Plans For Bored Ape Dating App 'Lonely Ape' Scrapped After Too Many Bros Sign Up, Or The Whole Project May Have Been A Troll Job

Update 5/20/2022: BuzzFeed released an article stating that the dating app was a prank, highlighting an earlier cancelation tweet from February 10th and a DM correspondence with BuzzFeed reporter Katie Notopoulos.

In early March, NFT collective Y4K went viral for announcing the creation of a dating app for Bored Ape and other NFT owners, dubbed the Lonely Ape Dating Club. Two months later, plans for the app have apparently been scrapped.

"Due to unforeseen circumstances, this project has been put on hold indefinitely," the website's homepage reads. However, according to its Twitter account, the circumstances which led to the cancelation of Lonely Ape Dating Club were in fact very foreseen by many outside observers — those who signed up for the app were overwhelmingly men.

Here's where the tale gets interesting. At the time the initial story of the "Lonely Ape Dating Club" went viral, there were many aspects of the app that seemed ridiculous to the point of parody. For starters, users wouldn't upload pictures or information about themselves to access the app, but rather link their cryptocurrency wallet. They could then filter potential romantic partners by cryptocurrency value and net worth. There were also options to attract potential crypto bigwigs by sending them tips using the app's "Coin Digger" feature.

A more thorough look into Year 4000 and the Lonely Ape Dating Club app suggests the possibility that the entire thing may have indeed been an elaborate prank or troll.

For starters, googling Y4k NFTs only brings up stories about the app and no additional information about the collective. The Year 4000 Twitter account has a mere 57 followers, and its only tweets are the announcement of the Lonely Ape Dating App, retweets of people making fun of it, and the announcement of its cancelation.

Next, there's the curious story of how the project went viral in the first place. The announcement of the app appeared on the sites LifeStyle Asia and HypeBae both of whom appear to have merely regurgitated a press release about the app. Of note, LifeStyle Asia is, as the name suggests, a website primarily focused on restaurants and fashion trends in Thailand, while Hypebae is a similarly fashion-focused website — neither are cryptocurrency news-focused publications.

Eventually, the creators nailed an interview with Cryptodroid, who noted that the venture seemed doomed since it was initially open to only Bored Ape members. However, the creators told them that the decision to only open the app to BAYC owners was made "because it is one of the most stylish projects, with impressive artwork and an extremely sociable community."

The project caught attention on Twitter once it was spotted by the Twitter account @CoinersTakingLs, an account devoted to documenting various mishaps of the crypto community. Similarly, though Y4K announced the cancelation of the app on May 12th, the story didn't gain traction until last night when it was spotted by @CoinersTakingLs, bringing schadenfreude down on the entire alleged project.

Also notable, prominent BAYC critic Ryder Ripps popped into the replies of Y4K's announcement to seemingly dance on the Lonely Ape Dating Club's grave.

At the moment, there's lots of circumstantial evidence to suggest the Lonely Ape Dating Club was an elaborate prank to troll the NFT community and further sour the general public's opinion on NFTs. However, considering how many legitimate NFT projects sound ridiculous to the outside world, it's easy to see why people took the project at face value.