Dating the FOSS Way

3 years ago by 𝙰𝚜𝚝𝚛𝚊𝚕 𝙼𝚘𝚒𝚛𝚊 to c/fossdroid

Tinder is a proprietary privacy nightmare that requires one's Facebook data for functionality. It even has its very own analytics library just to enhance the Orwellian tracking.

You don't want any of that.

If you're searching for a partner or a lover, Alovoa is the better corner of the internet to find one. It's private, secure, and vitally open-source.

You can find the service's source code here.

Alovoa has an Android and iOS app. Here is the native Android app. Its source code can be found here.

The native Android app was released fairly recently in late October last year, and appeared on F-Droid some days ago. If you encounter any bugs, report them in the Issues section of its GitHub repository.

I'm not the developer.

NettoHikari 14 points 3 years ago

Interesting. I had to chuckle though at the fact that the same people appear over and over again on their website with the title “Meet new, exciting people!”…

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ostrich 9 points 3 years ago

I'm sure they'll get more models (for the frontpage) soon. In the meantime, they have a little more than twenty thousand registered users, and it's a very young platform.

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NettoHikari 5 points 3 years ago

Sounds good to me! It was just a funny sight, that's all.

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ostrich 5 points 3 years ago

Yeah, it is.

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SJ_Zero 7 points 3 years ago

Internet dating is like the light from poltergeist. Don't look at the light, don't go into the light.

Even if it's open source, it's still bad for your soul.

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ostrich 10 points 3 years ago

I read an article a while back about how one DM on Twitter led to a happy marriage. The correspondents had no prior relationship. Just a curious DM. I'm not endorsing the use of Twitter here, especially for dating.

Dating isn't always about marriage, though, and dating platforms are also about... casual sex. Yup. One-night stands. A lot of magic can happen via online dating once the connection is there. I don't see it as inherently bad or evil.

A lot of very personal information is exchanged on these type of sites, so it's very, very important it's a private AND secure platform.

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SJ_Zero 2 points 3 years ago

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petrescatraian 5 points 3 years ago

@ostrich I did create an account, everyone was, like, thousands of km away. Sadly, it won't cut for me, even though I don't like Tinder's data collection. Guess that for some services it's either them or nothing.

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NettoHikari 5 points 3 years ago

If you're going to create an alternative, you'll have to start somewhere, I guess. Especially FOSS projects without real funds for ads in ad networks, etc. Things like that only grow slowly, if at all.

That's why I like the federation approach, like with this Lemmy instance. It's small and maybe it's not gonna take off, but users will still recieve fresh content from other instances, so yeah...

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petrescatraian 4 points 3 years ago

@NettoHikari Indeed, yea. But if you really are constrained geographically then it's less useful for the purpose, haha.

To compare it with the Fediverse - I knew nobody in my country on the Fediverse when I created my account here on Friendica. I just wanted to have a place where I would finally move away from Facebook - with the same goal of socializing with people wherever they might be. And too little people I personally know went here as well. Yet, I stayed because I wasn't constrained geographically to find people (I'm not sure you're anywhere close to Romania right now, haha).

But the purpose of a dating app is not just talking with others, if you know what I mean 😉 . So yea, I do hope it will take off, I'm glad it exists, but it is surely a bigger challenge 😁

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NettoHikari 3 points 3 years ago

Yes, of course. I didn't want to make the direct comparison to the fediverse. But the funding to have something like that take off is definitively necessary.

I'm personally situated in Germany, so I'm not that far away from Romania. I also have my own personal Pleroma instance for similar reasons: I wanted to participate in some "sane" social media and it's actually pretty good. First, I had a private Mastodon instance and then moved to Pleroma, because Mastodon had too many moving parts.

Generally speaking, to me, the Fediverse means "less activity, but higher quality conversations".

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petrescatraian 4 points 3 years ago

"less activity, but higher quality conversations"

Yea, I love this part as well. Guess that was one of the reasons I was so fond of G+ back in the day 😁

Germany

Oh, you're not far. Hi there! 😊

But the funding to have something like that take off is definitively necessary

I get your point now. Yea, I guess I'll try my best myself as well until I find someone that will stop me from doing this anylonger, haha 😁

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matty 4 points 3 years ago

@ostrich@social.fossware.space The only problem is that there's barely much people around my area which for me feels sort of pointless, even though I wish I can be away of such apps that obsessed with tracking my data

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ostrich 4 points 3 years ago

A little more awareness, and there'll be people around you on Alovoa. Give it some time. Tinder is just so horrible privacy-wise.

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matty 2 points 3 years ago

How would you say I can tell people about it as generally, the sorts of people I know in real life wouldn't get the fuss around privacy or being part of a data-farming services/website?

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ostrich 1 point 3 years ago

That's the more reason to stick with Alovoa. The network effect will make it better. Tinder started out this way, too.

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CorrodedCranium 4 points 3 years ago

I wonder what the user count is in different regions

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barrett9h 4 points 3 years ago

The fact that anyone using this app is (probably) conscious about privacy and/or Free software makes for an interesting filter.

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sabreW4K3 4 points 3 years ago

Anyone installed this in London? Is there anyone there?

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ostrich 4 points 3 years ago

Most likely. London is a huge metropolis.

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sabreW4K3 3 points 3 years ago

It has one woman in London 🥺

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ostrich 2 points 3 years ago

You could be the one to date her. 😊

Give it time, dear. Tinder and OKCupid didn't start out with millions of people. If we all give up on Alovoa because "nobody uses it", we'll never have a private alternative to the horrors out there.

Like Mastodon is to Twitter, or Lemmy to Reddit, this is our chance to create something big for years to come, together.

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NettoHikari 3 points 3 years ago

Interesting. I had to chuckle though at the fact that the same people appear over and over again on their website with the title "Meet new, exciting people!"...

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Mechanize 3 points 3 years ago

I did find the idea of a FOSS dating app intriguing, so I wanted to give it a spin, but it seems the site is offline since yesterday?

I was unable to find a status, or similar, page too, and the twitter account doesn't seem very active.

Is this the first "Lemmy hug of death" or just a weird coincidence? Hahaha

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ostrich 2 points 3 years ago

That Twitter link... is that a Nitter instance?

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Mechanize 1 point 3 years ago

Indeed, it is a Nitter instance. I find Nitter a lot better than Twitter's interface.

I used to use this list to find functional instances, but it seems they recently archived the repository.

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ostrich 2 points 3 years ago

UntrackMe has a list of Nitter instances. The app hasn't been updated in a while, though.

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NettoHikari 3 points 3 years ago

We also have our own Nitter instance here: https://t.donttrackme.fossware.space

Along with a Teddit instance: https://r.donttrackme.fossware.space

And last, but not least, we also provide Piped: https://y.donttrackme.fossware.space

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fervi 3 points 3 years ago

I have Alovoa account, but sadly noone response.

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ostrich 3 points 3 years ago

If it's a new account, give it some time. Someone will find you soon. ❤️

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yaomtc 1 point 3 years ago

requires one’s Facebook data for functionality

No, I've used it recently, doesn't require Facebook. At least in the US. It has the option to log in that way, sure, so do many services.

But otherwise you're right that it's a privacy nightmare.

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