```Datestodon — Fedi dating posts

[adriano@lgbtqia.space]

@alice "so it's not so full of old guys looking for 18yo girls."

One could argue that if they exist (they do, but in this particular setting I mean), at least the particular hashtag makes them really easy to identify, the problem would be upriver from this.

[loonling@lgbtqia.space]

@alice I like it! Maybe standardize some categories on what people are looking for? I don't want to regiment it *too* much, because that's how you take all the humanity out of it! But do you think some general categories would help? Or is that going too far?

[alice@lgbtqia.space]

@loonling I'd want to design to encourage "good behavior", so I'm partial to broad categories and short descriptions that encourages people to read rather than use filters.

It would be nice if you could browse he main hashtag to find folx to reach out to, or even better, be in a conversation with folx and just check their profile for a #Datestodon pinned post or bio.

[alice@lgbtqia.space]

@loonling making it easily scrapable is a bad design, and I don't want it to turn into a numbers game. I'd want it to encourage folx who happen to be open to dating each other to interact with more intention, while not attracting people who are "cruising"—there are already enough sites for that.

[alice@lgbtqia.space]

@BriBear I've met so many people from Fedi over he last few years, and they've all been wonderful 🥰

[loonling@lgbtqia.space]

@alice These are all very good points, yes! Everything you've described here lends itself well to more organic discovery, something I appreciate when meeting people offline. I'm strongly in favor of systems that get people off of their devices and interacting with others IRL. Keeping it simple, organic, and messy (i.e. human) is the right approach here In retrospect, I agree that adding categories or the like would make it scrapable and I wouldn't want that, either. The apps are all about that kind of filtering and just. It feels so minmax-y if you get what I mean? Like using sliders to design a "perfect" partner.

That turned into a bit of a word salad ramble, but maybe there's something useful in it?

[lydiaschoch@mastodon.social]

@alice This is perfect!

[lydiaschoch@mastodon.social]

@BriBear @alice How soon can we start using the #Friendstodon hashtag because I am quite excited for it.

[dodothedev@front-end.social]

@alice
Dang it, mid. Now I feel old!

[alice@lgbtqia.space]

@DodoTheDev 🫂

[alice@lgbtqia.space]

@loonling I made some improvements and formatted it nicely for markdown (I hope ). Thanks for the feedback

[alreadydeadxd@infosec.exchange]

@alice seems cool

[quasit@beige.party]

@alice
Can we think of some different way to represent age? I'm not sure how many people will be willing to call themselves "Old". I presume that's what "O" stands for.

Perhaps Rare, Medium, and Well done?

[quasit@beige.party]

@alice

Do we want a unique hashtag prefix for locations, to differentiate dating locations from regular locations? So #FDBoston, for example, as opposed to #Boston?

[alice@lgbtqia.space]

@Quasit I went back and forth on a bunch of options, and the relative set "younger, adult, older" seemed the set with the fewest issues, but I'm still not very happy with it.

[quasit@beige.party]

@alice

I was working on possibilities, but maybe it would be better to keep things simple.

One thing I've been wondering is if it's possible to search based on more than one hashtag at a time. For example, could you search for partners of the appropriate criteria in the location of my choice?

[alice@lgbtqia.space]

@Quasit I'm open to arguments either way, but I figured that dating is just a part of local life, so it could be included in the general location hashtag. That also makes it more discoverable when just looking at local posts.

[alice@lgbtqia.space]

@Quasit well, the location tag doesn't have to be *your* location (for instance if you're moving somewhere or visit regularly). I think it's fine to include a couple locations if you split time too.