Posted on 07/29/2014 5:11:43 PM PDT by BenLurkin
Dating website OKCupid has revealed that it experimented on its users, including putting the "wrong" people together to see if they would connect.
It revealed the tests after the uproar over Facebook manipulating the feeds of its users.
"If you use the internet, you're the subject of hundreds of experiments at any given time, on every site," it said. "That's how websites work."
OKCupid said one revelation was that "people just look at the picture".
As well as allowing users to upload pictures and set up dating profiles, OKCupid asks users questions and matches them with potential partners based on the answers.
In one experiment, the site took pairs of "bad" matches between two people - about 30% - and told them they were "exceptionally good" for each other, or 90% matches. "Not surprisingly, the users sent more first messages when we said they were compatible," Christian Rudder, one of the founders of OKCupid, said in a blog post on the company's research and insights blog.
Further experiments suggested that "when we tell people they are a good match, they act as if they are. Even when they should be wrong for each other."
...
In another experiment, OKCupid ran profiles with pictures and no profile text for half of its test subjects, and vice versa for the rest. The results showed that people responded solely to the pictures. For potential daters, Mr Rudder said that "your actual words are worth
almost nothing".
(Excerpt) Read more at bbc.com ...
This is fraud. They promised to provide compatible matches and apparently took money for it.
Aww who hasn’t.
Much ado about nothing.
No wonder. I want my Cow, Pig, and goat back but they won’t have me.
I bet the same sort of thing happens with the administrators of ObamaCare.
What could go wrong?! /sarc
And I suppose you are saying this from personal knowledge?
I never put my picture online. I really don’t want to meet someone who’s so insecure that they wouldn’t want to meet someone unless they know what they look like.
Duh. This is the same scumbag enterprise who got Brendan Eich fired. Zero integrity.
You are a sad person...
There is a reason the site’s nickname is “OKStupid.”
Because I see these sites for what they are?
The story just told you what they were and how they do the opposite of what they claim!
Fer cryin' out loud, who in their right mind needs to shop the internet for a "compatible" companion?
And no, I'm not sad...quite happy, in fact, since I've never fallen for any of that crap, nor needed it, being happily married for decades, with children that have been happily married for...well, long times, too.
Anybody that uses Facebook or goes to "compatibility" sites to meet their "soul" mate...they are the unhappy ones.
As well as being a loser or a pervert.
'I foresee cancellations, angry emails and falling revenue in your future.'
For men, online dating does not work unless you’re an Abercrombie & Fitch model.
Is okcupid only for gays?
No.
I put my money into my relationship with my wife and my time on the internet with the (mostly) good souls on Free Republic and a few other conservative sites.
I have no use for Facebook, Twitter or any of the "match" sites.
I will not argue that at one time, very early in the internet age, that there did exist a few meet and greet sites that were legitimate and did not provide loser and pervert refuges.
Sadly, that is no more.
And if you could get beyond your snarkiness, you would see it, too.
The sites hurt much more than they help.
They are both professionals and met on FB...
Congrats on being an ass.........
Then I am truly glad for you and I say that without reservation.
May I ask, has this been a recent occurrence or was it more in the infancy of the internet, when it wasn't full of trolls, Ponzi architects, sexual predators and just general low lifes, like it is now?
And again, I mean no snark or sarcasm...because I feel strongly that there is a certain element lurking that has seized upon the anonymity of the internet and pretty damned much ruined any real honesty and trust there was.
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