WIRED – Sep 24 – Facebook Dating's US rollout includes a few new updates, including safety features and more Instagram integration. Users can now feature permanent Instagram posts in their Dating profiles. By the end of the year, Facebook says it will also allow them to share Instagram or Facebook Stories. Instagram will also become part of Secret Crush, an existing Facebook Dating feature that lets users select up to nine Facebook friends they want to express an interest in. User can turn off matching with friends of friends, they can also block people from seeing their Facebook Dating profile. Before meeting someone in person for the first time, many people tell a friend or family member where they're going and when they expect to be back, in case something happens. More recently, people have been sharing their location using tools like Apple's Find My Friends. Facebook will allow them to automatically open Messenger from Dating and tell a friend the name of the person they're going on a date with, as well as the time and place where they plan to hang out. Fifteen minutes before your date happens, that person will receive a notification reminder and access to their live location. But unlike Find My Friends, the location is only shared for up to an hour, at least for now.
Category: Outlets – Wired
The Questionable Science Behind DNA Testing Kits
WIRED.CO.UK – June 1 – A new wave of DNA-based products claim they can tell people what to eat (Nutria), what cosmetics to buy (SkinGenie), and what wine they'll like (Vinome). BabyGlimpse allows couples to upload their data and preview what their child might look like. DNA dating app Pheramor pairs users with prospective partners based on the content of their chromosomes. But scientists are doubtful about their accuracy. People may think they're getting their entire genome sequenced, but that's not usually the case. Instead of crunching through all 30M letters on 23 pairs of chromosomes, these tests look for a handful of common specific markers that vary between people, called single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs). But one SNP on its own is not enough to have sweeping effects on what food people should be eating, or what wine they'll like.
This Dating App Exposes the Monstrous Bias of Algorithms
Has Tinder Changed the Nature of Love? Science Disagrees
WIRED.CO.UK – Feb 15 – In the 1960s, a young social psychologist Arthur Aron was carrying out experimental studies using university students, and brain scans on people who were in love, falling out of love and recently divorced. He became famous for his 36 Questions which is a set of very personal questions people work through with their partner to get closer to each other (fall in love). In the original 1997 study, two of the lab technicians who did the experiment eventually got married. "People thought it couldn't be done," says Aron, who is now a researcher at Stonybrook University in New York. In the last 50 years, we've made real scientific progress towards understanding the processes in our brain that give us that giddy feeling. Helen Fisher, a biological anthropologist at Indiana University's Kinsey Institute, was one of the first to publish research into the processes behind love – how dopamine courses through your brain, which parts light up. She says that the desire to love is a survival mechanism, one which won't be trampled over so easily by new technology. Others, such as sociologists and critical theorists, also argue that young people now aren't so taken in by the traditional ideas of marriage, or even a cultural emphasis on romantic love. "It's fascinating – people who are now in their late teens, early twenties – they do take love and relationships seriously," says Michael Gratzke, a professor of literature at Hull University. "But they're more comfortable with complicated relationships and patterns of love. A lot of the research into how technology has changed relationships is really only starting to be understood," says Gratzke.
by Sanjana Varghese
See full article at Wired.co.uk
Subscribe to OPW + Join IDEA + Hire Courtland Brooks Agency-Consultancy
Tinder Is Launching the ‘Swipe Surge’
Could A Text-Based Dating App Change Selfie-Swiping Culture?
WIRED – July 10 – Kelly Rakowski started an Instagram account called Personals where people can post their dating ads. She has 35K followers now. She wanted to create a way for people to find each other through their phones without the frustrations of dating apps. "You have to be present to write these ads," she says. "You're not just throwing up your selfie. It's a friendly environment; it feels healthier than Tinder." And now, she wants to an app. The Personals app will focus on the things people say and the ways others connect to them. The Personals' Kickstarter is about to reach its $40k goal so Rakowski will be able to turn the ads into a fully-functioning platform.
Facebook Dating Looks A Whole Lot Like Hinge
by Louise Matsakis
See full article at Wired
Bumble Lets Users Login Without Facebook
WIRED.CO.UK – Apr 16 – Dating app Bumble has changed its login system that lets users register and login without sharing information with Facebook. Despite the change, people can still login to Bumble using their Facebook account. "Many of our users and prospective users asked for an alternative registration method," says Louise Troen, Bumble's VP of International Marketing and Communications.
With This DNA Dating App, You Swab, Then Swipe For Love
WIRED – Feb 28 – Pheramor is a Houston-based online dating startup that claims to use DNA as the secret sauce in its matchmaking formulation. The company launched today, with plans to soon expand to other US cities. Its app is a sort of "23andMe meets Tinder meets monogamists." For $19.99 (plus a $10 monthly membership fee), Pheramor will ship users a kit to swab their cheeks, which they then send back for sequencing. The company will combine that information with personality traits and interests from their profile with genetically and socially optimized potential mates in their area.
Tinder’s Lack Of Encryption Lets Strangers Spy On Users’ Swipes
WIRED – Jan 23 – Tinder's mobile apps still lack the standard encryption necessary to keep photos, swipes, and matches hidden from snoops, according to researchers at Tel Aviv-based app security firm Checkmarx. Just by being on the same Wi-Fi network as any user of Tinder's iOS or Android app, the researchers could see any photo the user did, or even inject their own images into his or her photo stream. And while other data in Tinder's apps are HTTPS-encrypted, Checkmarx found that they still leaked enough information to tell encrypted commands apart, allowing a hacker on the same network to watch every swipe left, swipe right, or match on the target's phone nearly as easily as if they were looking over the target's shoulder. Checkmarx says it notified Tinder about its findings in November, but the company has yet to fix the problems. To fix it, Checkmarx says Tinder should not only encrypt photos, but also "pad" the other commands in its app, adding noise so that each command appears as the same size or so that they're indecipherable amid a random stream of data.