The selective dating app has a reliable proposition: not everyone gets in, and that is the product. It is an efficient piece of positioning, because a waiting list simultaneously implies quality, creates anticipation and excuses a small user base.

What has become harder to establish is what the selection consists of.

The disclosure has thinned

Earlier entrants in this segment were relatively specific about their criteria — some described a committee, some described the attributes considered, some described a member-voting mechanism. Whether one found those criteria appealing was another matter, but they were stated.

The current convention is considerably vaguer. Applications are reviewed; standards are high; the community is curated. What is being reviewed, against what, by whom, is not said.

Why vagueness is commercially rational

Because specificity invites complaint. A published criterion is a criterion that can be shown to have been applied inconsistently, and any stated basis for selection in this area will strike some part of the audience as objectionable. An unstated basis cannot be argued with.

It is also, one suspects, sometimes vague because it is thin. A “review” that consists of a photograph check and a queue is a review; describing it would not flatter it.

The question we would put

Not “how selective are you”, which invites a percentage nobody can verify. Rather: what specifically is assessed, by whom, and what proportion of applications are declined — and will you publish that.

Firms that answer are telling members something real. Firms that decline are entitled to decline, and readers are entitled to notice.

We would add our standing caveat: we cannot audit a vetting process from outside, and we do not claim to. What we can do is record what a provider publishes about it, and note where it publishes nothing.

What the waiting list definitely does

It concentrates a launch and it flatters the accepted. Both are real effects. Neither is a statement about who else is on the other side of the gate, and a member paying for exclusivity is entitled to ask which of the three they are buying.

For adults (18+) only.