Month: October 2018

AdultFriendFinder User Files Suit Over Data Breach

Posted on October 9, 2018

Lawsuit pic 2018LEGAL NEWSLINE – Oct 9 – A California man alleges his confidential personal information was compromised in an adult dating site data breach that happened in October 2016. Hackers accessed 339M accounts. The plaintiff holds FriendFinder Networks Inc. responsible because the defendant allegedly failed to implement industry-standard measures to safeguard users' personal information and failed to immediately notify its members whose information may have been compromised.

by Jenie Mallari-Torres
See full article at Legal Newsline

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Summarized by the IDEA team

Why Match Group Stock Jumped 15.7% In September

Posted on October 9, 2018

Match group screenshot aug 2018THE MOTLEY FOOL – Oct 7 – Shares, however, have pulled back 3.4% so far this month. We can attribute Match stock's strong September performance to powerful earnings reports. Q2 revenue jumped 36% YOY to $421.2M, operating income surged 81% to $150M, and earnings per share (EPS) rocketed 165% to $0.45. Tinder's growth continues to fuel Match's overall growth, with the dating app's number of paid subscribers soaring 81% YOY to 3.8M. The main thing investors need to watch is growing competition.

by Beth McKenna
See full article at The Motley Fool

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Young Indians Are Using Dating Apps For Much More Than Just Dating

Posted on October 9, 2018

Trulymadly partial screenshot 2018QUARTZ INDIA – Oct 8 – Last week, Bumble announced its foray into India. Besides Tinder, Bumble will compete with homegrown players like TrulyMadly and Woo. Winning over India may not be easy, since dating apps here are not exactly used the way they are in the West. Launched in 2014, TrulyMadly claims to be the market leader with a monthly download rate of ~65K. The uses of a dating app are pretty standard across the world. But there are a couple of differences in how Indians use them. A lot of 18- 21-year-olds use them to make friends. The 26+ audience uses dating apps pretty much as the first step towards matrimony. TrulyMadly revenue comes mostly from micro-transactions, rather than ads or membership. Users can buy a pack of Sparks to communicate on the platform or buy Select and get matched with the similar type of profiles.

by Kuwar Singh
See full article at Quartz India

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Summarized by the IDEA team

Young People Are Embracing Single Life, Tinder Finds

Posted on October 9, 2018

Single millenialsUSA TODAY – Oct 8 – Millennials are "single, not sorry," and they're making the choice to live life solo intentionally, according to a new survey from Tinder. 72% of the surveyed young Millennials "have made a conscious decision" to stay single for a period of time. More than half said single people were more open to new experiences and that they view themselves as more fun due to their single status.

by Ryan W. Miller
See full article at USA Today

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Heart Rate Social Connects The Health And Fitness Minded

Posted on October 9, 2018

Heart rate socialKVUE – Oct 7 – The free app aims to connect health-conscious people for dating, friendship or working out. Since its launch in September, ~1,500 members have signed up.

by Jenni Lee
See full article at KVUE

Summarized by the IDEA team

RichMeetBeautiful Is In Legal Trouble In Belgium

Posted on October 9, 2018

Richmeetbeautiful adTHE BRUSSELS TIMES – Oct 5 – The trial of the company responsible for the site RichMeetBeautiful, and its boss Sigurd V., began last Friday before the 47th division of the Brussels Criminal Court. The site was allegedly publicly encouraging sexual immorality or prostitution and breached the law relating to the fight against sexism in public. Last year, RichMeetBeautiful released a campaign on the ULB campuses. The campaign encouraged female students, aged 18 to 26, called "sugar babies", to be supported by middle-aged and comfortably-off men, "sugar daddies", by meeting them on the site. Last March, the Belgian courts also ordered that the site be blocked by Belgian Internet Service Providers.

by Oscar Schneider
See full article at The Brussels Times

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‘Single, Not Sorry’: Tinder’s New Campaign

Posted on October 9, 2018

Tinder single not sorry campaignTHE DRUM – Oct 9 – Tinder has kicked off its first major brand campaign, 'Single, Not Sorry,' an unapologetic celebration of single culture and the important role being single plays in people's lives. Tinder enlisted American photographer Ryan McGinley. He is known for his candid style that captures the energy of young love, culture, and experience. He has worked with Beyonce, Lady Gaga, Timothee Chalamet, and other stars.

by Kyle O'Brien
See full article at The Drum

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The Counterintuitive Evolution Of Online Courtship Behavior

Posted on October 9, 2018

Eharmony logo 2018MIT TECHNOLOGY REVIEW – Oct 2 – One of the curious features of human courtship is the asymmetry between the roles that men and women play. In recent years, researchers have begun to study this phenomenon in more detail, thanks to the rise of online dating. These show that in general, men tend to initiate contact, and women, often flooded with contacts, are more selective with their responses. Rachel Dinh and colleagues at the University of Oxford in the UK measured the change in online dating behavior on eHarmony's UK site over a 10-year period. They found out that the asymmetry has become more pronounced. "While early on, people might have hoped online dating would create a more equal playing field for women to initiate courtship, it has become clear that online dating has not only reflected but exacerbated male-dominated initiation," say Dinh and co.

See full artile at MIT Technology Review

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Internet Dating, The Story So Far

Posted on October 9, 2018

OPW – Oct 9 – From Webpersonals to Match, to POF and Tinder. This is a tidy little overview of the story of Internet dating so far, according to Visual Politik and IDEA/Online Personals Watch.

and here's the Spanish version

Full Disclosure: I (Mark Brooks, bio) worked with FriendFinder and POF in the past.

Post by Mark Brooks, CEO IDEA

Bumble Welcomes Priyanka Chopra As Investor, Partner In India Expansion

Posted on October 8, 2018

Bumble pryianka chopraTHE BEEHIVE – Oct 5 – Priyanka Chopra is an Indian actress, producer, philanthropist, activist, and entrepreneur. She is joining Bumble ahead of its upcoming expansion into India. Bumble and Priyanka first began collaborating for the launch of Bumble Bizz in October of 2017. From then on, they began architecting a plan to partner and collaborate on a rollout into India. Priyanka's manager Anjula Acharia also joins Bumble as a strategic advisor. Bumble will officially launch in India this fall after spending the past 9 months building a local team, defining a go-to-market strategy, and engaging key partners in the market.

See full article at The Beehive

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This post also appears on InternetDatingInvestments.

Summarized by the IDEA team