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Ohlala — Welcome to the wonderful world of instant paid dating
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I remember seeing this when it had made a splash in Germany and was creeping into NYC.
The coverage on TechCrunch: Ohlala, An Uber For Escorts, Launches Its ‘Paid Dating’ Service In NYC (but the company are clear to mention Escorts are not welcomed!
The Verge published a longer piece today: A new app lets women charge for a night out. Will dating join the on-demand economy?
The CEO has pinned this post to her Profile
@bentossell Her being a female founder has nothing to do with this and her claiming that it does just hurts every female founder who actually has been looked over.
@lajeunesse88 to be clear I wasn't saying one thing or another. merely just stating press and what the founder had pinned to her profile
For the first time ever, I wish I could down-vote a product on PH. If you have to say you're not an escort service, it's probably because you are. This doesn't help: "After you both agree on terms (i.e. price and location), the date is locked in."
The reality is that this kind of marketplace already exists elsewhere — i.e. on Craigslist and Reddit. While informal markets like that are easier to dismiss or ignore, if Ohlala is successful, it's interesting to imagine a world where the behaviors and activities that happen covertly could be made more visible, and therefore made safer.
I admit to having hangups about paying for sex (because it seems to cheapen it from a moralistic perspective), but we pay for people to use their bodies in a lot of different ways (physical labor, etc) — and though historically paying for sex has been associated with (rightly so) exploitation, I can also imagine an evolution in economics and behavior that is less exploitative. To flip this a bit, I think it's possible (and likely) that a market like this will have both empowerment and exploitation going on simultaneously. It really comes to down economics, context, and the power structures in which participants exist. Does that mean the market shouldn't exist? I think my point is: the market already exists, and Ohlala shouldn't be more offensive just because it's a more visible center of this behavior.
@chrismessina thank you for taking a minute to pen thoughtful remarks on this. I personally don't have an opinion but I appreciate your input. Escort or not, building and launching a product is difficult and the builders of this deserve more than just the trolling you see above.
@chrismessina to your point - if this was happening in Netherland it would probably seem normal. I guess there prostitution is safe, pays the taxes and it's outside the influence of crime
To me this looks like an email honeypot for blackmailing founders who register. Set up by a large scale VC to lower share prices. 😉 Mmh, shouldn't that be removed @bentossell?
What??? The website says "Ohlala is not an escort service. Escorts are not welcome." wonder how will they do community management
Relay