#ANYWAY. i think that's an accessibility feature that's sorely lacking and lacking in terms of depth and accuracy

[uncanny-tranny]

My disability-adjacent hot take is that subtitles alone aren't really enough. I have trouble differentiating where sound comes from, for instance, so it's wildly helpful to have clarification on where sound is supposed to be coming from (right versus left, ect).

On a related note, if your subtitles are not clear, accurate, or translated in the case of foreign language, your subtitles aren't good. I don't want to read a paraphrased, censored version of what people are saying. I want to know exactly what they're saying because omitting even one word can dramatically change the tone, implication, and the entire meaning of what is said.

[dragonairlairgiveaways]

Thoughts on Let’s Go

So as someone who has beat the main game of Let’s Go Eevee (like I’ve said before I’ve played through Kanto so many times now. I can do it pretty much blindfolded.) I have thoughts both good and bad on it. There will be SPOILERS here so I advise you to scroll past if you’re new to Kanto especially but also if you’ve played through the region before but not here yet because there are some new things/changed details. ANYWAY: 

PROS

I really love how expressive both your Partner Pokemon and following Pokemon are. Interacting with them is such a delight and makes me even more attached to my Pokemon.

Kanto is beautiful. Whilst I wish they’d kept more of the Savannah/grassland feel it had in past generations (because it made Kanto unique vs temperate Johto it shares its landmass with), the region feels so full, vibrant and alive.

I really love the gym re-designs, even if some are only subtle. I also love seeing the Gym Leaders and E4 with defined personalities. I was ESPECIALLY happy to be able to see Sabrina’s telekinesis in action thanks to the graphics we have now. 

Pokemon distribution across Kanto is so much better than in past games and makes forming a balanced, structured team so much less of a nightmare. Same goes for the altered movesets. 

Pokemon Tower. Oh God, the cutscene was so short, sweet and subtle but made me cry. It gave us the emotional attachment the older Kanto games missed out on. 

I really appreciated the changes to important locations game-lore wise that made them more fitting. Pokemon Mansion for example made me super uncomfortable thanks to the additions of the cloning/testing equipment in the basement and the confirmation from Jessie & James that sweet old Mr Fuji is the same Dr Fuji that created Mewtwo. 

It gets its own section because Cerulean Cave is BREATHTAKING design-wise and a lifesaver with the valuable respawning items hidden in the crystal dust on the floor. 

I love the rival. He is an absolute sweetheart and I just want to hold and protect him. 

Player! Character! Is! Expressive! No more thousand-yard stare in cutscenes. 

Can Ultra Balls be this cheap in the regular games please? 

Leaf/Green finally, canonically exists other than when chosen as the player in FRLG and my heart is filled with joy by this y’all don’t even know. 

NPC Pokemon with nicknames show up with that nickname when spoken to, not with their species name and idk it’s such a small thing but makes me happy. 

I really love how self-aware this game is in terms of how Pokemon plots go by talking about the E4 and people asking/speculating that they’ll come deal with the threat. Y’know given how in past games they’ve largely been suspiciously absent and left everything to a child.

The cutscenes in general are pleasant to look at/watch and don’t run in forever and are less frequent. They hit a good balance here I think. 

Speaking of which, the ones that play before taking on the Legendary Birds/Mewtwo are INTENSE.

Pokemon Box in your bag is super convenient, I just wish it wasn’t just one big, huge box so I could organise better. 

Getting to dress up my Partner Pokemon is precious. 

Riding on Pokemon is great and there are some rideable choices that were a nice surprise. 

The replacements for HMs are so silly and I love them. 

I’m a shiny hunter so I think the new shiny hunting method is super fun and relatively easy depending on the Pokemon you’re hunting. Streaks are easy enough to build and avoid breaking and seeing the Pokemon with its shiny colouration in the overworld adds the little bit more of excitement to me. 

Cinnabar finally has an obvious volcano on the map even if you can’t actually access it in game. (it’s not like you haven’t let us roam around active volcanoes before, Game Freak.)

I really like the torches in Victory Road? Lmao it’s such a minor thing but it makes it feel more... idk.. magnificent, I guess? Like it’s a manmade cavern. The final test. It feels more like it now with those and the changes to the puzzles. 

Thank you for the random NPCs that will heal your Pokemon when you’re far from a city/town. 

The spy NPC was great. I love her. 

Rare spawns are a neat little mechanic. Area unknown in the Pokedex? LOL GUESS AGAIN. 

Cons: 

The big one: Only Kanto Pokemon. It’s a huge sticking point for me because it’s quite limiting and just... a tad annoying. I get this game was an experiment and with its success will likely come more Let’s Go side games but... it was still disappointing. Even if they couldn’t add all Pokemon from later gens, they could’ve at least added the prevolutions/evolutions of Kanto Pokemon that came later to give the region an expanded Pokedex and just added more diversity to the game. Lance having a Seadra really brought that point home for me when it literally has a DRAGON TYPE evolution he could’ve used. 

Whilst the capture mechanic is fine I miss wild battles. If you need to grind especially it’s annoying because you have to burn through Pokeballs to get EXP. It would be nice to just be able to faint wild Pokemon. 

The rideable flying Pokemon. I’d hoped for something more like the Soaring mechanic from ORAS but nope. You also have to go into the party menu to return the Pokemon to its ball to be able to move between gate/map areas. It would have been so much better if you could just press one of the buttons to do that so you didn’t have to go about constantly opening/closing menus.

Super sad Trainer Customisation is so limited. I’m pleased they kept the option for skintone choice but I wish we could at least change the eye/hair colour of the player character. What outfits we get to mix/match are cute I just wish there was more. 

The lack of Abilities pains me. They added depth to the game both in and out of battle and I sorely missed them. (Hello yes, why is your Pokemon not getting paralysed after coming into contact with my Raichu? Oh right, Static isn’t a thing here.) 

Getting Meltan itself isn’t hard even if you just briefly download Pokemon Go to get it. Getting Melmetal however? Good luck if you just play casually or not at all really with how the crate feature works. 

I like that the Go Park exists but I’m sad it replaced the Safari Zone and that it doesn’t work in a similar fashion to Pal Park. Wasting Pokeballs on Pokemon I have already wasted them on to catch one already is kind of annoying. 

You can’t ride the Legendary Birds and that is just straight up NONSENSE to me. 

I wish we could play with/feed our other Pokemon, not just our partner. Pokemon Amie/Refresh is one of my favourite mechanics in the main games so I’m sad it’s limited to only our starter here. 

Not specific to Let’s Go but given a huge part of Pokemon has always been playing with friends, having to pay for an online subscription to access trading/battling really rubs me the wrong way and I still think it’s a bad move on Nintendo’s part as a whole. When Gen VIII comes along and if Pokemon Bank gets ported to the Switch (or a similar thing) am I going to have to pay for both? That kind of sucks for kids who play if their parents aren’t willing to pay for it or for people who can’t afford it in general. 

Big Mad that outside of completing all the research in Go (Again, not something everyone can do, I have severe anxiety/agoraphobia and therefore cannot leave my house much.) the only way to get Mew is to pay the ridiculous price for the Pokeball Plus. An event Pokemon that has always been given out for free shouldn’t be behind a massive paywall. 

Grinding to be able to take on all the Master Trainers is hellish to be honest. And not a good feature in lieu of an actual post-game. 

RIP Sevii Islands, it would've been nice to at least visit the first three (since they only have Kanto Pokemon living on them in FRLG). But no. 

So overall... I liked it more than I thought I would. There are things in the game I really, really loved and hope to see more of (PLEASE let following Pokemon return in the main series, I’m begging you Game Freak). But I still have my hang-ups and things that I think removing/keeping out took away from the Pokemon experience as a whole. 

As side games I’d like to see more of them with hopefully some improvements. But I definitely have a preference for main game, regular mechanics as a whole. The games definitely won’t be for everyone and YES, they are incredibly easy even for a Pokemon game - which was the point - so for some people that might be a problem/make them boring given the lack of challenge but I’d still recommend giving them a go if you’re a die-hard fan of the franchise. You’ll be pleasantly surprised.

[teamcalamity]

Opus Explorations - First Impressions of Planet 8

Welcome to Opus Explorations, a regular feature hoping to provide some inspiration to those of you stuck on the world map, not sure where to turn.

In each installment we will present deck ideas along with a brief summary, a suggested list and the verdict based on actual results when run at Team Calamity OP nights (usually a 4 round Swiss). If the summary sparks a tingle in your loins, then you can access in depth profiles of each deck in separate linked articles.  

With Opus VIII just about to launch, rather than deck lists this time we decided to just go with a few cards we are looking forward to trying (note we haven't seen the full list yet) . If you haven't already then read our previous post which might give you a bit more insight/context into some of the choices we make below...

Rich

Cloud

I might be completely wrong about this card, but I feel that Cloud has the potential to dethrone some of the more frequently played 5 drop fire forwards. Whilst the damage dealt in the early game feels a bit underwhelming, his damage will grow the longer the game goes on. I think the closest comparison to Cloud is Baugavern - except Cloud fits better into dual element decks, replaces the special with the ex burst effect and doesn't damage for a fixed value. And Baugavern by all accounts is a decent card for mono fire, right? The second ability is probably not going to be utilised unless it has the potential to win you the game, but it's mostly going to be risky to just use willy-nilly.

Ultimately, I think Cloud and the presence of efficient finisher damage like Iroha or Rain, could lead the the emergence of an up-tempo mono fire deck that's heavily centred on enter the field effects. Feel free to taunt me 4 weeks after release about how wrong I was, which is often the way when I open my mouth about newly spoiled fire legends...

Lasswell

Lasswell is the card I'm most excited to play this set. It is packed with power that can be problematic for your opponent on a short, medium and long term basis. The most important of Lasswell's effects is his enter the field, as I feel that in today's environment, any card without an enter the field ability is instantly less playable. It's not the most efficient way of generating an on-entry dull and freeze (I'm looking at you, Genesis...), but the efficiency comes from keeping him alive and using the on-swing effect every turn - which for 1 fire cp is nuts.

The special is a bonus more than anything - I imagine that most opponents will immediately respond to Lasswell more than any other forwards due to the pressure he brings, and keeping him alive long enough to use Azure Sky might be problematic.

The one drawback to Lasswell is that he realistically only fits into Fire/Ice decks, and even then I feel like that he requires the deck to be centred around him. Sure - he can be run as a 3 of, and devout'd back if necessary. But I think how the deck runs when Lasswell ISN'T on the field could be an issue. Still, if he performs as well as I think he can, he could be the revival piece to the competitive fire ice decks of yore.

Yuffie

Yuffie represents the ultimate value card, even if it does require a specific setup. Luckily, it will be quite easy to fulfil the 3 Category VII characters requirement via backups - had this card said forwards instead of characters I would feel very different about it.

Despite the necessity of being tied to other Category 7 cards, I think there is a lot you can do with a sneaky Yuffie ninja attack. The 1k AoE on-swing provides a cheap proc for a plethora of other decks (namely Barbarricia and Diabolos in wind, possibly Orlandeau or Opus 5 Ramuh if you feel like getting spicy with Wind Lightning featuring the Turks).

I don't think that Yuffie will be much of a game changer, and she is far from a high impact card. But I think the card represents good value if you meet the criteria and run Godo, and it nailed the flavour of what Yuffie should do in this card game - which does not include being Vincent's or Red XIII's side bitch.

Mitch

Earth – Ardyn. 1 million CP.My pick for earth card is Ardyn. Now I know what some of you are screaming at the screen “but Mitch, the world’s best player, surely you must see that this dies to Famfrit” (*Replace with your favourite way to bone this card) and let’s be honest, if this card couldn’t be removed in any way, this game would just go to deck out and be really boring, god forbid this counter play. I’m under no illusion this card is great verses all match ups and as a result isn’t going to be a 3 of. Just don’t play it vs water…But now I will get to why I like the card; it actually has nothing to do with playing the card. I like it because it forces your opponents to build their deck in a way that they have an out to it, be it Deathgaze, Vayne, Deathgaze, Famfrit or even Deathgaze. This legend will auto win some match ups if they have no easy way to remove. I understand that this card also has “counter play” in that you can break your own characters to stop this beasty from blocking. Okay. Break your stuff. Let’s take earth wind for example, what would they want to break? Cactuar? Nope A back up? Nope, that deck is so refined that it will really struggle to deal with it. Earth Wind can adapt,  but while this is true it that just feeds into my first point.

Lightning – Alphinaud

I know I should of picked the Kpop girls, but honestly they don’t excite me as cards, until they get the support to search or something to make this consistent. I may be wrong but the hype isn’t there for me at the moment.

I also see a lot of promise for mono lightning this set, you have that legend that deals 1k more than a fire legend who shall be shunned (BAD PALOM) and an action that makes this card a kill on sight.

My Card however is Alphinaud, searchable, haste with the right set up, but my interest is more in the deck it opens up. I believe that WOFF monsters, paired with this, lava golem and Urianger will actually become a thing. Urianger can bring back WOFF monsters with this card; it is a cheap aggro deck with a huge aggressive side. Originally I was thinking WOFF monsters would be 9k beasts, but with Alphinaud they won’t even be blocked!

Water – Shitty finger Zidane

I think fire might actually get to see some play this set, finally becoming a game of six colours. Fire got some great cards but it also got cards in other colours that compliment it. Everyone has thought of the Sage on Zidane first turn, and don’t get me wrong, it’s incredible. But I do think Zidane is viable in any water deck.

Zidane, to me, has given something to water which was sorely lacking or at least not strong enough to play and that is an aggressive early game. Everyone knows when you play water they need to set up, but this gives them a different playstyle. Then we come to the ability that it can’t be blocked if you have 6 or more in hand. Keeping 6 in hand before you swing should be viable which forces early removal for your opponent. This allows you to keep your hand up while setting up. Oh by the way, did anyone mention this was good with Fire?

Tom

It's easy to cream over new legends so i'll go for some that are a little less obvious, but I think will be really fun. 

Ice - Palom

2cp Ice forward with discard.....turbo is back!  Well no it's not, thank fuck, but for 2cp you get a multi choice card with all very viable options that you can flex depending on your situation and place a forward on top.  Ground breaking hero, no but I'd love to see ice evolve out from the standard Setzer, Locke VI discard package and I think there's options now to really play around with some different combos/deck setups. 

Fire - Marche

This was spoiled fairly early on and I think has gone under the radar.  Fire was crying out for some consistent value plays and this offers that with an EX to boot (it's searchable too).  I generally don't like cards that force you into mono situations but I like fire so i'll let this pass.  I'd never thought I say it but with Opus 8 buffing fire somewhat, will you be able to find space for this into a mono fire deck?! One to test out for sure.

Earth - Gladiolus  

FF15 slowly crawls it's way into FFTCG, this will probably be one more for fan service.  Limited to Earth CP yes, however, you are going to be running Noctis so that shouldn't be an issue meaning you get a 2cp 9k forward with a dreamy 6 pack.  I also love a special and this one is decent if not a little costly.  You will mainly be running for the cheap body (no pun intended).  Meta defining no, but if you are a fan this will be fun. Depending on the rest of the crew and if we get another Noctis could get interesting.

Peter

Sherlotta 8-053H

Ok so for a 2cp investment, at some point in the game you can cash in Sherlotta. Put her to the break zone to generate 1cp of any element.

You could do this immediately after playing her. For just 2cp! She's certainly my hero of this set.

Let's take a look at the possibilities of this mysterious woman.

Sherlotta will be a card I'll be looking to get 3 foils of, 100%.

Wind is my favourite element and the fact that this card now exists puts wind in a very fun position. You can add any card u want into the deck. You can play Phoenix L, Exodus, Dadaluma and even Opus 2 Yuna. Oh wait... noone plays that anyway :)

From a competitive aspect. Wind is a very popular element choice currently in the meta. Now every wind deck has access to the best bkup in the game. Shantotto. Scary thought huh?

So maybe it will even bring a psycological factor now I'm thinking about it.

As you know Shantotto is like Chaos/Cosmos and taps for any cp. In fact it gains the elements so there's synergy with H Bartz straight away.

I may be mistaken but up til now there isnt a way of playing a 6cp card without discarding from your hand. I feel this is important to mention because you're taxing your hand less which is great for high ceiling turns.

Honestly can't wait to build with this card. I'll be happier than a Catholic priest in an orphanage.

Team Calamity's OP runs every Friday from 7pm at Calamity Comics in Hatfield (North of London). You can also follow us on YouTube, Twitter and Facebook (teamcalamityfftcg), contact us on email (teamcalamityfftcg@gmail.com). Alternatively just write anything on the FFTCG Fans Facebook page, Team Calamity's James Stevenson will no doubt comment on it.

[news-mashable-yahoopartner-blog]

In defense of ghosting: It's nothing personal

Ghosting is everywhere, and dating apps are desperate to put an end to this disappearing act. But ghosting doesn't need a solution — it is the solution.

If you didn’t already know before plunging into the deep, dark depths that is online dating, you certainly learned quickly thereafter: dating is a numbers game. And when you’re messaging with what turns out to be your third lamest match of the day, ghosting becomes a necessary tool to manage the exhaustion that is mining through the hundreds of (probably boring) people at your fingertips.

For the record: This isn’t the nicest way of looking at people. But neither is the meat-market display of the swiping mechanism employed by the most popular apps. It is, as they say, what it is. If you’re going to partake, this objectification is an inherent and unavoidable aspect of dating app culture.

SEE ALSO: We're so tired of dating apps but we just can't quit them

There are a literal million reasons why a match can flop. You can chalk most failed conversations up to lack of spark — you either have a connection or you don’t. Not everyone wants to partake in games of witty one-upmanship (*raises hand*) or blatant innuendo (*puts hand down*). You might just be on completely different pages right off the bat. 

Some people are lazy swipers. They’ll casually swipe right before really analyzing your profile only to later discover — oh, wait — they actually really hate people with cats and ew that’s a cat in your last picture and they missed it the first time. It happens. 

Other people are coming off their last breakup sore and just looking for the validation, comfort and ego boost that newcomers tend to feel from the matching experience — they were never there to meet up anyway. 

See: a literal million reasons. 

So when someone doesn’t chat you back, the rejection isn’t necessarily personal. It’s cheesy but it’s true: It’s not you, it’s them. You’re not a fit, and that’s okay. 

Ghosting isn’t unique to the online world. We’ve done it countless times in person, it just doesn’t seem as pointed. “If you were at a party full of single people and chatted briefly to someone before pausing to chat to another, and then turned back to discover the first person had disappeared, you probably wouldn't think too much of it — after all, it's a big party and you're all there to mingle,” a 45-year-old single writer who uses a combination of Tinder, Happn and Bumble told me. 

Speaking briefly with someone in person does not imply an investment, and neither does an online greeting. You haven’t met, you can barely remember this person’s name without going back to check their profile, and you’ve made no promises or commitments. 

As a 32-year-old single software developer said, “I think that's why people feel okay ghosting. ‘I hardly know this person. Do I really have to go through the exercise of telling them why I'm not interested?’” And that’s the main issue: formally cutting off every conversation you might have with a stranger online would be exhausting. 

Even as someone who only casually flips through dating apps, I have 200+ matches that I do not speak with, either ever or any longer. Some I stopped replying to, some stopped replying to me. That’s online dating.

SEE ALSO: The internet baes who 'breadcrumb' you and never meet you in person

“I have so many conversations going on at the same time that don't result in actual dates that I can't actually reject all of them. So I ghost,” a 29-year-old investment professional told me. “I don't think the person really devoted any resources to chat me along with other multiple people at the same time online.”

Ghosting is easy. Sitting down to explain why you aren’t interested in continuing a conversation with someone you barely know is not. 

And what good would come of it anyway? As much as some people might feel like understanding why the other person disappeared would be helpful, there are too many variables. 

Even with the best intentions, some criticism might read as offensive. Or they might just not know what the hell they’re talking about. (They don’t actually know anything about you, after all.)  Or it might be one of those incredibly personal literal million reasons that would have no impact on your future involvements. 

As the 29-year-old investment professional put it, “How would the other person possibly benefit by an internet stranger saying he or she doesn't wanna meet up because ‘I find you boring.’” The 45-year-old writer said something similar: “If I hardly know a person, I think I have little right to judge their behavior. It'd be massively egotistical of me to judge them after so little interaction.”

Online dating moves quickly. One day you’re all about one or two threads of interaction, and the next it’s an entirely different set of people. It’s just not feasible for every match to answer your requests for feedback. 

“I think it's slightly unrealistic to expect people to pour their hearts out to you when you hardly know them,” the 45-year-old writer said. “The problem is that one person might just not be into it (call it chemistry, call it feeling, call it vibe, whatever) while the other person is projecting all sorts of stuff on the other person and building up the proto-relationship in their mind.”

The only effort we can reasonably expect from a match is to take a stab at an honest-to-goodness conversation. If it doesn’t pass the initial chemistry test, anything else is unnecessary.

There are, of course, scenarios where ghosting is bad. If you’ve been dating someone — even casually — for a chunk of time, for instance. But when you’re just chatting, gauging who the hell this person even is? When you haven’t even committed to a first date? It’s not rude — it’s just part of the process. It’s “expected,” as the 29-year-old said.

Dating apps like The League and others are rushing to try to "solve" the problem of ghosting. They’re offering features like read receipts or expiring messages that feel more like shaming. Those “features,” along with other attempts to engineer social interactions between matches (like limiting how many people you see, especially with The League’s penalization of people who dip into any kind of inactivity) are manipulating your behaviors by controlling your experience.

SEE ALSO: The best dating apps to get you laid

So why are these apps even bothering? Ghosting is always going to be a part of online dating, as long as it’s a numbers game. But neither of those things are inherently bad. Dating apps, as abhorrent as they can be, are at least convenient and manageable. You can gauge a potential match from a safe and fairly anonymous distance, and you can decide when to pull the plug without the risk of them continuing to have unfettered access to you. 

The fact that online dating is on your terms is one of the few things it has going for it. The best feature these apps introduced was making communication gated rather than leaving it open to a wild west world of negging and sexually-charged commentary. That’s done. But there’s certainly still room for features that would minimize the need for ghosting.

The most cumbersome part of all this is swiping through the piles of profiles — some of which are joke accounts or spam — to get to someone you could see yourself liking. Anything that would help that experience — vague and magical algorithms, for instance — would be more effective than these features that feel like yet another opportunity for a cash grab (with paid-for member accounts nabbing extra flexibility) rather than a service to the user. 

If, one day, apps were able to accurately detect and record your most personal-interest swiping habits to better predict who you would like — as in, be an actual matchmaker — we’d probably spend less time swiping and ghosting in favor of more time actually dating. 

SEE ALSO: Hater, the app that lets you find love based on what you hate

Most of the current algorithmic qualifiers don’t have much of a bearing on what kinds of people — personality, look, style, character — you’re looking at. Tinder’s voting-as-ranking system, based on what we know about it, seems far too much like a Black Mirror Season 3, episode 1 popularity contest than a personalized matching system. 

For now, we’re left with an imperfect system. There’s plenty about the culture of online dating that would deter any number of people. Ghosting, I would argue, is one of the less offensive ones — a tool of efficiency rather than rejection. But it’s up to you to decide if it’s worth the hassle.

WATCH: This nail polish is made from prosecco — making you both sparkly and tipsy

[viralhottopics]

In defense of ghosting: It’s a valuable dating tool, not a problem to be fixed

Image: Christopher Mineses/Mashable

Ghosting is everywhere, and dating apps are desperate to put an end to this disappearing act. But ghosting doesn’t need a solution it is the solution.

If you didnt already know before plunging into the deep, dark depths that is online dating, you certainly learned quickly thereafter: dating is a numbers game. And when youre messaging with what turns out to be your third lamest match of the day, ghosting becomes a necessary tool to manage the exhaustion that is mining through the hundreds of (probably boring) people at your fingertips.

For the record: This isnt the nicest way of looking at people.

For the record: This isnt the nicest way of looking at people. But neither is the meat-market display of the swiping mechanism employed by the most popular apps. It is, as they say, what it is. If youre going to partake, this objectification is an inherent and unavoidable aspect of dating app culture.

SEE ALSO: We’re so tired of dating apps but we just can’t quit them

There are a literal million reasons why a match can flop. You can chalk most failed conversations up to lack of spark you either have a connection or you dont. Not everyone wants to partake in games of witty one-upmanship (*raises hand*) or blatant innuendo (*puts hand down*). You might just be on completely different pages right off the bat.

Some people are lazy swipers. Theyll casually swipe right before really analyzing your profile only to later discover oh, wait they actually really hate people with cats and ew thats a cat in your last picture and they missed it the first time. It happens.

Other people are coming off their last breakup sore and just looking for the validation, comfort and ego boost that newcomers tend to feel from the matching experience they were never there to meet up anyway.

See: a literal million reasons.

So when someone doesnt chat you back, the rejection isnt necessarily personal. Its cheesy but its true: Its not you, its them. Youre not a fit, and thats okay.

Its cheesy but its true: Its not you, its them.

Ghosting isnt unique to the online world. Weve done it countless times in person, it just doesnt seem as pointed. If you were at a party full of single people and chatted briefly to someone before pausing to chat to another, and then turned back to discover the first person had disappeared, you probably wouldn’t think too much of it after all, it’s a big party and you’re all there to mingle, a 45-year-old single writer who uses a combination of Tinder, Happn and Bumble told me.

Speaking briefly with someone in person does not imply an investment, and neither does an online greeting. You havent met, you can barely remember this persons name without going back to check their profile, and youve made no promises or commitments.

As a 32-year-old single software developer said, I think that’s why people feel okay ghosting. I hardly know this person. Do I really have to go through the exercise of telling them why I’m not interested? And thats the main issue: formally cutting off every conversation you might have with a stranger online would be exhausting.

Even as someone who only casually flips through dating apps, I have 200+ matches that I do not speak with, either ever or any longer. Some I stopped replying to, some stopped replying to me. Thats online dating.

SEE ALSO: The internet baes who ‘breadcrumb’ you and never meet you in person

I have so many conversations going on at the same time that don’t result in actual dates that I can’t actually reject all of them. So I ghost, a 29-year-old investment professional told me. I don’t think the person really devoted any resources to chat me along with other multiple people at the same time online.

Ghosting is easy. Sitting down to explain why you arent interested in continuing a conversation with someone you barely know is not.

And what good would come of it anyway? As much as some people might feel like understanding why the other person disappeared would be helpful, there are too many variables.

Even with the best intentions, some criticism might read as offensive. Or they might just not know what the hell theyre talking about. (They dont actually know anything about you, after all.) Or it might be one of those incredibly personal literal million reasons that would have no impact on your future involvements.

As the 29-year-old investment professional put it, How would the other person possibly benefit by an internet stranger saying he or she doesn’t wanna meet up because I find you boring. The 45-year-old writer said something similar: If I hardly know a person, I think I have little right to judge their behavior. It’d be massively egotistical of me to judge them after so little interaction.

Its just not feasible for every match to answer your requests for feedback.

Online dating moves quickly. One day youre all about one or two threads of interaction, and the next its an entirely different set of people. Its just not feasible for every match to answer your requests for feedback.

I think it’s slightly unrealistic to expect people to pour their hearts out to you when you hardly know them, the 45-year-old writer said. The problem is that one person might just not be into it (call it chemistry, call it feeling, call it vibe, whatever) while the other person is projecting all sorts of stuff on the other person and building up the proto-relationship in their mind.

The only effort we can reasonably expect from a match is to take a stab at an honest-to-goodness conversation. If it doesnt pass the initial chemistry test, anything else is unnecessary.

There are, of course, scenarios where ghosting is bad. If youve been dating someone even casually for a chunk of time, for instance. But when youre just chatting, gauging who the hell this person even is? When you havent even committed to a first date? Its not rude its just part of the process. Its expected, as the 29-year-old said.

Dating apps like The League and others are rushing to try to “solve” the problem of ghosting. Theyre offering features like read receipts or expiring messages that feel more like shaming. Those features, along with other attempts to engineer social interactions between matches (like limiting how many people you see, especially with The Leagues penalization of people who dip into any kind of inactivity) are manipulating your behaviors by controlling your experience.

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So why are these apps even bothering? Ghosting is always going to be a part of online dating, as long as its a numbers game. But neither of those things are inherently bad. Dating apps, as abhorrent as they can be, are at least convenient and manageable. You can gauge a potential match from a safe and fairly anonymous distance, and you can decide when to pull the plug without the risk of them continuing to have unfettered access to you.

The fact that online dating is on your terms is one of the few things it has going for it.

The fact that online dating is on your terms is one of the few things it has going for it. The best feature these apps introduced was making communication gated rather than leaving it open to a wild west world of negging and sexually-charged commentary. Thats done. But theres certainly still room for features that would minimize the need for ghosting.

The most cumbersome part of all this is swiping through the piles of profiles some of which are joke accounts or spam to get to someone you could see yourself liking. Anything that would help that experience vague and magical algorithms, for instance would be more effective than these features that feel like yet another opportunity for a cash grab (with paid-for member accounts nabbing extra flexibility) rather than a service to the user.

If, one day, apps were able to accurately detect and record your most personal-interest swiping habits to better predict who you would like as in, be an actual matchmaker wed probably spend less time swiping and ghosting in favor of more time actually dating.

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Most of the current algorithmic qualifiers dont have much of a bearing on what kinds of people personality, look, style, character youre looking at. Tinders voting-as-ranking system, based on what we know about it, seems far too much like a Black Mirror Season 3, episode 1 popularity contest than a personalized matching system.

For now, were left with an imperfect system. Theres plenty about the culture of online dating that would deter any number of people. Ghosting, I would argue, is one of the less offensive ones a tool of efficiency rather than rejection. But its up to you to decide if its worth the hassle.

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from In defense of ghosting: It’s a valuable dating tool, not a problem to be fixed