It’s quite simple really, in my opinion:
There’s all kinds of bullshit involved in traditional dating. Asking someone out can be a definite social “faux pas”. I know this personally because I asked someone out and they were like “ew” and then told their friends “I can’t believe that guy would ask me out, do you believe that? Hahaha let’s all laugh at him”. Obviously they are shitty people, but it’s a definite issue. This was an extreme example, but there’s more like it (also personally experienced, but no need for more boring personal anecdotes), even just relatively simple ones like women being annoyed at being asked out so much.
Along come dating apps. This is an extremely convenient way to meet people, and mainly because of one thing: everyone there is fine with being asked out and being sexual. That’s literally the purpose why everyone is there. All the bullshit I talked about basically vanishes. They obviously come with their own problems, everyone knows about them, but it just can’t be denied that they’re extremely convenient, take a lot of pressure/fear out of the whole process.
limitedduck@awful.systems 1 day ago
Tinder was a paradigm shift. It’s success around 2015 started to flip public perception of online dating. Suddenly it was for all kinds of young people that were looking for the convenience of profile matching. A rising tide lifts all boats so legacy platforms shared in the popularity, also getting runoff from the non-target audience of the newer apps. The change in perception of online dating allowed people to appreciate its pragmatism. We’re in an age of busy people optimizing their lives. The structure and accessibility of online dating just fits with those kinds of people.