How to keep track of dozens of Tinder/Bumble people

August 23, 2016 4:16 PM

Shallow daters of the hive ... how do you keep track of this stuff? There really should be an app that holds a screenshot and a few notes.

Lately I am first-dating my fool head off, and I'm OK with that. But when I unmatch or swipe left on people, they disappear. Then a few months later they might show up, maybe with a new first picture. Perhaps we went on one date and I want to steer waaaayyy clear of them. To make things even more fun ... I am terrible with recognizing faces! (As I found out when I socially met someone who was SUPER STEAMED that, ah I completely did not remember the awkward date we'd had a few months before.)

Please help me keep track of my complicated socializing. Thank you!

posted by SockPuppetOfShame to Grab Bag (11 answers total)

I keep it very simple. I always move the conversation to text messaging (in other words, out of the app) before setting up a date, and I don't delete old texts. If I've ever messaged with this person before, the new messages will get grouped with the old ones (and, at least for me, the old texts are enough to jog my memory). This won't stop you from the potential embarrassment of engaging with the same person twice but that street goes two ways so it wouldn't bother me too much.
posted by telegraph at 4:26 PM on August 23, 2016 [3 favorites]

Response by poster: Not to threadsit, but I do meet people I like, it's not universal, no need for the judgment. But I'm bad with faces in general, and when a date is particularly meh my mind is happy to erase it quickly. (And not that it matters, but I am paying for my own meals etc.)

Currently I'm using Evernote, but the whole process is kind of time-consuming.
posted by SockPuppetOfShame at 5:04 PM on August 23, 2016 [5 favorites]

Google Keep lets you create a screenshot with a couple of notes.
posted by rhizome at 5:35 PM on August 23, 2016 [3 favorites]

I get what you're saying OP, and I don't think Sara C's comment is fair. I have serious problems recognizing faces to the point that if I meet someone new I can only distinguish them by their hairstyle and hair color (and hope their hair isn't similar to anyone else nearby!) for at least the first 3 weeks I know them, even if I see them almost every day. It has nothing to do with the person; I have this problem with literally everyone I meet.

I would probably take screenshots of pics and usernames and put them in a Google doc with dates and whatever other notes. Google Keep as someone mentioned above might also be useful but I've never tried it.
posted by a strong female character at 6:03 PM on August 23, 2016 [2 favorites]

If you have an iPhone you can keep screenshots with annotations in the Notes app. Create a new note per person. There's a search function too.
posted by ejs at 6:12 PM on August 23, 2016

This seems like a simple job for your contacts section on your phone.

On iPhones contacts you can add notes and even socials media account names. You could screenshot their photo and put notes about the date you went and when and where. Contacts are easily searchable. I'm assuming other phones have a notes section at minimum in contacts. My husbands android also has tons of feilds including screen name and notes too. Then it's all just - in your contacts. Even if you don't have their number. And if you keep seeing them or get more info about them it's easy to add their email or phone or whatever and just update their contact info. I don't think you need another app for this.
posted by Crystalinne at 6:27 PM on August 23, 2016 [2 favorites]

I dated a lot of people at one point and had a hard time keeping some of them apart. I kept notes on index cards, not even kidding.

I think the dating-a-lot-of-people thing works for some and not for others. Personally I found it exhausting and confusing after a while, but I was only doing it full on for 4 or 5 weeks. It's not a bad thing to try. The guys were plenty memorable but there are just a lot of people to meet and talk to and etc...I noticed a trendline of more people being interested in me and me not feeling it than vice versa, which was helpful.

i thought Bumble was a little easier because the woman has to make the first move (I am a woman) rather than Tinder because as soon as I swiped (as a woman seeking men) I immediately got a bunch of messages.
posted by zutalors! at 6:35 PM on August 23, 2016

Google Keep is delightful, and comes with the added bonus that you can color-code your notes. If you use the Google messenger app for your sms client, you can change the color of the text conversation person-by-person. You can color code your notes to match your conversation. I don't know about you, but my brain does much better if I can color code everything (even to the point of remembering, well, that topic came up in a red conversation, so it must have been with Dan). Much easier for me to recall Dan = red than Dan = chubby beardo in flannel # 6.
posted by phunniemee at 7:59 PM on August 23, 2016

Trello!

Advantages:
- free and accessible across multiple platforms (web, iOS, android)
- can make lists of cards (in this case, card == profile)
- cards can be easily moved into different categories
- cards can contain images, text, dates, links, comments, labels, checklists
- fast and very flexible

(...aaand I was so taken with my own idea that I made a sample board as a (fairly frivolous) proof of concept. If you're interested in playing around with the template, you can copy the board over to your account once you sign up! I created lists and labels in a way that made sense to me, but of course you can adapt them to whatever usage fits your brain best. :) )
posted by brieche at 8:32 PM on August 23, 2016 [4 favorites]

I saved people in my phone with the platform I found them on, username, real name. So if I met an OKCupid date with username "Cricket" and real name Riley, I'd enter them in my phone as "OKC Riley Cricket" or "OKC Riley Cricket Zoo Teacher" if I had a few different dates planned and I wanted to remember where I'd planned to go or what was notable about a particular person.
Tracking the app we'd met on, and their username, also meant I could find their full dating profile again quickly if I wanted to re-read something.

Once I had decided I didn't want any more dates with that person, I added an X- so their contact name became "X OKC Riley Cricket" or in extreme cases,
"X OKC Riley Cricket - Creepy, no"
Adding the X moved them alphabetically down to the very bottom of my contact list so I never had to see their name again, but allowed me to keep texts and remember them if somehow we met and exchanged numbers on another platform.

And when we stayed friends, I'd eventually just change their name to Riley.
posted by pseudostrabismus at 11:52 PM on August 23, 2016 [4 favorites]

It's a gay dating app so not maybe of interest to you (maybe it is?) but Scruff (the paid version) lets you make notes against profiles. It's a handy feature for remembering peep's actual names when you might only talk to them intermittently - but you can write whatever you want.
posted by esto-again at 2:40 AM on August 24, 2016