click to enlarge
-
Hinge
-
A sample Hinge profile
If you're single and in your 20s, chances are you’ve hopped on the internet-dating bandwagon at least once, even if it was “just to check it out.” And although everyone and their grandmother (in some cases, literally) uses online dating these days, the concept of it still perturbs some people.
One you get past the initial shame factor of meeting someone online, the fact remains that — no matter how much you apparently have in common with someone according to your profiles — you're still conversing with a stranger on the internet.
The new dating app
Hinge aims at eliminating the "rando factor" — the only people you will see on the app are Facebook friends with people you know — this could be determined for the better
or worse.
The Tinder-esque app only shows you other Hinge users in your “extended social network.” This means that instead of showing you everyone who is in your general vicinity, it only shows you people with whom you have mutual friends. That way, you can be 100% certain that you’re not sexting with, whoops we mean talking to, a psychotic serial killer. (Unless you know people who may be Facebook friends with a psychotic serial killer, in which case you have bigger problems to worry about.)
Like Tinder, Hinge lets you swipe left or right to show whether or not you’re into someone. Once you and another user both swipe right on each other, you can have a conversation.
Unlike Tinder, Hinge profiles display where each user went to school and where they work, in addition to which friends you have in common with them.
The more you use Hinge, the more the app will notice which professions you tend to prefer in a match based on whom you “swipe right” on, and will start to only suggest people with those professions.
“Tinder shows you who is physically around you, whereas Hinge shows you who is socially around you,” said Karen Fein, the marketing lead at Hinge.
Launched in D.C. in January 2014, Hinge is currently available in more than 10 cities, and hopes to expand into more with the $12 million it recently raised, according to the team behind the app. And of the cities the app is currently available in, its membership growing the most quickly in San Francisco.
San Francisco also has the most users out of any of the other cities Hinge is present in, so if Hinge sounds like an app you want to "just check out," you're in luck.
