Jonathan Badeen
speaker
219 appearances
2 recordings
1 series
first heard Jan 2025
last heard May 2025
Jonathan Badeen’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
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Appearances
You know, I wouldn't say that there were any specific stories that led to it. And a lot of the impetus for Tinder was my co-founder had noticed some of the issues with the existing products that were out there. But, you know, I think just generally the troubles I had made me a little bit more open to the idea of trying to create something. You know, because between just...
meeting people in the world or using things that existed back then like Match.com or OkCupid and all, the kinds of things where I'd go out with people where it's very clear that they were just out for me to buy them a meal and essentially ghosting me afterwards and stuff like that. I think that was from Myspace back in the day. But I think to me, I kind of forget about that stuff.
To me, the most memorable part was just how how absolutely nervous I was. Like I said, I'm not exaggerating about the amount of sweat that I had pouring off of me.
I think whether those things happened or not, whether that would have deterred Tinder from being created, I don't know, but it sure did make me maybe slightly more motivated to figure out a platform that would work for me a little bit better.
Oh, exactly. It was that. It was the fact that I was... You know, I'm sure the first few Tinder dates were much like the, you know, pre-Tinder dates. But after that, it was just like, oh, well, I've got another one tomorrow. And maybe in the back of my mind, I'm even thinking about that date tomorrow instead of the one that I'm on right now.
Not that you should be very focused on whoever you're with or whatever. But I mean, just like, it's just that... There just isn't that pressure. You realize how many people there are out there, especially in a big city like Los Angeles, but you realize how many different options there are and you have a means to find them.
Well, it's you. It's just a matter of pulling you out. These platforms are nothing more than... In many ways, I see them less as dating services and more as introduction services. They're not there for you on the date. They're there to get you introduced to somebody for the date.
I think it's what you make of them and how that affects you and allows you to come out of your shell or express yourself.
Yeah, I mean, I guess to me, you know, it's always just a little bit about, you know, what you do and what your family. I mean, obviously, you know, you don't want to focus too much on, you know, what you do. That sometimes can be a bad thing to some. But, I mean, it is a big part of our life. Yeah.
You know, and try to figure out the other person's interests and just sort of... You know, for me, it was generally just trying to keep it sort of natural. The most, you know, trying to force something was where it probably wasn't going to go well. Yeah. And so it was... Yeah, it's just trying to learn about the person.
And if the other person's interested and or if they're good at it, they're going to be asking you a lot of questions. And at some point, you just really have to figure out like, wait, am I answering too many questions? I should probably be engaging the other person more too and learning.
Of course. Yeah. No, I think that's important. For me, that comes naturally. I'm somebody who just, you know, that's probably one of my own downfalls. I'm all too eager to share the same information that I'd ask somebody else.
Well, first off, it is a cool story, but that's the not quite as true story, which is, you know, I had the epiphany, some basically coming out of the shower, looking at a mirror that was all fogged up and wiping the mirror only to reveal my face. and thus The Swipe was born.
It sounds amazing. It sounds amazing. I'm sure it's going to be in a movie or something at some point. But it's slightly based upon the real story, which was I actually came up with it prior to Tinder. And I came up with it for a...
uh, flashcards, educational flashcards app that I had, uh, um, I'd been thinking about problems with it and it really had to do with, uh, trying to solve very specific problems. Like while you try to study for your flashcards while walking to class, one handed, uh, eliminating buttons and, you know, trying to indicate whether you got the card right or wrong and all of those sorts of things.
And I woke up one morning, uh, just, uh, literally woke up, sat up in bed and was like, Oh my God, I got it. And I had been basically the swipe had been born for this flashcards app. And I was like, I've got to make this thing. You know, it's, this is the best way to make a flashcards app. Fast forward a few months though.
And, um, and that's actually when I had met Sean, um, my co-founder, Sean Rad. And, uh, we were showing each other our work. Um, and I had showed him the flashcards app and all. And then when we ended up making Tinder, um, We just ended up with an interface that was a stack of cards, and it was serendipitous, basically, and I ended up throwing the swipe in there.
I would never have come up with it for Tinder because I wasn't trying to solve those problems. You have a big heart and an X button in there. didn't, you know, didn't need it. Um, but, uh, but it felt right to put it in there and we didn't even tell people about it. We weren't trying to be sneaky or anything really.
It was just, uh, it was like, yeah, if you figured it out, it's like figuring out, you know, uh, command or control C on your keyboard instead of clicking the copy button or something, you know, it's just a keyboard shortcut. And it was, so it was not, it wasn't some big thing that we were like, we're going to change the world with the swipe or whatever.
It was, and it was a few months later that we had a college student write in and he said something along the lines of that he and his buddies walking down the street or campus or something like that, that they would say swipe right and swipe left as code about the ladies passing by. Wow.
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