Online dating... a brief history.
Online dating is so prevalent in today's society.
According to statista, the number of online dating users in the US in 2020 is a whopping
44.2 million and online dating revenue has amassed 602 million in 2020 alone.
So it's true that online dating is pretty popular.
But where did it all begin?
Well, let's go back before the internet to a time where there were actual services that
would help people meet someone beyond your typical party or a grocery store run in.
We can take it back all the way to 1695 with the first record of a dating ad that reads
"A gentleman about 30 years of age, that fays he has a very good estate would willingly
match himself to fome good young, gentle woman that has a fortune of 3,000 or thereabout
and he will make settlement to content.
Hard to know for sure, but maybe he was looking for a sugar mama.
In 1870, 7he first newspaper for singles called The Matrimonial News begins its publication.
Men have to pay $0.25 cents to place an ad (about $4.50 today, what a deal) and women
post for free.
It almost reminds me of how they allow women into clubs for free and then men have to pay
the cover.
Typical.
Then in 1959, a Stanford student used a computer called the IBM 650 to help determine the similarities
between 98 participants based on a 30 question profile.
Nothing much came of it.
But let's just say the students got a pretty good grade.
Cut to 1965 where Harvard student Jeff Tarr created operation Match, which was used by
more than 1 million people.
And he says "we're not trying to take the love out of love.
We're just trying to make it more efficient."
Sounds kind of like online dating apps, doesn't it?
In the 1980's and into the early 90's video dating became popular and created a lot of
seriously awkward videos.
Hi, my name is Scott Lewis and I'm an out of work actor at the moment working for various
TV companies.
I have a spot this morning or this afternoon I should say.
I'm a 25 years subscriber to both Playboy and the New Yorker Magazine.
At night I operate a damsel in distress hotline.
I guess you'd call me a knight.
They called them video personals and it got up to 600 video dating services.
It was pretty popular at the time.
People would talk about themselves in a Tinder-esque fashion and you would get to watch these videos
and set up a date if you thought the person could be a potential match.
Of course with the rise and fall of the VHS came the fall of video dating, which I believe
was probably for the best.
And then in 1994 the very first online dating website gets created with kiss.com and 1995
followed by match.com, which is still around today with 21 point 5 million members.
Many sources say kiss calm was the very first site but Gary Kremen founder of match claims
that they were the first where he says he came up with the idea in the shower, which
is where most great ideas come from.
Let's be honest, before creating match com he was paying $3 a minute for a 900 number
dating service where you get to meet potential matches by talking to them on the phone that
probably got pretty expensive.
In 1997 match was sold for $7 million to Cendant and then in 1999 acquired by IAC.
Since then, has scooped up all the dating sites you've probably heard of from plenty
of fish to Tinder to hinge.
But I digress.
Let's take it back a step.
In 1998 the movie You've Got Mail starring Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan actually had a pretty
big effect on the online dating world.
Because this was the first time mainstream TV exposed the normalcy of meeting someone
online, just like Tom and Meg did.
Just like the creation of any business and new idea, there's always going to be someone
who will step up and try to make it better.
So from the early 2000's up until present day, different websites are popping up trying
to make the online dating game better by trying to be more efficient.
Niche sites started popping up in the late 90's, such as Jdate in 1997 and eHarmony in
2000, where they claimed they have a questionnaire which will make sure that you get a match
with someone who is extremely compatible.
Ashley Madison came out in 2002 grabbing the attention of people trying to cheat on their
spouses.
Seeking Arrangement in 2006 for sugar daddies and sugar babies.
And the very popular Grindr in 2009 for gay, bi and trans people.
But everything changed when a little site came out called Tinder in 2012.
This app changed everything when it became the first app where you could swipe to like
or dislike someone anonymously based on their location.
Talk about super efficiency.
This caught on fast and by May 2013, Tinder was one of the top 25 social networking apps
online.
By October 2014, Tinder users completed over 1 billion swipes per day resulting in 12 million
matches per day.
An average user spent a whopping 90 minutes a day on this app.
Some drama went down and former VP of Marketing at Tinder, Whitney Wolfe quit the company
filing a sexual harassment and discrimination lawsuit.
After leaving the company, she decided to start a company called Bumble, where women
now had the power to start the conversation when two people would match.
Bumble is now close to Tinder as the second most popular dating app as of 2019.
She did pretty well for herself taking on the title of world's youngest self made female
billionaire after going public with her company in 2021 with a net worth of $1.5 billion.
As you can see, online dating has not only become increasingly popular over the years,
but the main way of meeting someone you're interested in.
New companies are popping up and growing in popularity every year like hinge, Zeus, Coffee
Meets Bagel, the league, happn and more.
I just recently sat down on my podcast How To Talk To girls with a guest who is starting
a new dating app in Southern California where once you match, you have a video date before
you can even text.
This world of online dating continues to evolve.
And I'm curious to see what happens next.
How about you?