Ignighter Blog

Reflections on a Philadelphia Group Date

[this post originally appeared on owocki.com]

This past Saturday night I had the great privilege to host a group date at the Noddinghead Brewpub in Philadelphia, PA. As some of friends & colleagues already know, I have been working as the Lead Developer for Ignighter.com for the past 6 months. Ignighter is an online ‘group dating’ service, aimed at young people who have just left college, moved to a big city, and having a tough time meeting fun new young people.



I’d always knew, since I first sat down with Dan and Adam, that group dating as a webservice had major potential. It’s already a huge phenomenon in Japan, where young people go out on ‘compa dates’. I mean, on an intellectual level, it just makes sense. Meeting people with your group of friends is safer, less awkward, and more fun than one-on-one meetings.



But, this Saturday night, I realized, on a whole new level, how much potential there is for group dating in America. The date this weekend was fun. And, I mean, F-U-N. For the two years I lived in Philadelphia, my group of buddies had a very routinized nightlife. Every weekend, it was the same bars with the same group of friends. About halfway through my group date on Saturday night, watching my friends mingle with the group of girls we’d just met, watching the smiles, the high fives, the positive body language, I realized on a whole deeper level: this website could really change the way young people meet. Along with that realization, came a few other insights about Ignighter:

• It’s not about finding a life partner. It’s about improving your social life. - The group atmosphere doesn’t lend itself to much romance, but it is an opportunity to meet a whole new group of friends. Chances are, you’re going to hit it off with at least one of them
• It’s easy, I mean: really easy - All I had to do was send a few messages, pick a time and a place to meet, show up, and holy cow: I just met 5 new ladies who live in my town. And shit: they’re interesting too.
• No matter how you slice it, it’s a whole freakin’ lot of fun - If you have a social bone in your body, you love meeting new people.

I came away from this group date feeling energized about my job, and bullish about the future of online group dating. Perhaps even more telling, my roommate, who has been cynical about online social networking and dating, but reluctantly accompanied me on the group date, came away raving about how great of a time he had.

I’m interested in comments from readers. What elements of a night-out make it the most fun? How do you meet new people when you’re out-on-the town? Would you use a webservice that is designed to set you up with a group of young people in your area?

November 10th, 2008 Posted by kevin | Uncategorized |

Oy Survey

Hey Ignighter friends, Dan and I wagered a naked run throughout the streets of Boulder based on the results of the following quiz. So if you will please take a minute to fill out the questions it’ll really help us figure out which one of us is the loser and which one of us gets to run around town in the buff. Thanks!

**Update 1: Some browsers may not show a submit button at the bottom (damn you Wordpress!). If that is the case, please click this link to take the survey. Thanks so much and sorry for the inconvenience

***Update 2: Adam had a nervous breakdown trying to get the survey to embed into the blog properly - it just wouldn’t work across browsers. Kevin took over, removed the survey from the blog and is kindly asking people to follow the link to take the survey. Thank you so much and we apologize for the inconvenience. Adam is now receiving flowers.

June 16th, 2008 Posted by Adam | Uncategorized |

BoulderDash - Ignighter Road Trip Part 3

At the end of Part 2 Jerry Rig and Alan Wrench were relishing their new manly alter-egos. They honeymoon wouldn’t last long though…

We woke up on the third day of our trip to find that somebody (the consensus points to me Rig) had left the headlights on the night before. The car was dead along with our Mr. Hyde charade. Needless to say, we didn’t have jumper cables. And while we had a conceptual grasp on the process of jumping a car, neither of us had ever taken the lead. We know, it’s pathetic. However we were fortunate enough to get some much needed help from the very kind Omahanian woman who worked at the check-in/concierge/valet/wake-up service/general maintenance desk.

Thanks to our new friend, we did get the car running. Now all we had to do was get the hood shut properly and we could be on our way. Unfortunately, we needed the manual to do so. Not a joke.

Once we got the hood shut we were back on the road, feeling ready to conquer the last leg of the trip and move into our summer digs in Boulder. The only obstacle left it seemed - aside from the incessantly pouring rain and disconcerting proximity to deadly twisters - was lunch.

Food stops along Rte. 80 in western Nebraska don’t come up too often. So when we passed a “food exit” at 12:45 we knew it would be best to pull off and eat rather than risk the chance that we wouldn’t come across another for hours. And we still weren’t passing any damn food stands selling freshly picked ears of corn on the side of the road! Share your product with us Nebraska, you’re the Cornhuskers! I always keep a used tissue in my pocket in case I come across a stranger who wants to know what Jersey is like. The point is, you have to share your culture with your fellow Americans. But I digress.

And do you want to know the reason for the digression? I’m trying to avoid reliving the following horrendous scene.

We decided to eat at Taco Bell. It was disgusting. I ordered a chicken quesadilla and a chicken taquito. From what I could tell, they consisted of the exact same three ingredients and only those ingredients (cheese, tortilla, rubber chicken) the only difference was that they were rolled up into different shapes; one looked like a half-circle while the other looked a lot like Joey Fatone.

The shape of the creation would ultimately prove inconsequential. The rubber chicken had its strangle hold on me and it wasn’t sitting well. The moment I got behind the wheel I felt incredibly queasy. We drove through the pouring rain for about 20 more minutes, with me trying to breathe while Dan laughed and continued bringing up gross details about the food we had just eaten.

Dan: I think your Fatone roll-up had some beak in it. It wasn’t supposed to crunch like that was it?

Me (between slow breaths): Shut up Dan.

Dan: I still don’t understand why you ate ALL of it.

Me: Me neither.

Why did I eat the whole thing? Ughhhhh.
We made it as far as the next turnoff when I knew I couldn’t drive any longer. We pulled off the highway into a deserted convenience store. I ran to the bathroom to refund my “meal” and Dan followed. With the camera.

Once the beak was out of my system, Ignighter was back on the road for the home stretch. A few hours later we were in Boulder! Road trip successfully completed!

While the trip sure had its ups (calzone) and its downs (vomit), it was definitely something we won’t soon forget. And Ignighter’s upcoming summer in Boulder promises to be an unforgettable experience too. It’s something we’ll try hard to hold onto forever. Because in the words of Kid Rock:

“Now nothing seems as strange as when the leaves began to change
Or how we thought those days would never end

Sometimes I’ll hear that song and I’ll start to sing along
And think man I’d love to see that girl again”

In our next post we’ll explain what exactly it is that Ignighter is doing here in Boulder, CO for the summer. It’s pretty exciting stuff!

May 28th, 2008 Posted by Adam | Uncategorized |

Our New Lead Developer

Part 2 of the Ignighter Road Trip will be coming shortly, but before that we wanted to introduce the newest member of our team.

Kevin Owocki is Ignighter’s new lead developer. Kevin has 7 years of software engineering experience, and he has run a handful of small scale web companies. He’s an avid runner and ultimate frisbee player. He loves exploring the outdoors, meeting new, interesting people, and chatting about technology and startups. Ask him about his unique ability to relate nearly any situation to the plot of a Simpsons, Seinfeld, South Park, or Family Guy episode. Kevin is psyched for a landmark summer, and we’re really excited to have him on the team!

May 25th, 2008 Posted by Adam | About Ignighter, Ignighter Update, Uncategorized, a/s/l check, ignighter |