Tinder will soon make its gender options more trans-inclusive
Tinder is attempting to get more in step with the transgender community.
Speaking at the Code Conference on Thursday, Tinder CEO Sean Rad revealed that the company is about to roll out new features in the popular dating app that will account for gender besides male and female, while he couldn't yet get into specifics.
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For users who are transgender, Tinder has been tricky — if not overtly dangerous and risky — to navigate in its current form. Trans users have been banned from the app after being reported by non-trans users who match with them. Others trans users report experiencing harassment on the app, or even fearing meeting up with users who might be unaware of or hostile to their gender status.
For banned users, Tinder has historically reviewed and reinstated accounts that did not violate community guidelines. But the app hasn't catered to its transgender community, said Rad. It currently only allows members to identify as either male or female, operating under the assumption that all users are cisgender, or identify with their sex at birth.
"It makes it hard to find what you're looking for," said Rad.
Tinder, however, started working with GLAAD, according to Rad, on how to modify the Tinder experience. The result is that, within a month or so, Tinder users will see an update that, Rad said, "will solve this for the transgender community."
But whether new proposal to have trans-inclusive gender options will positively impact the trans community remains to be seen.
Identifying yourself as transgender on a platform known to some extent for gender-based harassment, after all, still comes with risk. And some transgender users may still want to identify themselves as male or female without specifying they are transgender.
While Rad couldn't get into specifics of what the feature will look like, he did say that the set of new features will let people more accurately specify what they are looking for and, perhaps more importantly, "let people be who they are."
Mashable's Katie Dupere contributed to this report.
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Topics Apps & Software LGBTQ Tinder
Lance Ulanoff was Chief Correspondent and Editor-at-Large of Mashable. Lance acted as a senior member of the editing team, with a focus on defining internal and curated opinion content. He also helped develop staff-wide alternative story-telling skills and implementation of social media tools during live events. Prior to joining Mashable in September 2011 Lance Ulanoff served as Editor in Chief of PCMag.com and Senior Vice President of Content for the Ziff Davis, Inc. While there, he guided the brand to a 100% digital existence and oversaw content strategy for all of Ziff Davis’ Web sites. His long-running column on PCMag.com earned him a Bronze award from the ASBPE. Winmag.com, HomePC.com and PCMag.com were all been honored under Lance’s guidance.He makes frequent appearances on national, international, and local news programs including Fox News, the Today Show, Good Morning America, Kelly and Michael, CNBC, CNN and the BBC.He has also offered commentary on National Public Radio and been interviewed by newspapers and radio stations around the country. Lance has been an invited guest speaker at numerous technology conferences including SXSW, Think Mobile, CEA Line Shows, Digital Life, RoboBusiness, RoboNexus, Business Foresight and Digital Media Wire’s Games and Mobile Forum.
