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WikiDating, Does This Make Sense?

Posted by Nick O'Neill on December 11th, 2007 12:41 AM

Profile Edit Feature screenshotJared Goralnick emailed me a few days ago about a pretty amazing feature that had been added to the Ok Cupid website. Apparently, OK Cupid has decided to let other edit your dating profile. Want to know the real truth about someone? Now you can since their friends will be able to edit it. Thankfully, you must approve any of the changes to your profile. Access is not as unlimited as a brand new wiki page on Wikipedia but it’s a unique concept.

It’s fairly similar to the Honesty Box Facebook application that enables users to anonymously post comments about you. This is definitely a controversial feature for a dating site though. Have a bad date? Go let them know by posting how bad they are for a date. I wouldn’t expect that to get approved though. Conversely, this is a great concept if you have friends that want to help you get a date. They can come and post testimonials about how great a person you are.

Rather than just posting testimonials though you can actually edit the content of their profile. This is a great tool for someone that makes a business off of optimizing dating profiles. Do you think wiki dating is a good idea?

Posted in Social Networking
  

This entry was posted on Tuesday, December 11th, 2007 at 12:41 am and is filed under Social Networking. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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    If changes have to be approved, I'm not sure what the controversy is, only positive improvements will be approved. People already on match ask their friends to write their profile for them. The web 1.0 online dating experience doesn't suck just because of the poorly written profiles but for oh-so-many other reasons, mostly because almost all dating sites uses the "spam as a way to woo" method. And who dreams of finding a significant other in a pile of spam?
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    The reason this story caught my eye was because so many people who are genuinely interesting can't write a profile to save their life...and either don't realize it or have the courage to ask for help from a friend. It's sort of like how an article on this blog might have mistakes, but short of contacting Nick I can't do much about it. Enabling a profile-oriented site with wiki features enables us all to look a little better and offers a much gentler way of getting people to improve their image.

    Wikipedia allows the community to improve the quality of articles. Offering this for dating enables people to present themselves better.

    The same strategy could be applied to resumes--we all need to put a better face forward, and this is as innovative a way as any.

    The only thing cooler I've seen was also put forth by the founders of okcupid: Crazy Blind Date

    I'm not single, but when I was I tried a few sites...and I must say it's a pretty exciting space for innovation and social media.

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