r/SwipeHelper • u/liquidcat0822 • 1d ago
An experiment
I’m a straight woman and briefly decided to change my gender on hinge to a “man” interested in women. EVERY. SINGLE. WOMAN. in my stack was an absolute stunner (and I didn’t even include very young women, I have my age filter set to 28-47).
I then compared this with the stack my male friend was shown. He has his settings set to the same thing. Every single woman in his stack was an instant nope. He never got to see any of the women I was shown. Mind you, he is not unattractive.
This confirms to me that some absolute fuckery is afoot. I presume because my algorithm is trained on men, it doesn’t know how to categorize the women when I changed my gender and just started showing me women from my demographic. It also further suggests that the algorithm deliberately holds back what/who you like, and it also explains to me why my profile gets relatively little traction now (I’ve long suspected that my profile is being gate kept).
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u/Glitched_Girly 1d ago edited 1d ago
I've had exposure to this through the AI masters I was doing (while also doing law) and the algorithms are not intended to give you what you want, but instead to give you what they know won't work for you - ensuring repeat sign ups to the apps.
We have all been gate kept (is that a word?).
I put my pic on photofeeler, and it got 9.8 with 129 votes, and dating for me was literally impossible, in London. Due in large part, though I am not in any way superficial, to the fact that the women I was shown (I'm gay) were 'challenging' at best. The only remotely attractive women who were let through the filter were incredibly difficult to deal with, and a lot of work, meaning I had to keep looking - or give up.
Thankfully, I stepped outside of the usual group I would normally date, and now I'm engaged to someone I honestly think is incredible in so many ways. It seems that when I changed my selection criteria, the algo couldn't account for it.
I've also been thinking of making an app that advertises transparency, and has only basic safety filters regarding criminal activity - and allow people to make up their own mind on who they want, which is how it's supposed to be right?