FAQ & Submission Guidelines

What is The Date Map Project?

Date Maps is a storytelling project of romantic encounters and the places where they happened. 

What kind of stories do you publish? 

We want to show the broad range of what dating can be, and so stories of any kind are welcome. Everything from funny to disturbing or just plain uneventful. The meet-up might have happened yesterday, or 15 years ago, they’re equally good for Date Maps. 

A lot of our stories are first (or early) dates, but we use the term date very broadly. The only thing we ask is that the people are kept anonymous as much as possible, and that the pinned location is a public or semi-public place like a bar or a park. Think first dates, last dates, flirting attempts, marriage proposals, random people chatting you up on the street, your colleague asking you for a drink after work and you don’t know if it is a date or not, an awkward catcall, or that time you drunkenly decided to tell your best friend how you really feel… 

How do I add my own stories to Date Maps? 

There are three ways to add your own stories. 

  1. Use the Add a place button. You will need to register and login, and your stories will be published under your name / initials / pseudonym. This way, you have more control over your stories, you can edit them, see who likes and comments on them, and even interact with readers if you like.
  2. Use this form for anonymous contribution. 
  3. Create your own map on Google maps or another mapping service, and then email it to us on hello (at) date-maps.com. We will then add the posts anonymously to the map. This is a good option if you don’t want your own user, but have a lot of stories and don’t want to send in each separately.

 

Submission guidelines

  • Tell us the curious story of  your date or the perhaps tragically failed attempt at one. You can choose to focus on one specific detail or tell the story from beginning to end. Most of our stories are around 500-1500 characters, but it can be longer or shorter than that.
  • You can write your story in any language. Select one of the existing languages from the dropdown, or “Other” if your language is not yet in the list.  
  • Keep the people in the story anonymous – don’t disclose their name, workplace or other information that might make them easy to identify. If we find that someone’s privacy might be invaded, we reserve the right to edit the story, or remove it altogether.
  • If you want to tell us what happened (are you now married with five kids and a parrot, or did you never see the person again) you’re welcome to. But sometimes it can also be nice to leave it up to the reader to imagine what happened.
  • Everybody loves the juicy details, so feel free to be sexually explicit if you feel like it fits the story. 
  • We might also add a tag if we deem it troubling or receive comments from other users. We however respect our writer’s freedom of expression so we hope to maintain a welcoming environment without too much prudish meddling.
 

What if my story takes place in several locations? 

You can only choose one pin per story, but you’re welcome to choose any one of the locations as the pin, and still write about the whole date. You can for example pick the location where it started, the one where you stayed longest, or simply the one that you think is the most interesting. If the story ends up in your or the other persons home (we know, these kinds of stories often do – no judgment here), you’re welcome to include that part in your story, as long as you don’t actually disclose the location. 

Other questions? Feel free to email us at hello (at) date-maps.com!