OPW – July 25 – Eric Silverberg, CEO & Founder of gay dating app Scruff, talks at Tech Open Air about how Scruff spiced up ad design, embraced GDPR and set new revenue records in 2019. Tech Open Air is Europe's leading technology and innovation festival.
Category: Scruff
Scruff Acquires Jack’d for an Undisclosed Sum
SYS-CON – July 10 – Perry Street Software, a New York-based gay mobile software developer and the parent company of Scruff, has acquired gay dating app Jack'd. Jack'd will continue to operate as a stand-alone app. Since its launch in 2010, Jack'd has grown to ~5M members worldwide. Perry Street will invest significant resources to upgrade the technology and reliability of the Jack'd app. In the coming months, Jack'd members can expect to see the removal of all programmatic advertising, enhanced controls over privacy and security, and new features such as improved messaging, redesigned Match, richer search, and the ability to include video as part of member private albums or in chat.
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Scruff Is Launching a Live Trivia Quiz Show
THE VERGE – Mar 13 – Scruff, a gay dating app, is launching a new live quiz show, called Hosting, that'll live inside the app. There will be a $500 prize for each game, and participants can browse who else is playing and either "woof" at them, which is like a Facebook Poke, or "favorite" them, which adds them to a list of people they might want to revisit. Every show takes place at 9PM ET, and is available in North America. There are three rounds with 10 questions each. Players have 10 seconds to answer each question. Scruff has committed to being an ad-free platform, so it says there won't be ads during the quiz show.
Scruff Now Bans Jockstraps, Kissing, and Hugging in Profile Photos
OUT – Jan 24 – The update is specific to profile photos (excluding private albums and photos exchanged in messages). Pictures that violate these guidelines will be automatically converted into private album images and users will be prompted to select another profile photo. "Our policy is not related to FOSTA/SESTA," said Scruff CEO Eric Silverberg. "Our change is meant to align our content standards with the evolving content standards of our app store distributors." Being banned from app stores can be catastrophic for companies like Scruff, Grindr and Jack'd, all gay dating services that solely function as apps.
What Role Should Dating Apps Play in Preventing Cyberstalking?
CNET – Jan 21 – "The overwhelming majority of our domestic violence cases involve some type of technological abuse," said Sadie Diaz, a senior staff attorney for the Courtroom Advocates Project. Stalking victims say that dating apps and services have done little to prevent this abuse. The FBI encourages people to report cybercrimes to the Internet Crime Complaint Center, but it doesn't have a category for cyberstalking. The closest is "Harassment/Threats of Violence." While the FBI received 16,974 complaints in 2018, the Justice Department prosecuted 16 cyberstalking cases that year. Matthew Herrick, of New York, wasn't aware there were multiple fake profiles of him on Grindr. Then one day, someone showed up at his apartment expecting sex. It was the first of many. His ex-boyfriend had created the profiles after the two broke up, and was courting strangers to come harass him in real life. Herrick asked ~50 times for Grindr to delete fake profiles. Section 230 of the Federal Communications Decency Act, a law from 1996, provides immunity to tech platforms from actions of its users. When Herrick sued Grindr for failing to delete the fake accounts, a New York judge dismissed the case on Jan. 25, 2018. Nearly a year later, at an appeals hearing on Jan. 7, Grindr's lawyers echoed the same argument. While Grindr ignored Herrick's pleas for help, Scruff was more responsive. Fake profiles were removed within two days. Eric Silverberg, Scruff's CEO and co-founder, said the company has a focus on moderators and detecting fraud. Facebook, for example, continues to expand its protection against revenge porn, even if Section 230 would protect them.
by Alfred Ng
See full article at CNet
Scruff CEO: The Real Issue with Grindr Is Way Bigger Than Gay Marriage
OUT.COM – Dec 3 – President of Grindr, Scott Chen created a Facebook post where he defined marriage as a "holy matrimony between a man and a woman." Here is an interview with Scruff CEO Eric Silverberg.
Q: How you felt when the news surfaced about the President of Grindr's remarks on gay marriage?
A: It's very disappointing. As a private citizen, you certainly have your right to your private beliefs, but when a leader in the gay community says these things, they're disrespecting the decades-long work of marriage equality activists.
Q: What do you know about the owners of Grindr?
A: I know that today, Grindr is entirely owned by a Chinese company. I think what this whole incident shines a light on is just how important the identity and personal beliefs of the tech company leaders really are in 2018. That's why I'm proud that Scruff is a gay-owned business.
Q: Tell me more about how Scruff pursues a business model.
A: Some tech executives don't use the products that they're building. We here at Scruff absolutely do. That manifested in the decision we made this year to get rid of all programmatic advertising, and to forgo any kind of data integration with Facebook.
Q: Can you explain what programmatic advertising is?
A: Any time you see a banner ad in an app, your data — be it your location, your sexuality, or the app you're on — is shuttled out of the app and into something that resembles a stock exchange. In that instant, you have advertisers who are bidding on that impression. The issue now is that data doesn't just stop with the advertisers anymore.
Q: Do you believe the claims that Grindr won't allow advertisers to receive access to users' HIV statuses?
A: I think we should look at their history of decision-making. People have very good reason to be deeply skeptical.
Q: Why is Grindr so big?
A: They were simply first to market.
Q: What are your hopes for Scruff, especially in the wake of these revelations about Grindr's president?
A: My hopes for the gay community are that people become more aware of the apps that they use, and really hold their companies and their leaders to the standards that they always should've been held to.
by Phillip Picardi
See full article at Out.com
Scruff’s Latest Update: Fighting Gay App Racism
ADVOCATE – Sep 3 – Gay dating app Scruff has removed all programmatic advertising; it also no longer requires users to list their race or ethnicity. The first change means that Scruff will not display third-party ads from companies like Google's AdMob and Twitter's MoPub. These ads are automated by targeting specific demographics like the gay community, using data provided by the app. Instead, Scruff's advertising will focus on partnerships with LGBTQ nonprofits, health, and advocacy groups, as well as lifestyle and travel companies. In terms of the second change, Scruff will now only require users to share their name, email, and birthday – ethnicity and all other profile fields are optional.
Gay Dating App Scruff Isn’t Interested In Third-Party Relationships
ADEXCHANGER – Aug 27 – When the gay dating app, which now has ~12M users, first came on the scene in 2010, its monetization strategy could pretty much be summed up in one word: AdMob. But in January, the Grindr competitor decided to remove all its banner ad slots and stop selling its inventory programmatically. Today, subscriptions and in-app purchases make up ~80% of its revenue, and a direct ad sales team is responsible for rustling up the remainder. Some brands shy away from dating traffic, citing brand safety concerns, which makes it tricky for Scruff to monetize with advertising.
Gay And Bisexual Teens Are Using Grindr To Find Friends And Relationships
PINKNEWS – May 21 – The study by Northwestern University, and published in the Journal of Adolescent Health, found that 50% of teenage boys aged 14 – 17 are using apps like Grindr to look for more than just sex. The research was carried out using online surveys completed by 200 sexually experienced teenage boys in the US. The study also concluded that teenage boys using apps Grindr and Scruff are more likely to access sexual health services, like HIV testing.
by Ella Braidwood
See full article at PinkNews
BHOC Launches Website To Improve Hookup Apps & Public Health Interaction
