šø building the photo milestone
weāre finally doing this.
you now get profile photos as a milestone waiting to be unlocked in every match.
to be completely honest, i was extremely hesitant about this because the whole proposition of amble was for it to be conversation-first instead of appearances-first.
however, it seems i cannot be too idealistic or romantic when it comes to designing amble. i spoke to some of you and it does seem appearances are still a big non-negotiable, especially in the romantic aspects. i donāt disagree, i do think physical attraction is important. i too want my partner to look at me and believe iām stunning.
what sealed the deal was when half of you voted that you wanted a photo reveal feature. so that really told us this was the next step to take.
ps. if youād like to also vote for what we should build next, come join us here. we take your votes very seriously. i didnāt take a screenshot of the poll when we decided to go with photos, but we swear it was the top voted item at the point of decision-making!
making the reveal a milestone
we put a lot of thought into the timing of this milestone, and we decided to have it be revealed after the third fun fact.
this was tricky because if we revealed your photos too early, you would barely have had a chance to get to know the person you were talking to! cue the whole superficial and judgey spiel which we definitely want to avoid. plus, if you really wanted to match on photos alone - you already have bumble/tinder/hinge/cmb for that. go there!
but also, at some point, we need you to share what you look like. and thatās why weāre taking it into our hands to do the auto-reveal for you! so just upload one cute selfie of yourself and weāll do the rest. i think a lot of the time weāre too shy to share photos of ourselves on-the-go, and so uploading a solid photo of yourself once might be a better way to introduce the rest of who you are. and itās a great transition to build a real-life friendship/relationship off the bot! we want you to make connections that can last.
but also - if your match finds your visuals are not his/her cup of tea, i want to reiterate that that is OK, we all have our preferences! and if youāre the one doing the un-matching, do so with kindness and gratitude. letās be nice here. PLEASE.
keeping optionality (and therefore, autonomy)
i liked the old experience - do i get to choose?
yes, my dearest ambler. you do. during the profile setup phase, you get two options:
if you upload a photo, you only match with profiles with photos
if you donāt upload a photo, you only match with profiles without photos
why did we make it optional? honestly, the poll for this was 50-50, but what made us decide to go the extra mile to make it optional was a conversation i had with some of you sharing that you enjoyed the anonymity on here, and it made it easier to be yourself. so we decide to keep the option for you to continue that experience.
although to be honest - this will really hurt your wait times. but as one of amblers beautifully said āif we have shorter wait times but convo quality is still poorā¦ it doesnāt make it worthwhileā.
at the end of the day, weāve decided to prioritise your autonomy over the seamlessness/efficiency of the product, so i hope that counts for something!
how it works
butā¦ what if someone uses a fake/inappropriate photo?
in an ideal world, amble would be able to use AI to detect the suspicious stuff. but weāre not there yet! so we need your help to use the /report command while youāre in the match so we can investigate the user. alternatively, you can DM us on Instagram with your telehandle and the date of the match so we can look into it.
you will be blacklisted from amble if we learn that youāre abusing it. no questions asked.
we want your feedback.
at the end of the day, weāre trying to build amble into a safe space to connect, in the most authentic way possible. if you have any ideas or thoughts on how we can do better, talk to us! our Instagram DM is always open. :)
*find out more at our official website