Are Dating Apps Social Media? Explained Here
Here is a fun brain teaser – are dating apps social media? The intuitive response most of us have is “Obviously not!” but why?
Dating apps, dating sites, even websites for finding mail order international brides – all these are online places for sharing your interests, meeting new people with similar interests to you, and then strengthening your connection with them over time.
Yes, there are some key differences, but there are also differences between different social media sites – TikTok and Facebook aren’t exactly the same, are they? Even YouTube is considered a social media, so why not count Tinder, Bumble, SakuraDate, or any other website you can find online?
Along with international dating experts from BridesUniverse let’s discuss the various arguments For and Against below!
Contents
What Even Is Social Media?
The simple and straightforward definition of “social media” according to Oxford Languages is “Websites and applications that enable users to create and share content or to participate in social networking.”
This isn’t a new and revised definition either, it’s been that way for quite some time. So, by this very definition, any application that allows you to create content, share it with others, and “participate in social networking” is a social media app.
Now, this can sound like an incredibly broad definition. After all, according to this, even something as simple as online forums can be considered social media sites. But, guess, what – forums are indeed considered a niche and specialized type of social media sites.
So, if that one forum about a 2005 video game you keep following and writing in can be seen as a “social media platform,” why not say the same about Tinder or some of the best international brides sites? Let’s take a look at the arguments Against first.
Definitions may spell out one thing or another, but they are never perfect. Whatever an online dictionary has to say, everyone knows that the inherent purpose of a social media site is different from that of a dating app.
A social media site has the goal of not only helping you connect with people, but to keep you connected and interacting with those people for years and decades to come.
A quintessential social media site such as Facebook can help you meet entirely new people with whom you share certain interests, and it can even help you find your future wife or husband. However, the main goal of Facebook is to help you reconnect with people you know personally and to then keep you connected to them via the sharing of posts, photos, events, news, and more.
Even the aforementioned “niche and specialized” social media sites such as forums have the purpose of being a place for sharing interests and interacting with people over and over again for the long term.
A dating app, on the other hand, has the express purpose of helping you find people to date. Whether you’re looking for one-night stands or long-term relationships, a dating app isn’t supposed to be a place where you keep exchanging cat memes with Sarah for the next 30 years.
You either have a one-night stand with Sarah and move on or you form a long-term relationship with her. In both cases, you’re certainly not going to “stay connected” with Sarah on Tinder for the next several decades – if you do form a long-term relationship with her, you’ll likely start using “an actual social media site” such as Facebook for the aforementioned exchange of cat memes.
The same goes for even more specific dating sites such as those for mail order international brides – the only goal of such sites is to meet your future wife or husband online, marry them, and that’s it. You’re not expected to keep using the site after that.
So, even if dating apps technically fall under the definition of social media, surely they can’t seriously be counted as such, right?
Putting all the gatekeeping above aside, social media sites aren’t meant to all be the same. Yes, Facebook is primarily meant for keeping up with old friends you don’t often meet in person anymore, but other social media sites are meant for other things.
TikTok is for giggling at silly short videos and sharing them with your friends when you’re trying not to do anything productive. YouTube is for watching hours upon hours of long-form videos and vlogs. It has almost nothing to do with “making friends” or “keeping in touch with friends,” yet it’s still considered social media.
Even something like Spotify is considered a social media site as it allows you to interact with other people, keep in touch with them, and share content.
If something like YouTube or Spotify is social media, surely apps and websites (i.e. media) that are specifically designed to help you socialize with people should be considered “social media.”
Yes, the interactions you are expected to have on Bumble, on Boo, or on international brides websites aren’t expected to be the same as the interactions you have on Facebook. Yet, they are still social interactions you’re having on an online media platform.
In Conclusion – Are Dating Apps Social Media?
Many people to this day have an intuitive negative reaction to dating apps or international brides websites, even though the practice of socializing with people from the other end of the world with the express purpose of dating or marriage far predates the internet.
For example, the history of corresponding with “mail order brides” (or “epistolary courtship” or “correspondence courtship,” as it was initially known) via newspaper ads, magazine ads, and mail is centuries old and can be traced back to the taming of the American frontier.
So, you can quite literally say that “long-distance dating methods” such as epistolary courtship have been a form of “social media” long before modern-day online social media sites even existed.
This doesn’t mean that you should like dating apps or suddenly start using them alongside Facebook, of course. Like online forums and YouTube, dating apps or the international brides sites found on BridesUniverse.com can best be defined as “niche and specialized types of social media.” Yet, let’s not mince words and try to twist definitions – dating apps are social media.
