Com-Pat and Dateline
Using computers to find love in 1960s Britain.
The dating app seems modern — a byproduct of a social media generation where meeting matches happens online rather than in bars. And the apps have permeated our culture: I talk about Hinge with friends over brunch; The Tinder Swindler is currently trending on Netflix.
But, this world of digital dating isn’t new.
The first computer dating programs arose in 1960s England. There, two programs — Com-Pat and Dateline — came to dominate. Both functioned the same way (participants would complete a questionnaire that would be sent in and analyzed by a computer to identify compatible matches), but they offered different takes on the role of computer matching programs in 1960s dating.
In 1964, Joan Ball created the computer dating program Com-Pat (“computerized compatibility”). Prior to Com-Pat, Joan ran a marriage bureau and escort service (women required male escorts to attend most nighttime functions — it wasn’t sexual!), so she drew on her client base to launch the dating service. By 1967, she had “over 7,000 members matched,” according to a Com-Pat advertisement.
The rise of the program came during a period when British women were largely reliant on their relationships with men for economic stability. Women’s wages were not sufficient to pay for housing without living with a spouse or roommates. Women couldn’t get mortgages without a male to co-sign. In other words, marriage was an economic necessity for 1960s British women — and Com-Pat addressed this need head-on.
In turn, Com-Pat was explicitly focused on matches for marriage. The program was run by a woman and catered to a slightly older crowd, including people who had been divorced or widowed. By advertising itself as “well-known” and “well-established” and piggybacking off its credibility as a marriage bureau, Com-Pat sold itself as the dating program for those looking for “real relationships.”
The other dominant 1960s British computer dating program — Dateline — took a different approach. Founded in 1967 by 26-year-old bachelor John Patterson, an unemployed college graduate, Dateline grew rapidly; by 1972, Dateline was gaining close to 500 clients a week and reaching a database size of 50,000 people. By the 1980s, it was (reportedly) the world’s largest dating service.
While Com-Pat was founded on a veneer of being “well-established,” Dateline was plagued by sleaze. For instance, founder John Patterson was arrested in 1969 for trying to sell several different men “a list of 200 beautiful, sophisticated girls who would act as escorts and provide a night out ‘never to be forgotten.’” In turn, Dateline was defined by a perception that the service was built on commodifying women as much as on matching up users.
The differences between Com-Pat and Dateline were captured in their marketing campaigns. Where Com-Pat focused on respectability and a continuity with the past use of marriage bureaus, Dateline emphasized a newness and sense of novel experimentation. One Dateline ad read: “Are you adventurous? If the answer is yes, you must take part in this great social experiment.”
And, in turn, these different approaches to computer dating affected user experiences. Com-Pat drew on a clientele of Londoners who wanted to get married or remarried — the folks who would’ve previously done so using a marriage bureau. (Marriage bureaus were matchmaking services.) The service talked openly about how they wanted to match “like people with like people” and avoid “untraditional” matches like interracial or inter-religious couples. Basically, Com-Pat mirrored the social conservatism of the era.
Dateline, on the other hand, was focused primarily on profits. Matching was a pathway to moneymaking. It became the most profitable computer dating service in Britain, but it never prioritized client satisfaction. Dateline’s founder said he was “too busy to really reflect on the sociology of his operations,” saying that “even if his members have nothing else in common they have at least all joined Dateline.” Many users filed complaints against Dateline claiming the service took their money without sending them out on dates or intentionally matched them with incompatible people just for profit.
At their core, Com-Pat and Dateline are algorithms. They surveyed people, and they analyzed the data. While this might seem neutral, these programs — like all algorithms — reflect the biases of their creators: A middle-aged woman running a marriage bureau or a twenty-something unemployed bachelor. Where one aims for marriage, the other aims for money.
But they both — just like the dating apps of today — used modern technology to help people fulfill one of the oldest human desires: Finding connection.
Happy Valentine’s Day. xoxo.
❤️
Notes.
This post is excerpted and adapted from a brilliant article by Mar Hicks on how early computer dating systems replicated social order. Her article goes into so much more depth, including a look at the first American computer dating system, which came out of Harvard.
This 99% Invisible episode is a great look at algorithm bias. Joy Buolamwini of MIT is an expert on algorithm bias and marginalized communities; here’s an NPR interview she did.