Grindr & Scruff & Hornet… Oh My! Using Gay Social Networking Apps When Traveling

“I’m a big believer in that you can only see the people around you, that you cannot say to Grindr ‘hey I’m going to be traveling, let’s say I’m visiting New York, so I want to change my location and start chatting with guys in advance of my trip.’ We don’t allow that,” Grindr’s Joel Simkhai explains. “The idea is I want you to meet now, I don’t want you to go on, start chatting with guys, asking them a million questions with no intention of meeting them. Our solution is that you have to be in that location, and then you can start talking and hopefully meeting.

“We are an app to meet, we’re not an app for you to chit-chat endlessly or to get restaurant advice,” Joel adds. “I mean, those are all byproducts, but we’re designed for you to meet and that’s really important. We’re not a restaurant-planning app. I don’t want to be the app where every tourist messages you two weeks prior to their arrival to get you to help with their itinerary. That’s not what we’re about. Once you land, find out what’s hot tonight, what’s going on tonight.”

Hornet takes a slightly different position on this argument, because it does allow you to investigate different locations with the ‘Explore’ tab, although the distance indicator will tell other users exactly how far away from them you really are, so there’s no misrepresentation. “Both from talking to users and the international team who started Hornet, getting insider tips about places from locals was something we wanted,” explains Hornet’s Sean Howell. “We see a lot of users travel virtually before they arrive to a destination, to chat up folks about what part of town they should book their hotel in, renting a house that might be listed on a local website and not airbnb, finding gay clubs, and of course meeting locals.”

Although they enable you to connect with guys via a device that fits in the palm of your hand, in the comfort of your home, hotel room, airplane, taxi, beach, restaurant, art gallery, or wherever you may be, it’s important to remember that this is purely a first step. You wouldn’t have sat alone in a hotel room just perusing the gay listings in a guidebook, and similarly you shouldn’t use these apps as a surrogate social life, whether at home or on vacation.

So when you arrive in a new place, how can you get the most out of these apps? Grindr’s Joel Simkhai and GROWLr CEO and Founder Coley Cummiskey share their top traveller tips:

1) Get a local SIM card

“I’m obsessive about getting local SIM cards so I can have unlimited data, as unfortunately I pay very high roaming charges,” Joel says. “And I often try and get them in advance so as soon as I land at the airport I can swap my SIM and start Grinding. That’s usually the first thing I do when the plane lands. And sometimes I don’t even wait! Sometimes I’m in the air and you have a very poor signal, and I’ve got it on. I’m surprised how a lot of people don’t get local SIM cards.”

2) Be Wi-Fi aware

“Even if I have a local SIM card, I’m always asking for WiFi,” says Joel.

3) Shirt or no shirt?

“Shirtless photos that also show a face get the most messages by far, no matter what shape you are in,” says Coley. Joel agrees, “I think a shirtless profile is always appropriate.”

4) Let others know you’re on vacation
“One thing that is very popular is when people write that they are a visitor on their profile. I think it’s a good idea,” says Joel. “It’s good to say where you’re from, how long you’re staying. Mention what languages you speak.”

5) Keep the conversation going

“Unless you are done talking to someone, avoid short one word conversation killers like ‘LOL’ while you chat,” says Coley.

6) Take charge

Some foreign countries have different plugs and voltage, so ensure you have the right adaptors before you travel, or you’ll spend your first day flat and inactive while you try and source one. There are also various devices on the market that prolong your battery life. “Get a Mophie Battery case if you’re out and about so your battery doesn’t drain,” says Joel. “I have one, I couldn’t live without it.”

7) Refresh

“The ‘nearby’ tab on GROWLr only shows users that have been active in the last one to three hours,” says Coley. “So the more often you open the app, the more likely you are to be seen.”