So on the one hand it's nice to see when a cool algorithm or framework is used IRL.

On the other hand, actually applying a 'stable marriage algorithm' to people makes a bunch of assumptions which are worth interrogating:

- Do people actually know what they want even in the short term?

- Do people's preference change meaningfully over longer periods of time?

- Does your preference _upon reading people's profiles_ have any strong relationship to your preference after spending any amount of time with them?

The property that right after being matched, no one could have matched with someone whose profile they preferred more does not mean that this will create stable relationships.

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justonceokay 2 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Least they are using an algorithm that has the intended purpose of matching people. For profit dating apps are more interested in keeping you coming back then they are in creating successful relationships

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missedthecue 2 hours ago | parent [-]

This is an extremely common sentiment I see online - that there is some conspiracy to keep people single to reduce subscription churn. I have run two dating apps (my own apps, not working for a company), and what I found through trial and error was that no matter how many levers you pull and tweaks you make, a lot of it is simply user-behavior problems, not a tech or product design problem. There is no reliable way for a dating app to only serve users non-committal matches for example. The reason someone's matches aren't committal is because they don't want to commit.

The thought experiment I usually pose is to ask what you think a free, open source, and community supported dating app would change. The answer is "not much".

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godwinson__4-8 a minute ago | parent | next [-]

You ran not one, but two, dating apps that were your own apps, and were not part of a company?

Which apps were these? What were your user metrics?

Seems somewhat suspect to extrapolate from your personal experience to what the large dating apps are allegedly doing if you are not approaching their scale. You've mentioned your personal experience as some kind of authority a few times now in this discussion, why not name the two apps directly? Apologies if I missed it but I don't see where you gave any indication that this appeal to authority is credible.

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nostrademons 26 minutes ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Note that it's possible for dating problems to be user behavior problems in a way that is suits the profit motive of dating sites, without any conscious intent from anyone in the ecosystem.

Model a world where everybody's self-perception of their mating value is just a little bit higher than their actual value - in other words, one not too far off from reality. Some segment of this population will drop their standards in the face of repeated rejection, and then eventually find a partner because of this. Their "lowered standards" become an accurate self-perception of reality. But some segment of the population will be unwilling to do this. They have a problem - they cannot find a partner no matter how hard they look.

A problem creates a market. People who can't find a partner turn to dating apps to find a partner - some may pay, and a lot more will click on ads. There's a decent chance that dating app management isn't consciously optimizing for failure in dating and success in clicking on ads. However, all the apps that are good at finding partners for their customers find that their customers disappear, while the apps that are good at getting people to click on ads generate huge amounts of revenue and take over the market. Which is entirely composed of people who don't actually want to find a partner, anyway, because those people who care more about the outcome of finding a partner will usually drop their standards enough to find one.

The same dynamic applies in many other markets. Evolution and selection bias > intent and intelligent design. The market ends up composed of people who can't achieve the ostensible purpose of the market, largely through their own actions, because people who can drop out of the market. Happy people often go through life with very few transactions: they might change jobs a couple times early in their career before finding a boss and job they're happy with and staying there until retirement, or they date around a little and then find a partner they marry for life, or they might rent a couple apartments before buying a house, renovating once, and then staying in it for 40 years. The transactions are overwhelmingly composed of people who are dissatisfied, because that's why they're buying things.

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rationalist an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I am interested in creating my own dating app/website, but the problem I foresee is getting users - a Catch 22 problem.

I would like to create a service that opperated like OkCupid used to before they sold out. Visible compatibility percentages and being able to search profiles. No curation/algorithms or swiping.

I'm interested in helping people, not taking their money.

	▲	missedthecue an hour ago \| parent [-]
		Getting users to dating apps is probably easier than you think. Because men will go to where the women are so you only need to work on attracting female sign ups. It's actually that simple. The best way to launch is with a waitlist of warm users in 1 large city. I've seen a lot of people pining for the 2010-era OkCupid so you probably would have plenty of people willing to give it a try.

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jmilloy an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

My take is that it isn't about serving non-committal matches and withholding promising matches or whatever, it has more to do with whether you feel like there are better matches on the app if you just keep lookin or waiting. I can see how and app using the stable matching algorithm could really make you feel like you're getting the best match you're going to get, which I think could have a real impact on commitment.

	▲	missedthecue 44 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		"it has more to do with whether you feel like there are better matches on the app if you just keep lookin or waiting." Yes, the FOMOism in dating app user psychology is extremely real, but this isn't a product problem, it's a human psychology problem. In theory, you could make an app with, say, a lifetime number of swipes to prevent infinite FOMOism, but it would fail to be a viable product model because the #1 thing that I found users wanted -- more than everything else -- was optionality. And if you don't offer it, they'll go to someone who does. Hinge actually already uses Gale-Shapley and it doesn't seem to be producing meaningfully improved outcomes. https://blogs.cornell.edu/info2040/2021/09/30/hinge-and-its-...

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computably an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

> There is no reliable way for a dating app to only serve users non-committal matches for example

While that certainly sounds difficult, it sounds feasible for e.g. Facebook.

> The thought experiment I usually pose is to ask what you think a free, open source, and community supported dating app would change. The answer is "not much".

That sounds more like a framing problem. If the ultimate goal is promoting long-lasting new romantic relationships, and it's developed without any profit motive, I'd imagine a general social network that primarily organizes in-person social gatherings.

	▲	missedthecue an hour ago \| parent [-]
		Facebook has a dating app and it's completely free. There are no subscriptions or paywalled features. It works about as good as all the other ones.

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pdntspa 18 minutes ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I don't know... mid 2010's pre-match.com OkCupid and PlentyOfFish seem to get a lot of love. Not saying they didn't have problems but they did actually match a lot of happy couples and online dating didn't feel like nearly as much of a wasteland as it does today

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24 minutes ago | parent | prev [-]

[deleted]

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miki123211 an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I think what you should be doing as a dating app — much more so if a government one — is some kind of RL based on length of actual marriage.

At least, you should have some algorithm estimating marriage length / likelihood of divorce based on your (non-app) statistics, and then use that as one factor for your in-app calculations.

	▲	pinkmuffinere 10 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		Just to call out, you're implicitly assuming that strictly lower divorce rates is the correct end-goal. This may not be what you really want, eg you might find many abusive pairings where the weaker partner is too scared to leave. In the style of "The optimal amount of fraud is non-zero" [1], I'll claim that the optimal amount of divorce is non-zero. [1] https://www.bitsaboutmoney.com/archive/optimal-amount-of-fra...

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missedthecue 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

the stated vs revealed preference problem is very big when it comes to dating, and it's made worse that a lot of people have confusion and even shame about what their preferences actually are. And a lot of preferences are mimetic, which means demand for certain things is always outstripping supply. So it's really not even worth it to figure out someone's preferences if there is literally no one out there to pair them to.

The productive question would be to figure out how far outside someone's preferences they can go while still settling happily.

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qprofyeh 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

The match is whoever wants to start on the journey with the user, at that moment, and the algorithm is there to give the potential couple a better starting point. I guess at any rate that’s better than leaving it to hope and chance.

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drfloyd51 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I don’t think you are legally bound to marry. And if it stops working, divorce before resentment.

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2muchcoffeeman 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Gale-Shapely provides the best possible stable outcome for the proposing side.

You’re never going to match with people who aren’t actively looking.

You’re only ever going to match with the people who are looking at the same time as you.

Your criticisms are true of real life without apps. That’s why we have this thing called “divorce”.

Comments like these always seem to miss the point. They aren’t trying to solve marriage. They are trying to create social lubricants to get young people more interested in dating. This algorithm tries to ensure that at the very least your core values at the time match up.