The most popular dating app arrived in Brazil in 2013. Since then, hundreds of couples have been formed and, on this Valentine’s Day, many of them will celebrate the date, thanks to these technological tools.
This is the case of speech therapist Michele Ferreira, 45, who used technology to filter the profile of her future partner. “I got into it [no aplicativo] with the intention of being able to select, a little more, people that I had affinity with in terms of how I see the world, in which way I respect people, that this coincides a little more and I have the opportunity to talk much earlier to meet in person.”
Users of these applications can select profiles both by the photos and by the information provided by the platform, helping the algorithm to curate the ideal partner or partner, as explained by researcher at Instituto Tecnologia e Sociedade Nina Desgranges. “The platform’s usage history will cause certain profiles to be shown to it or not. The platform’s features do much more than guide and facilitate social interactions. But it will algorithmically promote some profiles over others.”
As for the doctor in psychology Marcelo Santos, these dating apps gave a technological answer to a transformation that society was already going through. “I can, suddenly, have the possibility of virtually meeting ten people, when I knew only one. The probability among these series of me getting closer to one is greater than before, when I had to meet one by one . So I would say it is a technological response to a movement within the transformation of these relationships.”
For Ramon*, user of these applications, the tool has a positive side, which is the ease of relating and meeting people outside the most immediate social circle. On the other hand, according to him, it makes meetings less spontaneous: “In a way it seems that in the virtual environment it is a more objective thing. I think it lost a certain magic of meetings. In the past, things were more spontaneous. It was something that happened without much foresight, it was less objective.”
Anyway, it was thanks to the dating app that Ramon* found his current girlfriend. Taking proper safety precautions to avoid blows, the important thing is to date.
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*Fictitious name at the request of the interviewee
