Bad first messages received on tinder (posting for reference to my essay)

 


  

Images from the showing and blue print close up in colour

It was nice to see the project intrigued the visitors yesterday, despite it being so close to exam time!

Also, here are the close ups from the blueprint project. Unfortunately due to unexpected logistical problems access to colour printers was limited for the exhibition and the blueprint suffered due to the colour scheme used. Here it is  in colour with a demonstration of the QR codes in action:

QR Links: http://virtualandmaterialrealities.blogspot.co.uk/2016/04/its-all-in-presentation.html

http://virtualandmaterialrealities.blogspot.co.uk/2016/04/profile-bio-issue-in-terms.html

http://virtualandmaterialrealities.blogspot.co.uk/2016/04/whats-in-name.html

http://virtualandmaterialrealities.blogspot.co.uk/2016/04/thirdhanddatingcom-site-name.html

Based on Dom's blue prints I made this mockup dating profile

Images from Presentation!

Hey guys,

Hope everyone's essays and stuff is going well!

I didn't take too many pictures of or final show thing yesterday, but just thought I would post them here in case anyone else didn't manage to take any.

Good job yesterday, the people I came in to look at it said they found the whole topic really interesting and that it covered something they had never really given much thought to before!

Some pictures from the presentation!

 

 

 

It's all in the presentation

The profile picture is perhaps the most vital component of a modern dating profile. It's the first point of contact when people view your profile and there is a plethora of information out there on the subject. Okcupid have published numerous studies on this issue, with interesting results.
The research focused on three main topics.

• Facial Attitude. Is the person smiling? Staring straight ahead? Doing that flirty lip-pursing thing?
• Photo Context. Is there alcohol? Is there a pet? Is the photo outdoors? Is it in a bedroom?
• Skin. How much skin is the person showing? How much face? How much breasts? How much ripped abs?

 For men, it was found that a photo that presents the user without a smile is helpful, throwing in a cute animal pic for good measure. Albeit grumpy cat is possibly a stretch. Ab shots do well but only for those who can pull it off.

For women, a Myspace style shot with the camera up at an angle has proven to be most effective , with a smiling or flirty expression preferable. Unfortunately, many guys seemingly have their head firmly in the gutter, and as a result cleavage pics outperform other types, although this is dependanmt on the users physical attractiveness.

More information can be found at: http://blog.okcupid.com/index.php/the-4-big-myths-of-profile-pictures/
http://www.eharmony.com/dating-advice/using-eharmony/the-most-popular-online-dating-profile-photos-revealed/#.Vx4Yz_krLIV

Profile Bio- an issue in terms

The style and content of the profile biography has a huge bearing on the responses received by a user. On apps like Tinder, the profile is perhaps of less importance as the profile is brief and the primary focus is on aspects like the profile picture, name and location. However, on more traditional layouts like the one presented here, the bio has a greater sway in how you are perceived.

Vocabulary-
Above is a chart displaying 380 of the top 1000 words used on the dating site okcupid, ranking in terms of the hotness of the people using these words with the hottest towards the centre. whilst the hotness of these words isn't isolated form other factors in their profiles, this can give an indication of what different genders find attracted. Thus the location of NYC was chosen and the hobbies taken. The profile is written in a confident style reflecting the profile picture, as advised by many so called "dating gurus" online, who encourage guys to amplify their masculine traits. Hobbies are easy to fake and exaggerate, so this information is extremely relevant to an investigation into modification of the self online.

Dating - Globalisation

Globalisation of dating

For a long time throughout the history of humans we have walked around doing our daily things and trying to find someone to mate with and ultimately re-produce. As the world has grown our technology has followed and thus has changed the way in which we date. The traditional way of dating has changed, while still there, there are now other options and other ways in which dating can begin.

Technology has paved the way for computers, the internet, mobile phones and apps, this has brought a huge change and overhaul in dating and created a new realm. Online dating. It’s a new era in human history, technology has suddenly become the norm and at the same time it’s so advanced to what it was 50 years ago. Instead of going out for a few drinks with your friends, going to school or the supermarket and meeting the future love of your life you can now just open up your phone, download an app and have the choice of 100’s of people to pick to start a conversation with and then eventually choose to go on a date if you both decide to. You could say that it’s dating made simple, it gives hope to everyone and hope that there is definitely someone out there for everyone.

It’s not just the world of dating that has evolved with technology, online dating has also adapted to change and developed more than anyone could imagine. There really is a dating website or app for everyone. This includes your usual well known OK Cupid, E-harmony but also many that are to do with religion like christianmingle.com and for fetishes and services like seekingarrangement.com, elitesingles.com, bondagepal.com and also for sexuality which include the infamous Grindr. From what once started as just a few messages between a few people has grown exponentially and become a worldwide, money making business.

In the UK, according to datingsitesreviews.com:

About seven million UK residents are currently using online dating. This is a huge amount of people using this platform as a means to meet others. However, there is a dark and dangerous side to this platform – as between 2009 and 2014, the number of reports of serious sexual assaults during first face-to-face meetings following initial contact online rose in the UK from 33 to 184. This is a 450% increase.

Before all of these apps and websites as said above, meeting someone was restricted and the majority of people that dated would already know or know of the person they end up dating. With the merge of the apps/sites and the internet, dating is now global. I could go on to my laptop now, log on to a dating site like seekingarrangement.com and chat to someone over in New York, Los Angeles or even Toronto and meet them just as easily. Dating has now been globalised, whether the intention or not, it also makes many companies a huge profit. Although many people in the world now have access to the internet, there are still millions living in poverty and unable to access this and other globalised platforms.

In January 2015 – a bit dated as a year in technology can change a lot – Mobile Industry produced a very telling article that explains in graphs and pictures the usage around the world and also stats on the UK. You can view this here –

http://www.mobileindustryreview.com/2015/01/3-billion-internet-users-2015.html

As you can see with the above image, the west is very connected, which for us makes dating globalised between developed countries, however, in other countries, access is still limited.

What's in a name?

Perhaps not the most changeable facets of one's personality but apparently significant according to the net, certain names prove more popular online than others.

Information provided by 'the grade', an online dating app which lets users rank profiles based on their quality and validity, suggest that names matter when it comes to how many positive swipes received by the user. the information is as follows:

Male Names

1. Brett
2. Tyler
3. Corey
4. Andy
5. Noah
6. Shane
7. Jeffrey
8. Rob
9. Frank
10. Jeff

For the sake of presentation, we have gone for the rather comical sounding Brett Jeffries as our username. An apparently desirable combination of names although bear in mind that this information is sourced form the states.

Female Names

1. Brianna
2. Erika
3. Lexi
4. Brooke
5. Vanessa
6. April
7. Natalie
8. Jenna
9. Molly
10. Katie

So can it be that hotter people have 'hot' names? Or is it that we form pre-concieved notions about attractiveness and personality at the fist glance of a title? Whichever the answer, the name you present and how you present it can be crucial in the success of your profile. Of course outright lying about your name online would be far from wise if you ever were serious about meeting a potential partner, but modifications such as shortening or lengthening a name may have bearing on your desirability, given the lack of information presented on a tinder profile for example.

For other cool statistics relating to the popularity of names in the online dating game, you can find further information on the website of the app: http://www.thegradedating.com/how-hot-is-your-name/

Thirdhanddating.com- Welcome to the post-human era

Thirdhanddating.com embodies the whole premise of this blueprint.

Thirdhanddating.com symbolises the nature of and psychology behind much of our habits of online dating. The nature of the self online is a complicated issue as it brings into question issues of trust, authenticity and confidence in relation to dating in a way seldom seen before the advent of dating profiles. In a market place that makes individuals condense the some of their experiences, likes and dislikes into a limited standardised format, the likelihood that the true nature of the subject is replicated through the subjects profile is minimal. The competitive nature of online dating pressures the user to often inflate or deflate certain aspects of their personalities and hide unwanted features from potential love interests. 

This brings us to the concept of the third hand. Inspired by Cyborg theory, it can be argued that the online dating profile is part of a new evolution of social interaction that is based on the users capabilities in designing what can be dubbed 'the social prosthesis', a third hand which allows access to the world of digital love. It is clear form data gathered by sites such as okcupid that there is a certain pattern that correlates how a profile is presented and the positive attention that profile receives, terminology used, profile picture technique and even the name of the user all effect the rate of swipes and replies an account receives based on averages. The amount of articles online centring around profile optimisation are evidence that this concept is now part of mainstream thought, but the implications of this behaviour are rarely thought about by the public at large. 

This profile is completely derived from information a potential user can readily access online, be it statistics or articles with the aim of getting a greater pull factor for the user. What this project aims to achieve is to increase the awareness that what you're seeing online when dating is not the reflection of a person directly, but a persons interpretation of what is perceived as desirable. Like a piece of designer prosthetics, you are interacting with a tool that is specifically designed to fulfil a task stylishly and with maximum efficiency. You are interacting with another users digital 'third hand'.

More stories for print for display

http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/features/6825878/When-swiping-right-goes-wrong-these-dating-horror-stories-could-put-you-off-Tinder-for-good.html

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/news/online-dating-horror-stories/

Links to stories that can be printed out

http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/PCWorld/story?id=4282014

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/sex/11051389/First-date-horror-stories-when-romance-goes-wrong.html

http://www.mirror.co.uk/lifestyle/dating/valentines-day-dating-horror-stories-5146819

A quote to post large in the room as visual display

In the virtual world of social networks, we get attracted to identities that are virtual. We don't know who is behind them and what their intentions are. Sometimes, they are just predators looking for easy prey. And they are very good at what they do.

STEVAN V. NIKOLIC, Weekend in Faro

Images to print

Hey guys,

So I've got about 4 different tinder conversations and a few interpretations of 'the guys you meet on online dating sites' to print off for our final presentation tomorrow.

Altogether it is around 15 pages- so if there's anything else I've missed let me know and I will print before we meet tomorrow around 11!

See you then! 

Spoof profile info

Format:

Profile:

Name: Brett Jeffreys

Location: NYC

Age:27

Profile picture:

I live by myself, I pay my own rent, I wear socks that match and I love my mom. I am a confident, attractive & comedic person.I  surf. Oh,  and I’m in the fitness biz, as well as back in school finishing up my pre-med reqs.

• Friends
• Food
• Skiing
• Hiking

On a typical Friday night I am: Trying to figure out the major and minor products when 1-bromo-2-propene reacts with potassium tert-butoxide. Either that or partying like a rock star. If all this hasn’t put you off yet, let me take you on a weekend trip to the beach and I’ll try my damndest. ;-) 

Tinder Date Gone Wrong

Sign advising how to handle a bad tinder date

Really interesting- will print off the graphic to use in our final display.

Voice Recordings

I could only upload the voice recordings as a video, but also have the mp3 saved so we can decide which one to use when we present. But they sound pretty funny, and the audio lasts just under 30 minutes.

Meeting 20-04-2016

[Dragos, Dominic, Sadeka, Danni]

• Project- Monday, 25th April 2016 - 11:00 
• Finalise room booking [Dominic]
• Print materials (stories, images, etc.) [Danni]
• Globalisation Map Completed [Stephen]
• Graphics & Information [Dominic and Daniaal]
• Computer reading stories [Dragos, Dominic, Sadekah, Danni] 
• Finish editing stories [Dragos] 
• 
  

Blue print 'the third hand' progress

Daniaal and myself have spent the day working on the blueprint for the digital prosthesis concept, getting to grips with the graphics technology (GIMP) and theorizing as to how to implement the stats into the final design.

Daniaal is in the process of formatting the layout for the blueprint ready for the data input from the sites forementioned in my last blog post. I'm currently in the process of writing the profile information to be forwarded on for input. We will use a spoof profile with QR codes linking to the blog explaining why we have chosen the information put onto the profile and will include the statistics that are behind these choices. We are currently using the character of Tom Anderson, the first friend of all myspace users when they create a profile, to emphasise the characterisation of real people into technology and popular culture through the creation of automated profiles.

History of Online Dating

In 1700, just a decade after the invention of the modern newspaper, the first matrimonial service was created. These amenities ran ads on behalf of single men and women who were desperate to find a good husband or wife.

At the time, being single past 21 carried with it a deep stigma and turning to a matrimonial service, for either sex, was seen as an act of desperation. Still, many matches developed from these services and many members of 18th-century society discovered love this way, even if it was something rarely talked about during its time.

The matrimonial services from that century were just the beginning of the pairing of technology and dating. Newspapers would also provide personal ads, which often trusted on the telephone to send/receive messages, VHS brought us video dating and, more recently, the Internet brought us online dating.

The eruption of the Internet in the mid-to-late 1990s produced a new context for personals, and by the end of the decade, they had become relatively acceptable. Even before the Web itself, bulletin boards and newsgroups held a variety of ways people could use technology to meet others with similar interests, including dating. Services such as America Online, Prodigy and eventually Craigslist offered chat rooms, forums and online classifieds of use to singles.

Though, from there, the market quickly exploded. By 1996 there existed 16 dating Web sites listed in Yahoo!, which was a directory at the time, and other powerhouses such as Friendfinder.com and OneandOnly.com had already started up.

By 2010, different dating sites were virtually in every city, sexual orientation, religion, race and almost every hobby, creating it easier to find exactly what we’re looking for and harder to stumble on someone who exists outside our pre-defined bubbles of identity.

In 2002, Wired Magazine predicted, “Twenty years from now, the idea that someone looking for love won’t look for it online will be silly, akin to skipping the card catalog to instead wander the stacks because ‘the right books are found only by accident.’”

Online dating is the new model for introductions, substituting the role of traditional personals and in many cases, merging with the functions of social media. If we are going to progress the way people meet one another, we’re going to have to do so by questioning the existing paradigms of online dating and figuring out how to do it better.

References: 

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/

http://brainz.org/