From Dawn Silicon Valley has a widespread perception that San Francisco is, to put it mildly, not a dating destination.
The city is known for its imbalanced gender ratio, according to census data. There is also a common stereotype that men working in technology lack social and emotional skills, have little interest in fashion, and are more likely to wear Patagonia vests and Meta glasses than make an effort with their appearance.
On August 31, Celeste Amadon, founder of the AI-powered dating app Known, made a bold attempt to challenge that stereotype. In an X thread accompanied by a moody, upturned selfie, she announced that her team was creating a list of “the most dateable people in science fiction” called the “San Francisco Hot List.” The nomination form invited people to recommend single friends based on qualities such as ambition, achievements, reputation, and aura.
The post was quickly mocked online by people both inside and outside the technology industry. Some called the list “disgusting,” while others joked that San Francisco has too few eligible singles. “The solution to dating in SF is to leave SF,” one female founder posted. Amadon, however, said the campaign became highly effective marketing for Known, generating more than 15,000 posts in the 24 hours after her tweet. It also pushed back against negative perceptions of San Francisco by promoting the idea that the city’s technology community can be attractive, social, and desirable.
“Not to be cheesy, but I think the sci-fi dating scene is worth defending,” Amadon told WIRED. “It’s been heavily criticized as a difficult place to meet people, but there are a lot of highly qualified people here—not only in terms of physical attractiveness, but also overall dateability.”
Known’s Hot List is part of a broader conversation about the appeal of San Francisco singles and why some local technology professionals appear increasingly interested in being perceived as attractive and socially desirable.
Last summer, two women in the technology industry, Madison Khanna, who is on the watch list, and Cat Orman, hosted a “Force Ratio” party at a Tesla showroom in San Francisco. Their goal was to ensure that the event attracted an equal number of men and women. According to the invitation, the atmosphere would be “unapologetically feminine and fun,” while “Patagonia vests will be turned away at the door.”
On August 28, Georgia Witchell, founder of Mantis Biotech, published an X thread titled “Tech Is Having a Hot Girl Renaissance.” Witchell cited Known and insurance company Corgi as examples of how social media has become filled with posts from “young, attractive women taking mirror selfies of their elegant, slutty duck faces” to promote their startups.
Witchell said her argument is not primarily a criticism of young women using their appearance as a marketing tool. Instead, she wants to explain how and why appearance became part of the startup marketing strategy. She told WIRED that the trend reflects a “renaissance of sales culture in science fiction.”
In much of Silicon Valley, software marketing was once “something geeks sold to other geeks,” Witchell said. But the rise of vibe coding has lowered the barriers to building technology products while raising expectations for marketing and branding. “The fact that you can build complex products is not enough to give you the luxury of not being charismatic,” she said. “People are starting to realize that.”
Brooke LeBlanc, community director at Corgi and one of the people Witchell mentioned in her thread, responded in an X post: “My mom just heard about the Rising Women of the Technology Renaissance and is really excited about the news,” she wrote. “No one in my family from Georgia can believe that a story about a woman caring about how she looks makes the news.”
Amadon said the connection between Known’s Hot List and Witchell’s thread was “minimal,” although she understood why the app’s marketing had attracted attention. She also noted that X is not Known’s primary marketing channel. Still, she acknowledged that the list was designed to capitalize on the conversation and create a more positive discussion about dating in San Francisco.
The strategy appears to be working. On September 1, Known published its first group of Hot List nominees, including startup founders such as LeBlanc and Jasper Carmichael Jack, CEO of the AI company Artisan. Not a Patagonia vest was in sight.
Source: www.wired.com