The basic model for online dating has been with us since the first matrimonial advert ran in the pages of The Times in 1695. Oh, the technology has gone through some transformations: "Lonely Hearts" columns, Betamax cassettes, toll voice mail, the World Wide Web, mobile devices. Gone, perhaps, are the days of typing "ISO" to save on per-word pricing. Yet it's still about monetized messaging: either pay to set up a profile and box or pay to send messages. Message in box, message in box, message in box.
Receiving a message on an Internet dating site is comparable to getting a cold call on your private home phone line, from someone you've never before lain eyes on, without their having first done you the courtesy of chatting you up for your digits… preferably in a public place. Meanwhile the sender is operating blind, making an approach without the the benefit of social cues and signals present under less dyadic circumstances. Both parties are thrust into a faux intimacy, unceremoniously moving from zero contact to private communication. Is it any wonder that so many such interactions are underwhelming, creepifying or otherwise nonstarters?
Swedish for "play", the term lek comes to us from biology. Gatherings of animals for courtship display, leks afford social mediation of social behavior. Research demonstrates that humans lek, while my own contention is that—unlike what has been found in other lekking species—lekking in humans knows neither boundaries of bodily sex nor sexual orientation: humans are designed to court in social settings, and any technology that would seek to facilitate human courtship will draw upon this as a strength. Traditional online dating sites do not. The Lekplay site will.
Lurk, stalk, mingle, banter, debate, flirt, opine, hang out and do stuff. The Lekplay focus will be on bringing people together in groups, online and off.
How? Well, it will require a new social technology ⇒.