ADWEEK – Oct 19 – 72andSunny said its first work for Match is slated for an early 2019 release. Match spent ~$52M on measured media in the U.S. last year and $42.5M just in the first half of 2018, according to Kantar Media.
Month: October 2018
UAE Continues To Block Dating Sites, But Allows Tinder!
MARK BROOKS – Oct 18 – It's no secret that the UAE blocks dating sites. I'm in Dubai for a few days and I thought I'd check the top ten dating sites in USA according to Experian for September 2018. Here's the results.
1 POF – blocked
2 Match.com – blocked
3 Zoosk – blocked
4 OkCupid – blocked
5 Adam4Adam – blocked
6 OurTime – blocked
7 SPDate.com – blocked
8 Badoo – blocked
9 Tinder – wow, Tinder is available and not blocked!
10 AshleyMadison – blocked
I also checked Matrimony and Shaadi and they're both open and available. UAE doesn't allow Internet dating but it does allow select matrimonial services. So how does Tinder make the cut? Does anyone have any insight on this?
See full article at the Courtland Brooks blog, which includes an additional 9 rankings from Experian.
Post by Mark Brooks, CEO IDEA
Pickable Dating App Lets Women Browse Anonymously
GOTHAMIST – Oct 18 – For women, Pickable requires no photo, no name, no age and no profile – they don't even need to sign up. Men upload a picture, set themselves as "Pickable" for a certain timeframe, receive real-time updates of the women currently browsing their photos, and chat requests from women in proximity who want to meet them. No swiping involved.
Wolfe Herd Made It To Marie Claire’s New Guard List
by Megan DiTrolio & Sara Holzman & Colleen Leahey McKeegan
See full article at Marie Claire
New Scammer Research By Barclays
THE FINANCIAL – Oct 18 – According to new research from Barclays, one in three romance scams (37%) results in losses of ~£5K. Almost two-thirds of cases (57%) result in losses of ~£2K. 'Baby-boomers' now represent 55% of all reported instances of romance scams. Almost half of daters (43%) admit they would trust someone after speaking through a dating site for just two weeks. Men are likely to trust a potential partner much sooner, 53% saying that they would trust someone up to two weeks after they start talking, compared to a third of women (33%).
Dating App Blindfold Launches A Free Launch Party In NYC
NEWSWIRE – Oct 17 – The new dating app, Blindfold, is throwing a free launch party in New York, giving away tickets to the new Off-Broadway play – The King, The Final Hours – on Sunday, Oct. 21. Attendees simply have to show the Blindfold app on their phone for a free entrance to the play that tells the unauthorized love story of Elvis Presley. Once a user matches with someone, Blindfold enables them to break the ice and play fun games that help them learn about each other. Users also get to see how compatible they are based on their answers to the game.
The full article was originally published at Digital Journal, but is no longer available.
OkCupid: Millennials Say Personal Politics Can Make Or Break A Relationship
USA TODAY – Oct 17 – New data from OkCupid shows politics is playing an increasingly important role in dating. 85% of millennial men and women said voting was "extremely or very important" to them. Melissa Hobley, CMO at OkCupid, said the data reflects a growing trend among millennial users: voting with your dating app. Hobley said that since President Donald Trump's inauguration, OkCupid has seen a "massive spike" in political terms on user profiles. The data show that politics is the "dealbreaker or dealmaker" for many OkCupid users, Hobley said. In many cases, respondents said they would not date someone who didn't share their political beliefs. 73% of millennial women and 56% of millennial men said they would prefer a partner who votes for the same party they do. 75% of women said they wouldn't date someone who didn't support the #MeToo movement, and 46% wouldn't date a nonvoter. However, 77% of men said they'd date someone who didn't vote.
Hinge To Measure Real World Success
SparkNetworks Ordered To Pay $500K In Fines For Auto-Payments
PATCH.COM – Oct 15 – Spark Networks USA, LLC, the parent company of niche dating sites Jdate and Christian Mingle, will pay $500K in penalties and up to $985K in restitution to customers whose subscriptions automatically renewed or whose refunds were denied when they requested them. Spark's dating sites were automatically renewing customer payments, without their express prior consent as required by federal and state law, among other alleged violations of law.
by Emily Holland
See full article at Patch.com
Donald Daters, A Dating App For Trump Supporters, Leaked Its Users’ Data
TECH CRUNCH – Oct 16 – A new dating app for Trump supporters has leaked its entire database of users – on the day of its launch. The app, called "Donald Daters," is connecting Trump supporters. On its launch day alone, the app had 1,600 users. Elliot Alderson, a French security researcher, could download the entire user database which included user's names, profile pictures, device type, their private messages – and access tokens, which can be used to take over accounts. The data was accessible from a public and exposed Firebase data repository, which was hardcoded in the app.