PSFK Interview: I’m In Like With You

I’m In Like With You is a new "flirting" site that brings some much-needed levity to online interaction. Still in beta (though they even have a Facebook app), IILWY is attracting lots of twenty and thirtysomethings based on its Dating Gaming premise–users pose questions and can choose to contact their favorite highest bidder. PSFK interviewed founder Charles Forman about the site and its development a few days ago (Dan Albritton recently left the venture).

What’s the mission of the site?

To be the greatest contributor to the decline of productivity in the world

Good job so far (took us long enough to post this). Who is your target audience?

Everyone who likes to peoplewatch. And anyone who is bored at work. I say that it’s great thing to do while you should be doing more important things.

Ages?

18-dead. We are seeing that our current userbase is about 22-35

How would you describe the site?

It’s a fun place to watch, maybe meet people, and feel comfortable and secure. I think interestingly we got pigeon-holed as a dating site almost immediately by bloggers. We hate that. Internet dating is retarded. Any dating site that’s out now is basically a mailing list for men. They essentially spam attractive girls and get a 1% response rate. You have the same problem on MySpace with friends requests. It’s a communications free-for-all.

It sure seems like a dating site….

We don’t care about match-making. We don’t care about successful relationships. This is a kind of a social network, in that if someone wanted to be contacted then they could create a game as an
ice breaker. We called this "flirting", which people do associate with dating, but we just wanted to make an interesting forum for communication. People can meet if they want or they can just watch and be a voyeur.

What are the future plans for it?

We’ve noticed that a lot of people who are on the site don’t create games and don’t bid. They maybe have boyfriends or girlfriends but find the whole process entertaining. We’ll be adding a feature that allows people to bet on who they think is going to win. We want to engage these watchers.

The next version of the site will have an amazing collaborative browsing tool. If you are on the site with a few on contacts, you will be able to go through site and see that person’s mouse move across the screen and view profiles together. It will add a serious amount of value.

Also, another feature will have the site going into autopilot when left idle. It will automatically select profile and games and become like a show for people to watch. We’re also thinking of adding a news channel that is a parody of culture/lifestyle/gossip blogs–the Gawkers of the world. The whole point of the site is to entertain people.

i’m in like with you