OPW – Geoff Cook and Catherine Cook, the co-founders of The Meet Group are speaking at the Mobile Strategies Conference on Nov 5-6th. Looks like an interesting 2-day conference, covering AI & Mobile Growth. See agenda (scroll down).
Category: Uncategorized
The Rise of Chatfishing: When AI Takes Over Modern Dating
VICE – A woman discovered the man she’d been texting for weeks on Hinge wasn’t the person she thought. His AI had been doing the talking. More daters are now using chatbots to craft messages or even run entire conversations, creating connections that feel perfect online but fall flat in person. The appeal comes from dating fatigue and the pressure to always say the right thing, pushing people to let algorithms handle the hard parts. But as AI smooths every interaction, it risks stripping away the flaws and emotions that make human connection real.
See full article at Vice
Cray App Launches to Help People Spot Red Flags
EINPRESSWIRE – Cray is a new dating safety app launched nationwide by Tampa-based Cray App, LLC. It helps users recognize manipulation, deception, and emotional risks in relationships. Created by founder Justin Smith after a painful breakup, the app analyzes ~70 red flags across 18 categories and generates two private scores: CrayScore™ for overall relationship risk and SchemerScore™ for signs of ulterior motives such as money, sex, or control. Cray combines psychology, humor, and education to make dating safer and more self-aware.
See full article at Fox40
Shay Levister Launches the World’s First AI-Powered Love Coach for Ambitious Women Looking for Love
PR NEWSWIRE – Certified Love Strategist, global speaker, and Founder Shay Levister, has launched HerPocket Coach, an AI-powered coaching app for high-achieving women who want to improve how they approach relationships. The app focuses on personal growth and dating skills through guided exercises, journaling, meditation playlists, and virtual coaching, with the aim of helping women build healthier, more intentional relationships.
See full article at PR Newswire
Announcing LTR 45 with Karima Ben Abdelmalek (happn) and Mark Brooks (Courtland Brooks)
OPW – Edition 45 of the LTR (Love, Tech, Relationships) online experience will be on Wednesday, October 22nd, at 12 pm (noon) EST (New York time).
In this edition, Mark Brooks will interview Karima Ben Abdelmalek, CEO and president of happn, to discuss HelloGroup’s acquisition of happn. The conversation will cover how the companies will work together, the product roadmap and market priorities, and what this means for users. After the interview, Mark will present Industry Trends and Opportunities for Growth, including market outlook, the role of AI in product and safety, and upcoming regulations.
If you hold a full-time leadership role at an online dating company, you are welcome to join LTR events for free.
Why attend LTR?
🏠 Flexible: Attend from anywhere – no travel required.
⏰ Convenient: Live session. 90 minutes.
💰 Free: No registration fees.
See the LTR Edition 45 speakers and invite page here.
Email mark@courtlandbrooks.com to RSVP.
London’s New Dating App Sonder Uses Canvas-Style Profiles
SWLONDONER – Sonder is a free London dating app that launched in June 2025. Profiles are built as personal canvases, essentially mood boards that show interests, and the app matches people based on similarities between those canvases. There are no user rankings or paid subscriptions, and the system aims to be non-discriminatory. The matching improves when a profile includes more detail. The team is running regular events around the city, and a friendship mode is planned for late October.
See full article at SWLondoner
Inside HUE: the New App Helping People of Color Find Love and Connection
POCIT – Launched in September 2025 by Princeton graduate Dayo Abeeb, HUE is a dating and social app built specifically for people of color. The platform allows users to filter by ~70 ethnicities, with two key features: Hue Dating for romantic matches and Hue Community for friendships and group chats. Abeeb created HUE after noticing friends struggling to find partners who shared their cultural backgrounds, an issue made worse by mainstream dating apps, where people of color, especially Black women, face bias and lower engagement rates. HUE aims to offer a more inclusive space. So far, the app has 3K users.
See full article at POCIT
UK to Classify Cyber Flashing as Major Online Offence, Dating Apps Face Fines or Blocks
MIRROR.CO.UK -In the UK, the government is moving to toughen the Online Safety Act by classifying cyber flashing, the unsolicited sending of sexual images, as one of the most serious online offences. The change will be announced by Technology Secretary Liz Kendall at the Labour Party conference in Liverpool. Once in force, it will require dating apps and social media platforms to actively detect, prevent, and remove such material. Companies that fail to comply could be fined up to 10% of global revenue or even blocked in the UK. The move follows polling that shows one-third of girls aged 12–18 and 5% of boys the same age have received such images.
See full article at Mirror.co.uk
Bumble’s “For The Love of Love” Reframes Subscriptions as Investments in Romance
THE DRUM – Bumble’s “For The Love of Love” campaign shows soft-focus scenes of real couples, handholding, kitchen dancing, dinner parties, even a baby bump, to frame its £30–£40 subscriptions as an investment in future happiness. The strategy shifts the app from a short-term dopamine hit to a long-term identity-driven purchase, asking users to stay subscribed with the promise that patience will pay off. The campaign leans on System 2 storytelling, using romantic imagery and social proof to normalize delay, positioning subscriptions as comparable to a gym membership rather than an impulse buy.
See full article at The Drum
Online Dating Is Quietly Reshaping Who People Marry
IFS – A new study from the Institute for Fiscal Studies finds that dating apps are linked with a measurable rise in interracial marriages. In U.S. states where Tinder usage is higher, the share of same-race marriages falls by about one percentage point. The effect is strongest for race, but much weaker for education, where online dating hasn’t shifted patterns nearly as much. The research also notes that race filters can limit this effect, showing how platform design directly shapes long-term relationship outcomes. Interestingly, despite the growth of apps, ~70% of serious relationships still begin offline, according to this study.
See full article at IFS