Facebook parent company Meta has reportedly shut down its experimental video speed-dating service, Sparked, after less than a year of testing. The company informed its testers via email that the service will officially close on January 20, 2022.
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The company confirmed last year that it was testing a new dating service called Sparked, which was developed by the NPE team. The service hosted several “audio only” date nights where users could chat with one another, but not appear on video.
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Sparked was a separate effort from Facebook Dating, which was first introduced in 2018 as a way to use the existing connections and profile to turn friends into more-than-friends. It also had a starkly different flow from other dating apps like Tinder and Bumble that allowed users to view profiles and photos before swiping on messaging prospective dates.
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At a fixed time, users from a certain area or demographic would take part in dating events, including a few global events. They'd have four minutes to chat with a potential match, and if they both wanted to spend more time with each other, they could set up a second, 10-minute date and/or exchange contact details.
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Facebook wrote in the email, “We started building Sparked in late 2020 to help people find love through an experience rooted in kindness. Since then, thanks to regular input and feedback from you, we improved where we could, learned a ton, and made connections between people. Like many good ideas, some take off and others, like Sparked, must come to an end.”
