42-year-old Lisa Catalano has been at it for six months now with the “Marry Lisa" billboards up and down Silicon Valley's US-101, and she’s still paying for them while looking for a husband, but her viral fame is a mixed bag.

It has now been a full six months since extremely eligible bachelorette Lisa Catalano started her “Marry Lisa” billboard campaign as she hunts for a husband the extremely unconventional way. And Bay Area News Group checked in on her this weekend to find that she’s still at it!

Six months into this marriage-seeking arrangement, the news group reports she’s received “4,000 applications from would-be suitors” from “around the world.” Most were tossed, as the applicants do not live in the Bay Area as Catalano has requested. Similarly, most men fell outside her stated preferred age range of 35-47 years old men (the News Group said that the online applicants were aged from “19 to 78”), and also per the News Group, many of the photos submitted were “clearly generated by AI.”

So how much action has this billboard campaign generated? The news group adds that Catalano’s six-month billboard campaign has merely netted “dates with nearly 10 men."  So she’s clearly being pretty picky. Though Catalano tells the News Group that she had a Valentine's Day date this past weekend with a man she’s seen “a handful of times,” and they did a dinner and a movie.

But there has also been hate mail! Catalano describes having two full three-inch binders with mean messages saying things like, “You’re washed up, you have nothing to offer” — in addition to rape threats and death threats.

“It’s a lot of getting called every name in the book — ‘bitch,’ ‘whore,’ ‘slut,’ ‘bimbo,’” Catalano told the news group. “I was getting called an ’empty egg carton’ because I’m 42 years old and expressing my desire to start a family.”

Though the struggle here may cut both ways. Catalano may be actively cutting down her candidate supply by insisting on her dates signing non-disclosure agreements, and how she keeps dragging the media into all of this. To that end, Catalano seems to be working on a KRON4 docuseries about this whole saga, which she’s promoting on her webpage, and which KRON4 is promoting on their website too.

Related: Bay Area Woman Spends Untold Thousands on Billboard Campaign Seeking Husband [SFist]

Image: Marry Lisa

Folsom fashion, Litquake’s parade of words, Michoacán flavors in Redwood City, Black woman-owned cafe in Mission Bay, Lassen’s open trails, Betty Reid Soskin at 104, SF plates on the Top 100 list, AI art in San Jose, a love billboard on 101, and Oakland’s Tiny Plot podcast.

Inclusive fashion at Folsom

Folsom Street Fair returns Sunday with vendor stalls as vivid as the stages — from sequined kaftans and femme harnesses to hand-cut fringe and heritage leather reworked into new shapes. Five and Diamond, Love Lorn Lingerie, Bearly Covered, Krakenwhip, and CantiqLA each carry their own lineage, from pandemic sewing experiments to decades of queer craft.

Together they build a living archive in fabric and metal, where every strap and stitch carries both pleasure and defiance.   — 48Hills

Litquake season

Litquake returns, starting with the Small Press Book Fair on Sunday at Yerba Buena Gardens, where independent publishers, journals, and bookstores set up shop on the lawn. From there, the festival spreads across the city and beyond through October, with events ranging from a panel on writing about wildfire to an evening with US Poet Laureate Ada Limón.

Later in the month, Alta Journal teams up with Litquake to celebrate John Freeman’s California Rewritten, and neighborhood readings fill bars, bookstores, and back rooms. — Alta Journal

Voices in code

At the San Jose Institute of Contemporary Art, Stephanie Dinkins has turned the gallery into a living conversation. Her installation Data Trust gathers oral histories from Bay Area Black communities, feeding them into an AI system that transforms the stories into moving, evolving projections across 14-foot walls.

Visitors can add their own memories through red rotary phones, weaving personal voices into the shifting digital fabric. Supported by the Hewlett 50 Arts Commissions, the project opened to a packed crowd and will remain on view through March 2026. — Bay Area News Group

A plot of their own

In Oakland’s Union Point Park, a group of unhoused residents decided to try something different — building a community where they could write the rules themselves. The new KQED podcast A Tiny Plot follows their experiment, tracing nights in tents, clashes with the city, and the hope of shaping a model for survival.

Reporter Shaina Shealy spent a year recording the daily grind of people who refuse to be defined only by crisis. — KQED

Nation’s oldest park ranger turns 104

Betty Reid Soskin, the nation’s oldest park ranger, marked her 104th birthday with hundreds of students at the East Bay middle school that carries her name. She says her life didn’t really begin until 50 — long before she put on a ranger’s uniform at 84.

Before that she ran a Berkeley record shop and wrote songs for the civil rights movement while raising kids in Walnut Creek. Later she worked for state assembly members, pushing for what became the city of Richmond’s Rosie the Riveter Park — where she eventually took the job of telling its stories herself as a ranger. — Richmondside

Quiet season on the peak

In the far northeast corner of California, Lassen Peak rises above a landscape of steaming vents and alpine lakes. This time of year, its 10,457-foot trail is clear of snow, the days are warm, and the crowds have thinned. The climb is short but steep, with views stretching from Lake Helen to Mount Shasta on the horizon.

For Bay Area hikers, it’s about the same drive as Yosemite or Tahoe — without the long lines or packed trailheads. The park’s geothermal basins, often called a “Little Yellowstone,” add another layer of wonder to a fall visit, making the trip feel both otherworldly and close to home. — SFGate

Michoacán in Redwood City

Mexico’s president Claudia Sheinbaum calls Redwood City home to the best Mexican food in the US, thanks to its deep ties to Aguililla, Michoacán. Families brought recipes, bakeries, and taquerias — including Carnitas El Rincón and Panaderia Michoacán — keeping traditions alive for decades.

Rising housing costs have changed the neighborhood, but for those who stayed the food remains a living connection to home and heritage. — KGO

SF on a plate

San Francisco tastes like the city itself — old favorites, new spots, and a mix of chaos and calm. At Piglet & Co, honey walnut shrimp and pork toast carry sticky sweetness, while Hilda and Jesse’s pancakes pile whipped buttermilk and blueberry syrup into a soft, messy tower.

Gola’s Tunisian deviled eggs with roasted shrimp add spice and nutty depth, and Prubechu’s ko’ko’ wings hit with a sharp, citrusy punch. All of them show up on this Top 100 list, a snapshot of a city forever rewriting its menu. — 7x7

Nirvana in Mission Bay

NBA Champ turned storyteller Festus Ezeli gives a strong endorsement to Nirvana Soul Coffee, a local Black woman-owned coffee shop, which recently opened its fifth location in SF’s Mission Bay.

The San Jose-based company recently partnered with NFL star Chidobe “Chido” Awuzie and will soon be opening locations at SFO and San Jose’s SAP Arena. — Festus Feasts

Love on a billboard

Drivers beware: Lisa Catalano is looking for love — and she’s advertising it on Highway 101. The Bay Area bachelorette has put up digital billboards from Santa Clara to the city, directing curious viewers to her website, marrylisa.com, where applicants can fill out a form and see her likes, lifestyle, and non-negotiables.

Catalano, whose fiancé passed away in late 2023, says she’s ready to love again. The billboards sparked TikTok chatter, but she insists it’s not a stunt: “This is a real endeavor. My goal is to meet the love of my life.” — KRON4

Top image: Bearly Covered/Facebook

Previously: Dancers on Buildings, Cowboys in Oakland, and Fun at the Santa Cruz Boardwalk

Last week: Waymos driving like humans, flying cars on pre-order, and a Toronado memecoin; This week: Interview with the first openly gay Black legislator, all-ages show at SOMArts, and the 27th annual Native Contemporary Arts Festival.

Week in Review

Wrapping up the week of June 2-8.

You might want some popcorn while you read the top 10 wildest SF nonprofit scandals. Speaking of popcorn, they’re filming a movie about the firing and re-hiring of OpenAI’s Sam Altman, which is partially set in SF. Or maybe you’ve had your fill of popcorn following The Big Feud.

Waymos are learning to be more human-like by rolling through stop signs and such. (Pretty soon they’ll be blaring “Green-Eyed Lady” whenever the ignition starts, like SFist’s neighbor.)  You can now pre-order a flying car, but you won’t be able to legally drive it very many places. Those speed cameras are all up and running—be prepared for real tickets starting August 5.

Lurie doesn’t sound very keen on Ed Lee-era tax breaks for tech companies. Billionaire-backed California Forever is cozying up to Suisun City with plans to turn its downtown into a “lifestyle and entertainment destination.” A lot of small neighborhood groups have been  left in the lurch by the Parks Alliance closure.

Toronado’s original owner is regretting a deal he made to sell the bar to a crypto bro who aims to  memorialize it via memecoin. SF Art Institute is set to reopen, which will now be known as California Academy of Studio Arts, or CASA. Bay Area icon E-40 appeared on NPR‘s Tiny Desk Concert.

A four-alarm fire destroyed, damaged five row houses in SF’s Richmond District Friday morning, leaving one pet cat dead and 35 people displaced.

Fifteen people were detained at SF immigration court. Two headliners at last weekend’s La Onda Festival in Napa were forced to cancel their sets after the Trump administration denied their visas, claiming their music “glorifies cartel violence.” Pete Hegseth demanded that the Navy take Harvey Milk’s name off one of their ships.

A man was arrested for committing back-to-back assaults in Fort Mason. A 40-minute CHP chase took place from San Ramon to Milpitas.

The Week Ahead

Looking ahead to June 9–15.

Thursday

Join Assemblymember Corey Jackson—California’s first openly gay Black legislator—for an in-depth conversation with KQED’s Otis R. Taylor Jr. The two will discuss leadership, equity, and public service in a live community dialogue open to all. Thursday, June 12, 5:30-7 p.m. // Manny's, 3092 16th St // $15

Friday

Thrive City invites families to a night under the stars with a free screening of The Princess & The Frog. Arrive early for kids’ crafts, games, face painting, and a festive Mardi Gras Princess Parade before the movie begins. Don’t forget a blanket and warm layers—space is first come, first served, and RSVPs get priority! Friday, June 13, 5 p.m. // Thrive City | 1 Warriors Way // free

Close out the Spring Queer Arts Festival with Magical Realism: Queer Caribbean Sounds, an all-ages night of music, ritual, and reggaeton joy. Headlined by genre-defying artist Esotérica Tropical and featuring Batey Tambó and DJ Kayaté, this immersive evening celebrates queer Caribbean resilience through sound, movement, and healing. Come dance, connect, and revel in the magic. Friday, June 13, 7-10 p.m. // SOMArts Cultural Center, 934 Brannan St // $20

Saturday

Don’t miss NorCal’s largest Succulent Expo show and sale, June 13–15. With 40+ rare plant vendors, expert talks, and a members-only preview sale, it’s the ultimate weekend for succulent lovers. Join for just $15 to get early access, skip the line, and support plant education and conservation. Friday, June 13–Sunday, June 16, 10 a.m.-5 p.m. // County Fair Building, Golden Gate Park, 1199 9th Ave // free, all ages

Join fellow Bay Area Singles in their 30s and 40s for Social & Volunteering, at the San Francisco Food Bank. After sorting produce to music, the group will head to Long Bridge Pizza for food, drinks, and conversation. It’s a low-pressure way to give back and meet new people—no swiping required. Saturday, June 14, 11:30a.m.-3 p.m. // San Francisco Food Bank, 900 Pennsylvania Ave // $20

Sunday

Celebrate Indigenous creativity at the 27th Annual Native Contemporary Arts Festival, featuring Native music, dance, spoken word, and art curated by Janeen Antoine, with performances from Pomo dancers, singers, drummers, and more. Shop handcrafted goods, meet artists, and honor the vibrant cultures of North America’s Indigenous communities. Sunday, June 15, Noon-3:30 p.m. // Yerba Buena Gardens, 750 Howard St // free

Image via Esoterica Tropical on Facebook

Previously: Last Week, This Week: Kabuki Meets Broadway in 'Pacific Overtures' Revival

A new exposé from the NBC Bay Area Investigative Unit combines two common local gripes — the notorious difficulty of the Bay Area dating scene, and Silicon Valley companies’ constant desire to charge thousands of dollars while providing virtually nothing in return. In this case, however, the company called “Silicon Valley Matchmakers” is not really a Silicon Valley company. And despite their promises of a “local office” and “real, local singles,” they appear to be operating the exact same stock-photo website in multiple different markets and coordinating the entire scheme out of Oklahoma.

I normally refrain from linking to businesses who may be operating on the unethical side, but this is just hilarious. Here we see the website for Silicon Valley Matchmakers. Boy, does it look similar to something called East Bay Matchmakers. Just for fun, let’s copy and paste the boilerplate verbiage from the website and see if any other “local” matchmaker sites pop up.

They do! Singles, get ready to meet Vegas Matchmakers and Capital City Matchmakers, both of whose websites brag of local offices and phone numbers, but are otherwise the exact same damned website. NBC Bay Area tracked down the company’s vice president of operations Mike Carroll, who apparently runs this network out of Oklahoma.

It gets funnier. “A testimonial from [alleged human customer] Blake, thanking Silicon Valley Matchmakers for introducing him to his soulmate Kristie, also appears on East Bay Matchmakers, and even on a website in Nevada, where Blake praises Las Vegas Matchmakers for introducing him to his soulmate Kristie,” NBC Bay Area reports. “And a quick search of those pictures of happy couples reveals they’re stock photos.”

It gets less funny when you realize people paid up to $8,000 for 16 months of this “matchmaking”, which is organized via phone by people hundreds of miles away, and in at least one case produced a total of four dates over those 16 months.

“Ultimately, what it is is very little service for a lot of money,” one jilted subscriber told NBC Bay Area. “I’ve been totally taken advantage of. Taken to the cleaners.”

I’m too cheap to even pay ten bucks a month for OKCupid, so this all seems pretty out of the ordinary to me. Wealth is surely relative, and on one hand I cannot feel anything but sympathy for people cheated out of thousands of dollars. On the other hand, if a tiny office in Oklahoma is scamming Silicon Valley’s riche with a Wordpress template and a batch of stock photos, well, I have to swipe right on their pluck.

Related: Secret Members-Only Tinder 'Select' Is Just Tinder For Hotter, Richer, Shallower People

Just when you thought Tinder could be no shallower, TechCrunch breaks it to you that within the dating app is a secret members-only version "for celebrities and people who do really well on Tinder,” in the words of one anonymous source.

A tool for nominating hotties to Tinder Select could be their so-called "Elo" score, a reference to skill level in chess that's internally calculated by Tinder based on how often other users swipe that they're interested in you. According to TechCrunch, its not just the people that are more appealing— Tinder Select "looks way better than regular Tinder in terms of design."

Users of Tinder Select will see a navy blue 'S' at the top of their app, and can toggle between the Tinder Select layer and the regular Tinder layer, which TechCrunch speculates makes sense considering "Tinder Select may have a smaller pool of users in certain markets," which is another way of saying "in markets outside of NY and LA."

As more users join dating apps in their search for whatever it is they're looking for, welcoming apps like Tinder have given way to more "exclusive" offerings. Those include The League, which has been described as Tinder for elitists and takes into account your LinkedIn work and education information, and Raya, an app for celebs, models, and the Instagram-famous.

Judging by a reference on Reddit, Tinder Select has been around for at least six months. That's not sooo long... our invitations could still be on the way, or maybe they just got lost in the mail.

Related: Use Tinder? You Have A Secret Internal Desirability Rating!

Sex, love, and other mysteries in the city your mother warned you about.

Most actual Bubbes, or Jewish grandmothers, prefer to do their well-meaning nagging and cajoling in person or over the phone. I should know. "Would it kill you to find a nice Jewish boy," your own Bubbe might ask, "a doctor, or a lawyer?" That tone, perhaps, is why she complains you "never call."

Well now, God help us all, Bubbe has a new way of communicating with you about your love life. She can text. Sort of.

"Bubby," is a chatbot and app, a spin on the slew of dating services and communities like Tinder, Bumble, J-Swipe, and so forth. But unlike some of those (cough cough Tinder), Bubby's emphasis is on love — the old world, shared values kind. As Bubby co-founder Sarah Persitz tells SFist, her app is "a curated space inspired by Jewish values and tradition." Specifically, and unlike some shared-interest dating sites like, say, Christian Mingle, Bubby is for people of all faiths — or no faith at all. That means goyim, or non-Jews, and even the shiksas, or non-jew temptresses your rabbi warned you about, are welcome to join.

Allow Persitz, who created Bubby along with Stephanie Volftsun and Jordan Klein, to explain using her own dating life as an example. "I know that Shabbat (the Jewish sabbath, sometimes feted with a dinner party) is something important to me — not from a religious perspective, but just from a values perspective. To have a good dinner party with drinks and friends, to have tradition and community, that's important to me. I want to be with someone who loves a great Shabbat dinner, and they may be Jewish, and they may not be."

Bubby, like services including the League before it, takes applications to do that community "curation," and it's currently running beta versions in New York and San Francisco with expansion plans soon. Like the latest iteration of Hinge, the app hopes to eschew the constant swiping culture of Tinder, focusing on quality of match recommendations rather than quantity. Several times a week, Bubby will introduce you in a grandmotherly matchmaker tone to new possibilities. "He's from this place, he went to this college and works at that company, etc." she'll say: to quote the app's marketing slogan, adapted from the musical Fiddler on the Roof, "Matchmaker, matchmaker, make me an app."

Bubby will ask you if your'e interested or if the match is "not for you." If it's a match, you'll be encouraged to text each other and make plans. Bubby, Persitz says, wants to connect users in the real world as soon as possible to see if there's a real-life connection. Further, "Our Bubby bot does do follow ups, reminding people to ping each other, checking in a few weeks later." How very realistic! "The idea is that it can add this personalized matchmaker experience," Persitz says.

What Bubby is and how it works is still evolving, but its values are in place. Says Persitz, "We're inspired by our Bubbes and the love stories of another era — but we're totallly aware that we live in the modern world."

Related: Eff-ing In SF, Vol. 9: Tech Bachelor Hacks Tinder, Goes On 150 First Dates In Four Months

Well what do you know! Tinder's CEO Sean Rad, who famously did not know what the word sodomy referred to, isn't a total idiot! In fact, he and his company have made a positive effort to embrace and protect, in particular, trans people who are using Tinder to get out there, get laid, and not be attacked online by strangers for their gender identity/expression. That's to say that Tinder has broken the gender binary and is now offering a spectrum of ways to identify, almost 40 options by one count, including non-binary and two-spirit, a term used by indigenous people. Some heads will explode at this number, and that's just wonderful.

Where Tinder ran into particular difficulty in the past: In addition to your usual online harassment, users have reported other users who appear to be transgender. Reported enough times, and profiles can be frozen, which many trans users report was their experience.

According to the New York Times, who covered the change, Tinder realized the issue about seven months go and began working with trans activists and leaders to arrive at solutions.

“Dating for trans people is generally safer via an app like Tinder,” trans activist Andrea James, who worked with Tinder on the change, told the Times. “I find it much safer to make connections online versus having a stranger approach me in a cafe or bar.”

Facebook opened itself up to the spectrum of genders by which people identify themselves in 2014, allowing for a "write-in" option as well as providing options for neutral or preferred pronouns. Now Tinder is apparently on board, which would only make sense as it uses your Facebook profile. But I'm left with one question for Tinder after this change. How does one identify one's interest in a particularly gender or genders on the app now? Has that changed, or will it?

“Part of the problem is a lot of tech platforms try to stay out of complex issues because they don’t want to alienate any of their users,” Tinder's CEO told the Times. “For us it’s very important to come in and particularly now given what’s going on in the world, with all the division in the world, it’s particularly important to step in and make a statement of inclusivity and acceptance.”

Related: Use Tinder? You Have A Secret Internal Desirability Rating!

Sex, love, and other mysteries in the city your mother warned you about.

To rebuild Hinge, a relatively small dating app that's often invoked as an alternative to Tinder, the company first plans to destroy it. The app, which has decent brand recognition and a mostly positive reputation, will automatically update on October 11, becoming a paid monthly membership with legacy users extended a one-month free trial. Also on the new Hinge, which has rebranded as "the relationship app," the company announces there will be no more swiping, the right-left "hot-or-not" format popular across many similar apps. All these changes reflect a company positioning itself in a dating app ecosystem, where different apps, like particular bars with distinct vibes and cultures, attract groups of like-minded users, hypothetically, at least, in order to make better matches.

Based in New York, Hinge launched in San Francisco in 2014, presenting a similar format to Tinder — integrating with Facebook to get pictures — but with an added emphasis on finding matches with Facebook friends in common. Hinge also prominently lists education and employment on users' profiles, implicitly prioritizing these traits in its culture.

On Tinder, users can casually swipe through hundreds of profiles before coming up against limits like a depleted pool of potential matches or an explicit swipe-limiter (which combats completely mindless swiping or auto-swiping programs). By contrast, Hinge provides users with "batches" of potential matches, sort of like The League. Consider it "small batch" dating, then, with an emphasis on giving each profile a good once-over and then moving on with your day. That, apparently, wasn't enough: "Dating apps have become a game, and with every swipe we've all moved further from the real connections that we crave," reads an email to users announcing the change. "We, as a team that believes in and fights for relationships, are over the games, including the ones we created. It turns out, most of you are as well."

Part of the rollout for the new Hinge involves a creepy website that alludes to "the dating apocalypse," with images of a seemingly haunted theme park (and unsettling auto-play carnival music). Beside a ferris wheel that reads "cycle of loneliness" appear spooky research findings and quotes. According to an internal survey of Hinge users, for example, 81% have never found a long-term relationship on a swipe-based app, and only 1 in 500 swipes result in phone numbers being exchanged.

Okay: Dating apps have definitely changed the way people date, partly by emphasizing the abundance of potential dates in cities. While that has costs and benefits, to dismiss anything that doesn't rise to the formal category of relationship, as Hinge appears to do, seems a little old-fashioned, no?

There may be other motivations. Hinge boasts $20.6 million in four funding rounds according to Crunchbase and it appears to have no revenue stream. Making money as a dating app — especially as a free one, as Hinge has heretofore been — is a notoriously difficult problem. After all, retaining users might appear at odds with the goal of getting users into relationships, and therefore off of apps. "Most of the dating apps out there are games designed to keep you single, and swiping is the most iconic feature of these games,” Hinge CEO Justin McLeod tells TechCrunch. While he doesn't say more about the format, he does add that the subscription cost will be similar to that of a Netflix account.

Wait, does this mean my friends' parents will pay for it?

Related: Eff-ing In SF, Vol. 7: How Do Dating Apps Make Money?

Sex, love, and other mysteries in the city your mother warned you about.

Though he may have programmed dating apps to automatically match with as many women as possible and systematically send them the same series of messages, Sebastian Stadil thinks of himself as a romantic. "That has to do with my French upbringing," he says. "I very much believe in this 'romantic soulmate' kind of thing." Actually, that's the real reason why Stadil sought to date women "at scale," one of many technical phrases he uses in his highly technical approach to courtship.

It's an emphasis that plays to Stadil's strengths. After completing his studies in economics and computer science in France he moved to San Francisco to found cloud computing company Scalr, where he serves as CEO. While Stadil has been met with professional success in the Bay Area — Scalr boasts millions in investments and he now serves on advisory boards at Google and Microsoft — the 31-year-old has been less lucky in love.

Stadil and his girlfriend broke up, which was understandably difficult, but he decided he'd better waste no time in his search."I was determined to find the One, even if it meant swiping right on the whole Bay Area," he writes in a Medium post detailing his experience. "Normal dating was a nightmare, so I hacked it." That meant writing a program for automatic swiping, messaging, and date scheduling on OKCupid, Tinder, and Hinge, creating a kind of cyberspeed dating with up to four dates per day and eventually 150 first dates in four months starting last summer.

Stadil honed his approach, which he calls "industrialized," over time, testing various photos and messages against controls. "I assumed canned messages wouldn’t work well, but after over 10,000 sent, there wasn’t a significant response rate difference between personalized and generic messages," he writes. That led to the following series of messages, deployed in order until he got a 'yes' or no response at all.

• Bonjour ! Care to meet over coffee some time next week?


• Perhaps I can tempt you with some pastries instead? I know of place with fruit tarts, chocolate pies, and macaroons. :)


• Can I interest you in a chai latte then? Better than coffee, and we can still get the pastries!


• Fine, if you don’t like coffee nor pastries nor chai, we can do tea. How does tea sound?


• Yeah, you are right. Tea is a little boring. We should get ice cream! How about the Bi-Rite Creamery?


• Ice cream is too cliché anyway. We should do something no one else does on a first date, like meet at a gas station and get beef jerky! Think of the stories we could tell our grandkids!


• Alright, I’ll admit that meeting at a gas station isn’t the most romantic. And let’s be honest: American food portions are so large we don’t need more calories. How about a boat ride on Stow Lake? We can get a nice pedal boat and get fresh air and plenty of exercise. How about that?

Of course, tea and pastries (incidentally, Stadil found via his data that a "warm" cup of tea was not as tempting as a "nice" cup of it) aren't awfully expensive. But in the end, at scale, costs added up. Stadil also invested in paid premium versions of Tinder and OKCupid to maximize his reach — as power-users of Tinder, for example, know, a limited number of "likes" are offered for free. "The thesis behind the decision there," Stadil tells me, "is if I'm going to spend $20 per date for tea, for two, maybe some cookies to go with it, if every date costs $20, then the $20 that it costs you to get infinite swipes, that just makes the whole process a lot more efficient." Stadil also refused to split costs on dates. "I could feel the reaction that you re not supposed to split the bill on the first date," he told me, "that the norm is the guy pays on the first date." Stadil also selected date spots that were near his office, often summoning Ubers for his dates to bring them to him. "I can't really afford to take an Uber and then cross the city and then have a one-hour date and then Uber back to work. That would take two hours of my time. It was just much more time efficient, and gentlemanly, for me to order up an Uber for her," he argues. All told — Ubers, tea, and premium subscriptions — the endeavor cost Stadil about $6,000.

While bringing dates to him made more time to have more of them, that wasn't always easy, Stadil tells me: "There were times when I had three to four dates a day, and those were kind of painful because you end up drinking a ton of coffee or a ton of tea, and that just sucks. Usually what I would do is two, three coffee drinks a day and then drink dates in the evening." That aspect of Stadil's speed-dating appears to exhibit a double-standard. While dating cuts both ways — each party investing time and effort in the search and in each date — Stadil seems to have valued his time more highly than his dates'. In the end, that predictably led to difficulty for him. Even if, as Stadil puts it in business parlance, he was able to "convert" a first date into a second one, he might forget details of their original date. "It gets tricky, because you end up telling your story three times a week, and you get a little awkward, repeating stories." After learning that a woman was an orphan on date one, he made the mistake of asking her about her parents on date two. "That was an awkward moment," he writes in his Medium post. "If you're reading this, I apologize."

Stadil also betrays a double standard when it comes to control in dating. "In my sample of 150, not once did a girl take the initiative, pick a place, and invite me." he writes. "I’m told it’s fear of appearing desperate, but fuck that! Own your life, don’t let someone drive it for you." Of course, Stadil automatically sent messages first, and he also told me he "hated" the dating app Bumble, a highly popular option where women must message men first. "It gives all the control to the women. I'm not a passive guy: I take action, I like to control my life," he said.

Stadil is, on the whole, a self-effacing and well-intentioned person, both in his post and, fairly clearly, in his life. For example, he's amusing and self-deprecating when it comes to his appearance. "I’m a fat, bald, short guy whose only quality is that he isn’t an ax murderer." His most successful profile picture hid his flaws, he told me, chuckling. Even if his methods are unorthodox, it's easy to root for him, and in the end to feel disappointed along with him when he says he "failed" in love. "Dating is like enterprise sales," he writes, I think sort of heartbreakingly. "When your customer goes for a competing, more compelling product, you’re never told and you don’t get any feedback."

There was one glimmer of hope in all this: A Google employee whom Stadil refers to as Jane. "She was fun," he writes. "I had a special feeling so I brought her on a special date at Golden Gate Park. I brought a basket with fruits, macaroons and red wine and rented a boat. We took turns, and she rowed with the vigor of a thousand Vikings. At some point, we got lost and I used this opportunity to steal a magical first kiss. That was my best first date on more than 150, ironically the only one that hadn’t been part of my rigid routine."

Not only was Stadil more successful by devoting time and thought to someone he was interested in rather than abiding by his usual rote system. He was successful in part because he was honest, telling Jane about his program: "She just laughed and said that was ingenius and pretty smart," he recalled to me. After five fun dates, the two parted ways.

Stadil was less forthcoming, though, with his other dates. That made me question his choice to publish his story under his own name, revealing to women he'd met that they had, as he writes, "participated involuntarily in this experiment." Stadil does thank them for that participation, and he did leave some time between the dating spree before publishing his story. "I met smart girls, pretty girls, fun girls, and weird girls and it was great even though in the end, I didn’t find my soulmate." Did Stadil, I had to wonder, have any of his own questions about the ethics of his project?

Not really. "Coming from France, where dating is one at a time, and moving to San Francisco where people are dating four five or six people at a time, that ethical change was kind of already made," he says. "I didn't invent it, I just decided to take that a little bit further." In that vein, I might argue that plenty of people use standard greetings with online dating matches or swipe blindly to see who they might match with or even repeat the same date regimen with different people. Whether or not it's the most rewarding and promising way to go about dating is another matter.

Though none of Stadil's dates seem to have been the wiser, save Jane, some of his friends learned of the effort. "Once in a while, with a friend, we had a conversation, and they would start complaining about how repetitive [dating] was, they would say 'oh I tried building [a program to help],' and I would say, well, I have one too... I'm not the only one who has built this pre-built automation, a surprising number of my software engineering friends [have done so.]"

That said, Stadil won't share his program with them or anyone for that matter: "If you are to give this to other people, if other people were to use this, I would be arming my competition," he tells me. He also doesn't want to give it away willy-nilly for a reason he discovered over the course of his dates. Here's a Facebook post from him:

In hindsight, Stadil doesn't think his tactic was ideal. "I think I would have been more successful if I had spent that time going to a dance class or going to a yoga class, and not being on the dating apps, and being in social places." Couldn't he do both, I asked? No, he says, for him it's a binary. "I have fairly limited time so I had to choose one or the other."

Still, he ends his Medium post on a hopeful, if exhausted, note. "I'm running out of steam. It is a very time-, resource-, and attention-consuming thing. The whole point of automating was precisely to make it not so. It’s time for another approach. A drastic change. But not tonight. Tonight, I have a date."

Actually, he tells me, he hasn't been dating much. "I kind of sometimes start the app again and get a few dates that way, but I'm mostly focused on my company," Stadil says." The other strategy I'm contemplating is just choosing a market, a different market. For example, my friends that are in New York are doing somewhat similar things, and there there is a higher ratio of women to men, which skews the supply and demand equilibrium."

In the end, Stadil wonders whether he might attract a partner in revealing his quest. "Who knows, perhaps I’ll find my special someone through this post?" he writes. Hear that, ladies? Feel free to reach out with a message, automated or otherwise.

Previously: Eff-ing In SF, Vol. 8: Five Signs He's A 'Peter Pan'

via GIPHY

Sex, love, and other mysteries in the city your mother warned you about.

Peter Pan was the original fuccboi. That dude would NOT grow up, you know? So perhaps it should come as little surprise that a city with a long history of comparisons to Neverland has a shit-ton of fuccboi Peter Pan syndrome sufferers who are effing up your lovelife.

If that's the case, then this blog post is for you, and it's inspired by a rant that might stand for many others. A 35-year-old San Francisco woman, one who identifies as queer but is clearly dating all the wrong dudes, tells Elle magazine today that she is utterly exasperated with her romantic prospects here.

"Dating in the Bay Area is hard," she observes, "The tech guys are the worst; I've pretty much stopped dating them." Yes, a lot of tech guys are young, and therefore dumb, but she adds that "it's not just tech guys." In the end, it's a general immaturity — the kind that stands in the way of a person's ability to really appreciate and account for another person in their life. As she puts it, these guys "don't want you to have needs and wants of your own." Some she's dated have even adopted expedient political opinions just to get laid. "It kind of sucks when you thinks someone is super cool and really down with social justice and it turns out they're just into fucking girls who are into social justice," she says.

Now, this particular Wendy doesn't speak for everyone — there are plenty of people out there who are looking for a bit of boyish charm. Boys do make such excellent playthings. But when you've personally decided that you're through with the Peter Pan types you keep dating, look out for these five signs he isn't ready to grow the eff up.

1. He wears a little green hat

Peter Pan guys are easy to spot because they wear those fucking little green hats. You know the ones: With those little red feathers in them? Who do these guys think they are, some kind of puckish wood nymph? By extension, this rule can be applied to any dude that wears hats, especially uncool ones, especially inside. If he wears a hat at a restaurant, go to the bathroom and do not return.

2. He flies in through your window at night

Umm can we talk about how this is definitely NOT okay? This is some heavy breaking and entering shit, plus it's rude as fuck and a clear invasion of your space. This Peter Pan asshole needs to learn some serious boundaries. Even if he isn't literally sneaking in to your apartment, this type of person will always put his needs ahead of yours — at all hours. Yes, this includes unwanted texts for late night booty calls.

3. Super vague at making plans

"Second star to the left and straight on 'til morning" does not constitute a date night plan. Where are you going? Where is this headed? In the end, you need a dude who you can scheme things out with. And, if he's trying to take you somewhere and wont' tell you where that is, start preemptively typing 911 into your phone.

4. He has hella other chicks and they're tryna kill you!

Look, it's 2016: This thing doesn't have to be totally exclusive right away. Monogamy is so retro! But if your dude has all kindsa chicks and mermaids and such who are actually attempting to murder you, that's a red flag right there. Please be careful! Possessive behavior on the part of his friends, especially those with whom he might be romantically involved, is definitely a bad sign. While, yes sure, they could just be jealous — it's clearly a deal-breaker if he has other known partners who are out to get you. You just don't need that drama in your life anymore.

5. He fetishizes youth

Neverland doesn't last forever. Face it: We're all getting older. If he wants to ride a skateboard or a motorcycle or some shit to feel young, that's up to him. But if he's obsessed with youthfulness in others and is somehow trying to enforce it on you, it's time to make romantic investments elsewhere. You know where this is going: In the end, this dude is just gonna leave you for some young thing who doesn't have half of what you've got. I mean, what, is this dude gonna try to date your daughter or something? That's disgusting.

All previous volumes of Eff-ing in SF
Related: Neverland Forever: SF's History Of Lost Boys And Girls

When it comes to online dating, your average 20- or 30-something has a lot of options. Think Tinder, OKCupid, or Grindr to only name a few. The prevalence and variety of dating apps, however, can make it hard to know just exactly which one is right for you (economists refer to this as the "paradox of choice"). Thankfully, the good people at Priceonomics have come to the rescue, helping you decide which dating app to use by collating data like an app's number of users, frequency of use, age of users, and, of course, the gender split of various online dating options.

Some of the information, say for example that Tinder is the most popular of the apps surveyed or that almost 50 percent of Christen Mingle users are over the age of 50, is not that surprising. However, the fact that the average Happn user engages with the app 10 times per day might help inform your app choice when trying to find a date quickly.

The study also reveals regional differences: Grindr, which has a predominantly gay user base, is popular on the West Coast and in the South, while Bumble, which only allows women to initiate chats, is big on the East Coast. However, we both know you're not reading this to figure out the regional distribution of dating app use — you want to know what app is right for you. Well, understanding that no one but you can truly answer that question, Priceonomics takes a stab at it anyway.

"Straight men may want to check out Coffee Meets Bagel, while straight women can confidently choose between a number of apps where the gender ratio is favorable," explains the study, noting that CMB has the highest percentage of female users (other, interestingly, than Christian Mingle). "Bumble is a hub for twentysomethings," it continues, "while Match has the most users in their fifties."

There you go. Now, as to how you should use the apps? Our handy Tinder primer might help with that.

Related: Eff-ing In SF, Vol. 7: How Do Dating Apps Make Money?

I'll admit I hadn't been swiping very carefully on Tinder when I got a match, so, as one does, I went back to look at her profile.

"Let's match and never message each other," read her rather canny bio. "It will be fun!"

Dear reader, we never did message each other.

That's not uncommon, says Eve Peters, who holds a BA from Stanford and a JD from Berkeley. Formerly of OKCupid Labs, an incubator within that online dating giant, now she's the founder and CEO of a small dating app called Whim, available in San Francisco, New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles.

"We did a bunch of research and we found that only five percent of matches actually culminate in real life dates," Peters told me, "and that's after an average of two weeks of back-and-forth."

Instead, Whim promises "Dates, Not Texts." Enter your neighborhood and some times when you're free, then peruse potential matches. Swipe carefully: If you match with someone, you won't be given an option to message one another.

Instead, Whim will contact you both individually with a date spot and a time to meet there. "A lot of people are really trying to make it work— how about Wednesday lunch, how about Saturday — and it just fizzles," says Peters. While she admits that "people enter the date a little more comfortable... when they've established a rapport via messaging... that's outweighed by the disadvantage of false expectations." It's all too easy to form an attachment to an idea about someone or a few messages from them, only to be surprised and distracted when confronted with the real them.

Of course, you might need to make adjustments to Whim's plans for you. To do so, the app sends you your date's phone number, allowing you to SMS message them. As you might expect, that's been a sticking point for some — in a culture of unconscious swiping, awful internet trolls, and even sexual violence — it could be potentially dangerous.

But Peters says it hasn't been a problem. "Getting [users] at least into SMS land gets them to treat each other like real people," she says. Additionally, Whim's user base is small enough that Peters can individually respond to red-flagged behavior or harassment, in which case she'll remove the perpetrator and recommend that the victim block their harasser's phone number. If a user flaked on the date or their real-life behavior constituted harassment, Whim will also take action to remove them from the system.

Okay, so, just like that rando you met on Tinder with whom you're now sitting down to coffee, you probably already know whether Whim is a match for you and your needs. If it is, by all means, it is in the app store and I'll see you on there. Regardless, there's a lot to learn from the bevy of dating apps and the ways they differentiate themselves. As Peters admits, "In San Francisco... there's a new dating app coming out every week."

You yourself might have a quiver of apps at your disposal, and if so, you know that each one has a different character or flavor. How do they get such different users? How do they tell us to behave, and how do we conform to their cultures? How do they keep us swiping, and maybe most pressing for them, how do they make money when we do so?

First, to call some of these services "dating apps" might be a mischaracterization. They could just be about that ego boost you get from scoring a match. Users might not even be single, or looking to date — making them "more... a game in the app than they are [a service] delivering you offline results," as Peters puts it.

Others reward you simply for opening them. Bumble, a popular app where women message men first, might even be stacking the deck. "I get the impression that a lot of people like Bumble because the first set of girls are really hot, but I think they have an algorithm that probably puts their most right swiped-users up front," Peters conjectures.

Even if apps keep users coming back — which is a problematic proposition — profiting from them isn't easy. As one OKCupid founder, Christian Rudder, put it during a talk in San Francisco: The point of that company is to get people off its website, never to return. How do you make money on a one-time, one-off user?

Probably you don't, but also, probably that magical one-timer is not who uses OKCupid et al. Rudder's remark implies immediate, complete, and lifelong monogamy, with no side-swiping or trial-and-error. In real life, you might never know when you'll find yourself in dating applandia. And return users — or power users —  might help dating apps and sites in their quest to build revenue.

Last year, the Wall Street Journal wrote that dating websites were expected to make $1.17 billion, and apps to make $628.8 million per information from IBISWorld. But even with those figures growing, there might not be enough slices of the pie to go around. “In terms of revenue, the online-dating industry has matured, but there are too many players and not a lot are generating sufficient revenue for these sites,” IBISWorld researcher Britanny Carter told the Journal.

So far, the future is shaping up to be "freemium," a model for apps that is free to all but offers perks to those who pay. Last year saw the introduction of Tinder Plus, covered here by Techcrunch, a paid version of the app that allows premium users to undo matches, remove ads (another revenue stream) and get more "super likes," which boost users presence in others' feeds. A six-month Tinder Plus subscription costs under $6.

At Whim, the solution to monetization has been, like the app itself, a little more humble: A tip jar. If you liked your date — the app will ask you how it went — you can throw the company some cash to keep the service running.

"We're still considering a few different revenue models," Peters tells me, "We've always wanted to build a premium, rather than a freemium, experience."

Perhaps, for example, on a Whim date your first round of drinks would be free at a participating bar, and in exchange for a nominal monthly subscription or a date-by-date fee.

Most users, I would imagine, are more concerned with their own dating pursuits than how their internet matchmakers are making ends meet. For us, our time and effort are the currency, and the less of it wasted on bad dating experiences or pointless messages, the more we stand to profit. "If you don't like your date, it sucks," Peters says of a potential bummer date on Whim, "but at least you didn't spend all this time on it."

Previously: Eff-Ing In SF, Vol. 6: Completely Forget About Your Girlfriend With Automated Gift Delivery

"Roses are red, violets are blue, and we'll send them both to your girlfriend for you." Okay, while not in those exact words, that's the basic pitch behind a suite of services such as "Better Boyfriend" that target the young straight men of San Francisco, a set of truly hopeless romantics — and not in the positive sense.

The brainchild of 27-year-old finance consultant and Harvard graduate Dan Sullivan, Better Boyfriend has more than 350 members according to coverage in the Guardian. Each month, the home delivery subscription service emails them about seven gift and activity recommendations, from chocolates and tea sets to picnic baskets and in-home massage credits. Sullivan's three-person team delivers the unbranded, unlabeled gifts to boyfriends. At around $70 per month for the subscription, depending on the gifts selected, that nets Better Boyfriend roughly $17,000 in monthly revenue.

"BetterBoyfriend hit something,” Sullivan told the Guardian. “It’s a pain point everyone has.” So far his customers include friends in finance and tech, one of whom writes by way of a testimonial that, "The picnic basket was awesome! I had it fully stocked as soon as she woke up on Saturday and we had brunch in the park! Thank you!"

If you're the type to shop around, Fortune points out another, soon-to-launch service, the Gentleman App. "Gents, let's face it, we're not the best at relationships," reads that site. "It’s time you let a professional take over the date planning and daily affirmations." How does that work? "All of the dates are planned by real people who are deeply familiar with your city, so you get the most authentic experience. Complete your survey and we'll connect you with a real person to better understand your dating needs. " And girlfriends, take note — you can secretly sign your man up for the Gentleman App — you know, if you don't want to just cut out the middleman and buy yourself gifts.

San Francisco's hetero-bro population doesn't have a reputation for Lothario-like prowess in the first place, so if you don't have anyone for whom you need automated gift deliveries just yet, worry not. You might consider services aimed at scoring dates and relationships. Last year, Business Insider introduced us to Introverted Alpha, a loal dating consultancy. "My clients are usually guys in their late 20s," said Jones, "Most of my clients are very good looking and social, but they have built up all this tension around this one thing, and they don't want to be creepy and weird." Introverted Alpha pitches itself as an alternative to the more troubling Pick Up Artist macho approach: "You can attract women without being someone you’re not," the website advises.

While more secure types might have no problem admitting they sought professional guidance or outsourced gifts, there are potential problems for those less willing to disclose their secret hired gift elves. An early package from Better Boyfriend, for example, included a receipt with Sullivan's name, rather than the boyfriend in question. ‘Listen dude she’s not mad but Cynthia found out," that boyfriend wrote to Sullivan. Perhaps better discretion is called for as these services gain market share. And/or there are going to be a lot more women shrugging and admitting to their friends, "My boyfriend hired an app to send me stuff because he is lazy and otherwise lacks imagination, but at least he's spending money on me and I'm just waiting for that ring, amirite?"

All previous volumes of Eff-ing In SF.

April showers bring weekend nights staying home and swiping on Tinder, so the timing is right for an academic study published this week analyzing what types of profile picture poses and body language expressions get the most ‘Like’ swipes or green hearts on the online dating app. Turns out that profile pictures with “expansive” poses — what we sometimes call ‘manspreading’, though the practice can also be employed by females — are 27% more likely to get a ‘Like’. As someone who’s always desperate to get laid on Tinder, I was thrilled to see some peer-reviewed academic research on the topic.

In a new study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), a journal whose name the research community pronounces as “The Peenass” and I swear to God I’m not making that up, UC-Berkeley post-doctoral research fellow Tanya Vacharkulksemsuk and several other university researchers found that “postural expansiveness makes humans more romantically appealing”. The study performed 144 speed dates, but also 3,000 Tinder-swipe test cases, and found that arms-out expanded postures brought a higher incidence of Likes and desires for dates.

Per the study’s abstract:

“we tested the causality of postural expansion (vs. contraction) on attraction using a popular Global Positioning System-based online-dating application.… Mate-seekers were significantly more likely to select partners displaying an expansive (vs. contractive) nonverbal posture. Mediation analyses demonstrate one plausible mechanism through which expansiveness is appealing: Expansiveness makes the dating candidate appear more dominant. In a dating world in which success sometimes is determined by a split-second decision rendered after a brief interaction or exposure to a static photograph, single persons have very little time to make a good impression. Our research suggests that a nonverbal dominance display increases a person’s chances of being selected as a potential mate.”

A separate study that also incorporated data from OKCupid, Grindr, Match and eHarmony was published by Consumers’ Research this month and found that Tinder — despite being the most popular and most commonly used app — was also the app least likely to produce a relationship. Tinder also edged out OKCupid as the app most likely to solicit online harassment from suitors.

“Tinder users reported the least success with ending up in relationships of any duration and trailed the other platforms in terms of longevity,” notes author Kyle Burgess. “The highest reports of harassment came from Tinder and OkCupid users at 39 and 38 percent respectively.”

Once you’ve expansively manspread your arms for your new Tinder pictures and adjusted your expectations of dating success downward, remember our report last fall about the best opening lines on dating apps for San Franciscans.

Related: SNL Accused Of Ripping Off Sketch About Parody Dating App

Has cupid struck this year? Or has he struck out? Well, depending on your particular level of commitment or lonesome despair, here are a few things you might enjoy doing this Valentine's Day. All events are on February 14th, which as fate would have it falls on a nice, low key Sunday. You could always just go to church, you know?

Taken: You and your significant other have been seeing each other for some time, so isn't it time you saw something else, like a nice view? Peruse this list of romantic destinations with views we've compiled for this and all similar occasions.

Taken and Naked: Enjoy some couple's nudity on Sunday at the spa with a Valentine's Day special. Archimedes Banya, which offers a love birds' special, are also among SFist's 11 best spas, a list you might want to consult in general for your spa day needs. Archimedes Banya, 748 Innes Avenue, Basic Passes start at $42

Somewhat Taken: Your best chance at taking this romance to the next level? Exactly! I was thinking the same thing! A Lady and the Tramp reenactment with spaghetti Sunday at Capo's, Tony Gemignani's Chicago pizza spot in North Beach. As you'll see, they're making it relatively affordable at just $50 with a glass of wine included. Capo's, 641 Vallejo Street, 5 - 10 p.m.

Uncomfortably Sober and Alone: We can fix half of this right away with SFist's list of the city's best dive bars. Tell 'em we sent you, and expect a gruff nod and/or a quizzical look. That's the sign we worked out with them in advance.

Decrepit and Alone: Consult SFist's list of the best old man bars. These spots, from Aunt Charlie's to Clooney's, are fit for old men of any age or gender.

Gay and Alone: Hosted by their softball team, SF Eagle's Valentine Beer Bust is sure to be anything but. The competition to find someone may be fierce, but in the end, most everyone at the Eagle is batting for the same team. SF Eagle, 398 12th Street, 3 - 6 p.m.

Alone with Popcorn: If all you need is a bit of darkness and some cool films, Indiefest is your knight in shining armor. Check out a screening of SF Indifest's shorts, "Don't Get All Mushy On Me." Roxie Theater, 3117 16th St. 2:15 p.m. $12