So I checked out a few apps over vacation. Some of them might not be crazy new, but I haven’t reviewed them yet.
Lonely Chat
Garbage. Deleted this quickly. Doesn’t encourage the user to make any kind of an interesting profile. Obnoxious interface. This is what POF looked like in its infancy.
PURE
Beautiful graphic design, but little else besides. It looks elegant, but the user base isn’t there. There isn’t any sort of match-making algorithm. And you’ll have to shill out money if you want to find out if there’s anything here. I don’t know what’s past the paywall, because what came before it didn’t a great deal of faith.
MeetMe
Some interesting things here. The interface is clunky, and the ads are obnoxious as can be. But the user base is there. I got into real conversations more often and more quickly than I have on OkC or Tinder in a long time. I think that the Tinder user base has always been incredibly passive. The OkC user base is so jaded, “impress me” seems to be the unofficial motto, and maybe (like me) you find that tedious. This app is younger, more welcoming and happy to have you there (so are the other users).
Interesting things: it’s kind of hard to navigate, there seem to be 10 different mechanics for “liking” people and browsing profiles. There’s also “friending” which is a whole separate thing and feels out of place. BUT one thing I liked is that if someone likes you, you are then shown 12 profiles, only one of which is the person who liked you. You pick 5, if one of them is the person who liked you, you’ll match. If they weren’t among the 5 you selected, you won’t match. I liked this feature, because it means you won’t end up matching the person you would’ve picked last for the team. If that makes sense?
Also, you can post status updates and photos. Everyone near you will see your statuses in their feed. People can like or comment. This makes it a little more like a Facebook or Tumblr or Instagram for dating. People can start the conversation with you by commenting on a post you made that they like. It’s kind of fun. Be warned: 50% of the posts are lonely men who are whining about not getting laid. And about 10% are people offering or asking for pot. But maybe that’s up your alley. And a lot of the posts are funny/interesting/insightful/safe-for-work-sexy.