An Experimental New Dating Site Matches Singles Based on Their Browser Histories

Unlike most meeting applications, which charge monthly or annual costs for their paid levels, there is only a single payment of € 9 to register unlimited matches in accordance with users; A free option limits users to five games. Depoort says that he does not want to use users by making them pay according to recurring. When I suggest that this type of remuneration model is especially unknown today, it pushes back. “I am an artist, I like to do things differently.”

The first journals and reactions were mixed. “Super bizarre”, an application developer note on X.

“This is the craziest idea,” said another user Product hunt. “I love audacity.”

“Good to see the concentration of confidentiality from the start given the sensitivity of some of these data,” published a programmer Bluesky.

The biggest concern for users – just, is around the confidentiality and safety of users, and taking into account the amount of personal data that Deporter asks people to get rid of, these problems are also in mind. The site scans up to 5,000 recent browser searches or dates back to the search for research history, which could be several years, but never exceeds the maximum number of entries. (Navigation data for incognito fashion sessions cannot be downloaded). Deporter uses Firebase, Google’s open source tool to develop AI applications, to store and manage data.

“It is not exposed to the Internet.” DEPOIRDER says the treatment of AI, which, according to him, occurs locally. “I don’t want to expose a browser history to another business.”

There has already been complaints check by e-mail late and that the site does not allow users to delete their profile; Depoort says he has since solved these problems. The dating of the browser does not currently allow the download of photos, but Depo trainer works to change this, and says that it plans to implement more functionalities in the coming months, including an application for easier communication between connections and a recommendation functionality which suggests possible first date locations.

The idea originally came to Deporter in 2016 in V2, an art and experimental technology center in Rotterdam. He organized a workshop that explored unique ties between the participants who knew his work and who agreed to share a year in their research history.

The nature of Depor’s art as a digital provocative has sought to question the subtext of hidden connections, adopting a “critical and humorous” approach to some of the most urgent questions of its generation. Surveillance, AI, automatic learning and social media are recurring themes through its explorations. “Difficult subjects,” he said when we talk about Zoom. “But there is no big message. I want to leave it open. If anything, I want to show what is possible with technology in a fun way.”

In 2018, in a series entitled “Jaywalking“, He transformed live surveillance feeds video art, forcing viewers to deal with the use of public data as a means of invasion of privacy. He followed this with Die with meA cat application that could only be accessible when your phone had less than 5% of the battery life; Although Deporter quickly rejects the final interpretations of his art, he read as a comment on the value of time and the way we choose to use it when you know that it is short. For those who can look beyond the shock of the initial vanity of Brower Dating, the question is also urgent: what happens if the curiosities that we are so strong to hide are in fact the things that can bring us together?

Depoort, 34, does not pretend to be a guru of meetings. “I’m not a specialist,” he said. He surfed Tinder at the start of the application but has been with his partner for 10 years. He promises that despite his artist work, the site is not a gadget and he wants to continue to evolve. People have already suggested that it could work better to match potential friends rather than romantic partners. Depoor provides that there will be obstacles but will not obtain them sugar; He is aware of the difficulty of users on board to hesitate to share their anxieties and their personal desires.

“Either people are fans of the idea, or they are not,” he says. “There is no convince.”