Over a decade ago, online dating existed through sites such as match.com and OKCupid. But they did not tend to attract younger users, and for many there was a stigma attached to using them. But apps such as Grindr, which launched in 2009, and Tinder, which launched in September 2012, have radically changed the landscape of online dating.
Emily Witt, the author of Future Sex, a book that examines sex in the internet age, tells Nosheen Iqbal about the origin story of Tinder, meeting the founders, and why it was such an instant success. Emily discusses her own experience of using it and the apps that followed in its wake.
The apps have grown in response to a culture where people are single for a lot longer, and also where there’s a changing sexual morality that’s open to different kinds of relationships, Emily believes. Apps have completely altered the way we think about relationships, sex and love.
Photograph: Aamir Qureshi/AFP/Getty Images
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