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Tinder invites 15 more countries to join the U.S. in ‘swiping’ to find their best presidential match

Tinder

Image Credit: Paul Sawers / VentureBeat

As we edge ever closer to the 2016 U.S. presidential election, a number of organizations have been ramping up their efforts to get folks out and voting.

We already saw Facebook’s reminders boost voter sign-up. And earlier this year, not-for-profit youth organization Rock the Vote teamed up with Tinder to match users to their most appropriate candidate based on their opinions on political and economic issues. Now, Rock the Vote is expanding the partnership to include Tinder users in 15 additional countries.

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As before, Tinder users can swipe left or right on a range of issues, including immigration, taxes, gun control, and minimum wage. Before they’re matched with the most suitable candidate, they’ll be asked who they would vote for as the next U.S. president. Then Tinder will tell you if your policy choices match with your preferred candidate.

Above: Tinder: Swipe the Vote

While it makes sense to re-run the Swipe the Vote campaign closer to election day, given that we’re down to two candidates, it may seem odd that Tinder’s opening things to 15 more countries, when only those in the U.S. are able to actually, you know, vote. However, “Clinton vs. Trump” has engrossed people the world over, so it is an election that will undoubtedly be of interest to many Tinder users, regardless of where they live.

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After completing the poll, U.S. users can then discover where there closest polling station is — powered by Rock the Vote — and share their match across the usual social media channels. Everyone else — in Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Colombia, France, Germany, India, Japan, Korea, Mexico, Russia, Spain, and the U.K. — can still tell the world who they would vote for. We can perhaps expect a few transatlantic arguments surfacing on Facebook as a result of this.

“The voices and opinions of our users are more important than ever — with this election marking the first time that nearly all millennials can vote,” explained Tinder founder and CEO Sean Rad. “We are excited to be doing our part to educate and mobilize our users, in partnership with Rock the Vote, while driving global conversation and awareness about this historic election.”

It’s interesting to see Tinder continue to align itself with campaigns that have little to do with its core service offering, and it could well hint at similar initiatives in the future. Indeed, the U.S. presidential election isn’t the first such tie-up that Tinder has gotten involved with — last year, it teamed up with the National Health Service (NHS) in the U.K. to raise awareness about organ donation.

At any rate, Tinder says that it plans to release data based on its poll results next week (ahead of the election), so that could provide some interesting insights.

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