Remember the Aughts, when singletons (we called single people “singletons” and they spent time “quirkyalone”) used to flock to the various sites that featured Nerve personals? If you liked reading The Onion, for instance, you could visit their personals section and look for someone local to you, who would have written a little seeking-other ad usually modeled upon the snarky, urbane, interestingly-damaged-goods style of The Onion itself.

Less bruited about was the fact that Nerve white-labeled itself for a number of sites, and if you wanted to, you could play the detective game of deciding which hipster site fed which singleton into the interpersonal food court that was Nerve. At some point, it felt like all the underemployed writers in the world were logging into Nerve to freshen up their copy, polish a headline, optimize a keyword or two; they didn’t want to date you, necessarily, but they did, like all writers, appreciate the feedback from fans.

Now, with the the Teens in the offing, Nerve is going another direction, and that brings them to Seattle “just in time for Valentine’s Day,” they tell us. Nerve Dating dispenses with the whole chore of the encyclopedic dating profile. CEO Sean Mills, deriding the trend toward algorithmic love matches, puts it like this:

For most people, the challenge is less about figuring out whether you like someone, and more about starting that first conversation so you can meet more people. It can be really hard to walk across the room and start talking to someone you don’t know. We wanted to make that easier, and to do it in a way that felt natural and casual instead of gimmicky and contrived. (“I see you and I are 93% compatible!” — once again, no one ever.)

The site we came up with feels more like a lively party than an awkward blind date. On Nerve Dating, you actively share your thoughts and opinions about restaurants, bars, movies, music, and books, and anything else you’ve seen or done; then, you’re instantly introduced to other people who did the same.

“It can be really hard to walk across the room and start talking to someone you don’t know.” Mills doesn’t add, “Right, Seattle?” But we’re pretty sure he’s looking at us, meaningfully. Seattle is fourth in line for launch, after, of course, New York, San Francisco, and Los Angeles. As of today, says Mills (or his PR bot):

[P]eople in Seattle will be able to meet based not on who is mathematically matched to them, but on conversations about culture, news, and their favorite activities. In a town with a lively music, culture, and food scene like Seattle, it just makes sense to have a dating site that celebrates the voice of an individual. It’s colorful conversations, not math, that create connections.

Prove it, Seattle!