release of the Charm dating app in 2013, and initially about Meetme in January 2013. If you were on the fence about attending, perhaps you should reconsider attending now. Geoff Cook (see Linkedin bio) has been with myYearbook/Meetme for 12 years and is one of the great voices of influence and experience in our little dating and matchmaking industry. He's done plenty of rounds of experimentation and is now head of a profitable, fast-growth public company. In January Meetme stock was at $1.42. Now it stands at $5. The financial market is upvoting Meetme. It's not too late to book iDate…and hey, it's nice and warm in Miami right now. 😉

See all posts on MeetMe

Summarized by the Courtland Brooks team

Bumble Is Launching Video Stories

Posted on January 10, 2017

Bumble logoTECH CRUNCH – Jan 10 – Bumble is releasing BumbleVID, a feature which will allow users to record 10-second videos directly within Bumble, which will disappear after 24 hours. Users can also add pre-recorded videos, but only ones taken in the last 24 hours.

by Fitz Tepper
See full article at Tech Crunch

See all posts on Bumble

Summarized by the Courtland Brooks team

Facebook Thinks It Knows Whether You’re Single Or Not

Posted on January 10, 2017

Facebook loveCOSMOPOLITAN.CO.UK – Jan 10 – A research carried out by Facebook in their ‘The Formation of Love‘ study suggests that the frequency with which we post on Facebook says a lot about whether we’re single or not. According to the findings, people who post roughly two times a day are more likely to be single. Once a person is in relationship, the number of post decreases.

by Catriona Harvey-Jenner
See full article at Cosmopolitan.co.uk

Mark Brooks: No surprises here really. Singles are more socially active. Therefore, they’re going to be more social networking active as well.  

Summarized by the Courtland Brooks team

For Many Millennials, Marriage Can Wait

Posted on January 10, 2017

MillenialsARKANSAS NEWS – Jan 10 – In every state and Washington, D.C., the number of people 20 – 34 who have never married has risen sharply since 2000, according to a Stateline analysis of census data. 81% of young people are still single in Washington, D.C., up from 73% in 2000. In six states (Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island and Vermont) ~70% of young people are single. Marriage is becoming less feasible for young people because of economic uncertainty, said Gary Lee, professor emeritus of sociology at Bowling Green State University, who wrote a book last year about the declining marriage rate. Young couples are living together without getting married at a higher rate. For 70 years, the typical marriage age in the U.S. has been steadily creeping toward 30.

by Tim Henderson
See full article at Arkansas News

Summarized by the Courtland Brooks team

Snap Interactive Completed Reverse Stock Split

Posted on January 9, 2017

ACCESnapinteractive logoSSWIRE – Jan 9 – SNAP has completed its previously announced 1-for-35 reverse stock split. SNAP's common stock will continue to trade on the OTCQB market but its trading symbol (STVI) will have an added designation of "D" for a 20 business day period following the reverse stock split (STVID). After 20 business day period, the symbol for SNAP's common stock will revert to "STVI". As a result of the reverse stock split, every 35 shares of SNAP's common stock were combined and reclassified into a single share of common stock and the number of shares of common stock that SNAP is authorized to issue was proportionally reduced from 500M to ~14.3M. A reverse stock split is a process by which shares are merged to form a smaller number of proportionally more valuable shares.

See full article Internet Dating Newswire

See all posts on Snap Interactive

This post also appears on InternetDatingInvestments.

Summarized by the Courtland Brooks team

What Is It Like To Date While Blind?

Posted on January 9, 2017

Visually impaired picWASHINGTON POST – Jan 9 – Jolliff, 29, has been blind since birth due to what's known as Leber Congenital Amaurosis. She can distinguish lights from darks, and her seeing-eye dog helps her navigate the world. Yet her dog can't help her swipe right or left on Tinder. So she seeks romance elsewhere. Last fall, Jolliff signed up for eHarmony and OkCupid. "I want the 'deeper' connection. I like being able to see how much effort a guy is willing to put into crafting his profile." Both Tinder and Coffee Meets Bagel, two popular dating apps, have done little to accommodate the blind or visually impaired community. Tinder's VP of global communications branding, Rosette Pambakian, declined to comment, saying she didn't think it "makes sense" to include Tinder in a story about visually impaired daters. Dawoon Kang, COO of Coffee Meets Bagel, said she hadn't given blind or visual impairments much consideration. But she's open to it.

by Alexandra E. Petri
See full article at Washington Post

Mark Brooks: This Washington Post reporter appears to have not appreciated Tinder's refusal to comment. Granted, its not the easiest question to handle. This is where the help of a trusted intermediary can come in handy. When I handle press calls for my clients I act as an analyst, and am quoted as such. The press trust me to guide them to the right spokespeople, and to guide them on the 'fit' of their subject matter. Please see CourtlandBrooks.com.

See all posts on eHarmony          See all posts on Tinder
See all posts on OkCupid             See all posts on Coffee Meets Bagel

Summarized by the Courtland Brooks team

How Happn Founder Came Up With Great Ideas

Posted on January 9, 2017

Didier-Rappaport-founder-HappnTELEGRAPH.CO.UK – Jan 9 – Didier Rappaport explains how an obsession with the internet led him to co-found video website Dailymotion and the Happn dating app.

Q: What's your business background?
A: I worked as an international textiles trader for almost half my professional life. But when the Internet arrived, I became completely obsessed. I was also one of the three co-founders of Dailymotion, which we sold in 2011. I eventually started Happn in 2013. I spend three hours a day reading and monitoring what's happening in the world. People ask me from where I get my great ideas. It's simply from working and reading.

Q: How did you develop Happn?
A: We started by asking consumers what they didn't like about dating apps. They told us that they were too virtual, deceptive and time-consuming. We wanted to bring the real world into the dating space. So when you open the app, your timeline shows people who are currently around you. We have 25M users worldwide. We want to make it profitable by the end of 2017 and we're pursuing a freemium model.

by Anna Isaac
See full article at Telegraph.co.uk

Mark Brooks: Everyone is pursuing a freemium model. But that runway will run out soon. Media costs are rising. Dating apps will probably lose their luster. More paid acquisition will be necessary.

See all posts on Happn

Summarized by the Courtland Brooks team