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Month: September 2021
Courtland Brooks Is Hiring
OPW – Sep 4 – Courtland Brooks is a unique agency/consultancy that just serves Internet dating and online social communities. See www.courtlandbrooks.com. We work with startups thru $500m+ a year revenue companies. We also work with best-in-class vendors who wish to approach the industry. We're hiring new advisors. Pay is hourly. We promise the work is interesting and impactful. The Courtland Brooks team are all entirely remote, so location is not an issue. Please email mark@courtlandbrooks.com if you are interested in joining the Courtland Brooks team.
Match CEO and Bumble Create Relief Funds for Employees Affected by Texas Abortion Law
Aisle’s Portfolio Reaches 6.5M Members
BW DISRUPT – Sep 2 – Over the last two years, Aisle's member base has grown by 100% and in 2020 alone, Aisle's member base grew by 50%. 45% of Aisle's revenue came from Tier 2 & 3 cities in 2020 as compared to 38% in 2019. Aisle is India's second most downloaded dating app. It has announced that the total member base on its portfolio apps has now touched ~6.5M. Aisle's portfolio of apps include high intent dating app Aisle and vernacular apps 'Arike' and 'Anbe' designed exclusively for Malayalam and Tamil speaking audiences respectively.
See full article at BW Disrupt
See the top news on Aisle
See the top news on Anbe
See the top news on Arike
Match Group Prepares for ‘Cuffing Season’
CNBC – Sep 2 – Match Group Americas CEO Amarnath Thombre joins Closing Bell to discuss Match Group’s stock, which is down 13% in the last two months. He’s hopeful that the incoming fall and winter will drive singles to seek companionship and start using Match’s apps.
ParshipMeet Prepares for IPO in 2022
REUTERS – Sep 1 – Dating group ParshipMeet has started preparations for an IPO next year. ParshipMeet, which is 43% owned by buyout group General Atlantic and 53% by German broadcaster ProSiebenSat.1 Media, has invited banks to pitch for roles in the listing. ProSieben CEO Rainer Beaujean has publicly set his sights on floating ParshipMeet in 2022. Its e-commerce business bought The Meet Group last year for $467M and renamed it ParshipMeet Group. ParshipMeet could be worth upward of 3.5B euros ($4.1B). ParshipMeet reported H1 revenues of 280M euros, up 19% on a pro-forma basis, while EBITDA climbed to 61M euros.
by Arno Schuetze & Douglas Busvine
See full article at Reuters
Dating App Ziinkle Raising Money on Birchal Crowdfunding Platform
YAHOO FINANCE – Sep 1 – When entrepreneurs Melanie Leahy and Elisse Alexander decided they wanted to build a dating app, they knew they wanted to use equity crowdfunding to make it happen. The pair's dating app, Ziinkle, offers the usual swipe and chat functions, along with a feature allowing users to scope out potential venues where other singles are mingling. Now, they're looking to raise money through equity crowdfunding. The startup hopes to raise $500K and $1M on equity crowdfunding platform Birchal.
Banned and Blocked: LGBT+ Websites Censored From Russia to Indonesia
THOMSON REUTERS FOUNDATION – Sep 1 – The Russian LGBT Network has been able to challenge shutdowns in court. 32 different LGBT+ websites were blocked at least once on Russian internet providers between mid-2016 and mid-2020. Same-sex relations in Russia are legal, but attitudes about sexuality and gender identity remain conservative. In a 2020 referendum, voters backed an amendment to the constitution to allow marriage only between a man and a woman, closing the door on same-sex weddings.
Website bans violate Article 19 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), of which Indonesia, Iran and Russia are signatories. The multilateral treaty says "everyone shall have the right to freedom of expression … (including) freedom to seek, receive and impart information and ideas of all kinds, regardless of frontiers".
Iran blocked the highest number of website addresses linked to LGBT+ content. 75 unique LGBTIQ URLs were detected as blocked in Iran, followed by the UAE with 51 unique LGBTIQ URLs were found to be blocked. Five years ago, Indonesia's government said it would move to ban LGBT+ sites, and at least 38 LGBT+ websites are currently blocked. Grindr is banned in Indonesia, Lebanon, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and the UAE.
by Hugo Greenhalgh
See full article at Thomson Reuters Foundation News