How Grindr Is Changing the Way We Connect

AUSTIN, Tex. â€" It is easy to write off Grindr â€" a location-based dating application for gay men â€" as a hookup application because, well, that is what it is.

But the company, which is approaching its fourth anniversary, has amassed more than five million users who spend on average 90 minutes each day using the application. Billions of messages fly across the service every year, and 76 percent of the company’s revenue comes from money generated by Grindr users who fork over cash for the service’s premium features.

Jamie Woo, author of the book “Meet Grindr, How One App Changed the Way We Connect,” says the cultural and technological impact of Grindr is much broader than most people realize. Mr. Woo, in a presentation on the design principles of the application, delivered Saturday afternoon at the South by Southwest conference, sad the application has completely â€" and likely permanently â€" altered the way app developers and users think about location-based services.

Grindr’s main purpose is to facilitate hookups that are “spontaneous and intimate,” he said. Both of those results are immensely appealing â€" a kind of serendipity â€" and contribute to the reasons people are loyal and dedicated to an application, regardless of its intention. Scores of mobile apps and social networks have failed to inspire such enthusiasm, he said.

Mr. Woo said there are a lot of lessons to be learned from Grindr’s financial success, which has inspired a wave of competitors â€" Mister, Scruff, Jacked, Tinder, OK Cupid Locals â€" to follow in its wake.

He said the primary appeal of Grindr is its simplicity. Users browse thumbnails, mark the ones they like as a favorite or send them a message. That is different from Facebook and Twitter, where likes, pokes, retweets and favorites are often murky signals at best. Grindrâ! €™s message is immediately clear from the moment that users sign up. The inherent value in that kind of intuitive design cannot be underestimated, he said.

The application also focuses on proximity rather than location â€" showing people’s distance in time, like 10 seconds away. This preserves privacy while sustaining a sense of mystery. The application also removes barriers for men who want to meet other men who are looking to connect.

But as much as Grindr is about casual interactions, it is also, at its core, a social networking application based on one’s whereabouts. Mr. Woo said a Grindr survey of its users found that two-thirds of them were using the application to find new friends, to network or to kill time, as well as to hook up.

He said apps that have tried to do the same thing, including nondating applications like Highlight, have struggled to recreate that dynamic.

“You’re putting two people with not a lot in common on a crash course to meet, and that’s special,€ he said.

The one question that Mr. Woo could not answer is how to develop a version of Grindr that works for straight people and women. The company tried to release an app called Blendr, but it has been far less successful that its predecessor.

It could simply be that “gay men are early adopters,” he said. “I joke that the wheel was invented by a gay man so he could get to his hookup faster.”

Disruptions: Digital Era Redefining Etiquette

Some people are so rude. Really, who sends an e-mail or text message that just says “Thank you” Who leaves a voice mail message when you don’t answer, rather than texting you Who asks for a fact easily found on Google

Don’t these people realize that they’re wasting your time

Of course, some people might think me the rude one for not appreciating life’s little courtesies. But many social norms just don’t make sense to people drowning in digital communication.

Take the “thank you” message. Daniel Post Senning, a great-great-grandson of Emily Post and a co-author of the 18th edition of “Emily Post’s Etiquette,” asked: “At what point does appreciation and showing appreciation outweigh the cost”

That said, he added, “it gives the impression that digital natives canâ™t be bothered to nurture relationships, and there’s balance to be found.”

Then there is voice mail, another impolite way of trying to connect with someone. Think of how long it takes to access your voice mail and listen to one of those long-winded messages. “Hi, this is so-and-so….” In text messages, you don’t have to declare who you are, or even say hello. E-mail, too, leaves something to be desired, with subject lines and “hi” and “bye,” because the communication could happen faster by text. And then there are the worst offenders of all: those who leave a voice mail message and then e-mail to tell you they left a voice mail message.

My father learned this lesson last year after leaving me a dozen voice mail messages, none of which I listened to. Exasperated, he called my sister to complain that I never returned his calls. “Why are you leaving him voice mails” my sister asked. “No one listens to voice mail anymore. Just text him.”

My mother realized thi! s long ago. Now we communicate mostly through Twitter.

Tom Boellstorff, a professor of digital anthropology at the University of California, Irvine, said part of the problem is that offline and online communications borrow from each other. For example, the e-mail term CC stands for carbon copy, as in the carbon paper used to copy a letter. But some gestures, like opening an e-mail with “hello” or signing off with “sincerely,” are disappearing from the medium.

This is by no means the first conundrum with a new communication technology. In the late 1870s, when the telephone was invented, people didn’t know how to greet a caller. Often, there was just silence. Alexander Graham Bell, the inventor, suggested that people say “Ahoy!” Ohers proposed, “What is wanted” Eventually “Hello” won out, and it hastened its use in face-to-face communications.

Now, with Google and online maps at our fingertips, what was once normal can be seen as uncivilized â€" like asking someone for directions to a house, restaurant or office, when they can easily be found on Google Maps.

I once asked a friend something easily discovered on the Internet, and he responded with a link to lmgtfy.com, which stands for Let Me Google That For You.

In the age of the smartphone, there is no reason to ask once-acceptable questions: the weather forecast, a business phone number, a store’s hours. But some people still do. And when you answer them, they respond with a thank-you e-mail.

“I have decreasing amounts of tolerance for unnecessary communication because it is a burden and a cost,” said Baratunde Thurston, co-founder of C! ultivated Wit, a comedic creative company. “It’s almost too easy to not think before we express ourselves because expression is so cheap, yet it often costs the receiver more.”

Mr. Thurston said he encountered another kind of irksome communication when a friend asked, by text message, about his schedule for the South by Southwest festival. “I don’t even know how to respond to that,” he said. “The answer would be so long. There’s no way I’m going to type out my schedule in a text.”

He said people often asked him on social media where to buy his book, rather than simply Googling the question. You’re already on a computer, he exclaimed. “You’re on the thing that has the answer to the thing you want to know!”

How to handle these differing standards Easy: think of your audience. Some people, especially older ones, appreciate a thank-you message. Others, like me, want no reply. “It is important to think about who the relationship is with,” Mr. Senning said.The anthropologist Margaret Mead once said that in traditional societies, the young learn from the old. But in modern societies, the old can also learn from the young. Here’s hoping that politeness never goes out of fashion, but that time-wasting forms of communication do.

E-mail: bilton@nytimes.com

Disruptions: Digital Era Redefining Etiquette

Some people are so rude. Really, who sends an e-mail or text message that just says “Thank you” Who leaves a voice mail message when you don’t answer, rather than texting you Who asks for a fact easily found on Google

Don’t these people realize that they’re wasting your time

Of course, some people might think me the rude one for not appreciating life’s little courtesies. But many social norms just don’t make sense to people drowning in digital communication.

Take the “thank you” message. Daniel Post Senning, a great-great-grandson of Emily Post and a co-author of the 18th edition of “Emily Post’s Etiquette,” asked: “At what point does appreciation and showing appreciation outweigh the cost”

That said, he added, “it gives the impression that digital natives canâ™t be bothered to nurture relationships, and there’s balance to be found.”

Then there is voice mail, another impolite way of trying to connect with someone. Think of how long it takes to access your voice mail and listen to one of those long-winded messages. “Hi, this is so-and-so….” In text messages, you don’t have to declare who you are, or even say hello. E-mail, too, leaves something to be desired, with subject lines and “hi” and “bye,” because the communication could happen faster by text. And then there are the worst offenders of all: those who leave a voice mail message and then e-mail to tell you they left a voice mail message.

My father learned this lesson last year after leaving me a dozen voice mail messages, none of which I listened to. Exasperated, he called my sister to complain that I never returned his calls. “Why are you leaving him voice mails” my sister asked. “No one listens to voice mail anymore. Just text him.”

My mother realized thi! s long ago. Now we communicate mostly through Twitter.

Tom Boellstorff, a professor of digital anthropology at the University of California, Irvine, said part of the problem is that offline and online communications borrow from each other. For example, the e-mail term CC stands for carbon copy, as in the carbon paper used to copy a letter. But some gestures, like opening an e-mail with “hello” or signing off with “sincerely,” are disappearing from the medium.

This is by no means the first conundrum with a new communication technology. In the late 1870s, when the telephone was invented, people didn’t know how to greet a caller. Often, there was just silence. Alexander Graham Bell, the inventor, suggested that people say “Ahoy!” Ohers proposed, “What is wanted” Eventually “Hello” won out, and it hastened its use in face-to-face communications.

Now, with Google and online maps at our fingertips, what was once normal can be seen as uncivilized â€" like asking someone for directions to a house, restaurant or office, when they can easily be found on Google Maps.

I once asked a friend something easily discovered on the Internet, and he responded with a link to lmgtfy.com, which stands for Let Me Google That For You.

In the age of the smartphone, there is no reason to ask once-acceptable questions: the weather forecast, a business phone number, a store’s hours. But some people still do. And when you answer them, they respond with a thank-you e-mail.

“I have decreasing amounts of tolerance for unnecessary communication because it is a burden and a cost,” said Baratunde Thurston, co-founder of C! ultivated Wit, a comedic creative company. “It’s almost too easy to not think before we express ourselves because expression is so cheap, yet it often costs the receiver more.”

Mr. Thurston said he encountered another kind of irksome communication when a friend asked, by text message, about his schedule for the South by Southwest festival. “I don’t even know how to respond to that,” he said. “The answer would be so long. There’s no way I’m going to type out my schedule in a text.”

He said people often asked him on social media where to buy his book, rather than simply Googling the question. You’re already on a computer, he exclaimed. “You’re on the thing that has the answer to the thing you want to know!”

How to handle these differing standards Easy: think of your audience. Some people, especially older ones, appreciate a thank-you message. Others, like me, want no reply. “It is important to think about who the relationship is with,” Mr. Senning said.The anthropologist Margaret Mead once said that in traditional societies, the young learn from the old. But in modern societies, the old can also learn from the young. Here’s hoping that politeness never goes out of fashion, but that time-wasting forms of communication do.

E-mail: bilton@nytimes.com