Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by jdminhbg 1886 days ago
The cost of 12 months of a dating site is trivial compared to the benefits of finding the right person. If someone offered you a soulmate if you gave them a couple hundred dollars, you'd take it in a second, right? Paying ahead actually aligns your incentives better, because the site is no longer incentivized to drag you along single month after month to keep you paying.
2 comments

This is bordering on logic like the following: - Water is really important, why don't you buy this $100 bottle of water. - The site has an incentive to improve your dating outcomes. No, it's primary objective is to maximise revenue, everything else is a side effect. - Paying more for something means someone will commit/ follow through, somehow raise incentives. This is just a guess, not supported or disproven by reality.

I like to think defensively especially when it involves companies. What are they doing, and what do they stand to achieve?

These apps have not shown any value to their users, paywall their content and have an aggressive-long-term subscription model because they have optimised themselves straight into the garbage can, by thinking short term.

Effectively, you're not paying for "12 months" despite the label, you're paying for a significant chance at finding a soulmate? If that's the case, why not label it as such?
Because after your 12 months you can't use the profile any more. Better to label what you pay for accurately.