avocet

I read through "Why I Will Never Have a Girlfriend". It's a self-defeating load of bollocks. His odds are VASTLY better, and he's not giving himself any credit.

So he's saying out of all of the women in developed countries aged 18-25: 65 399 083

And let's assume his claim that only 50% are single: 32 699 541 (rounded down)

According to his numbers, only this many of these women would be beautiful and available: 73 919

Only 2% of ALL single women aged 18 to 25 are beautiful enough for him? So if he walked into a room full of 100 single women (not too difficult at a typical bar or social gathering) only 2 of them would qualify? This is ludicrous. Unless this particular gathering was a Buttered Pork Rind Aficionado's Convention, it's safe to say that the most discerning man would find at the VERY least 8 of those 100 women desirable.

And the "also might like me" bit. He's saying just one measly percent of these women he's attracted to will desire him. Come on. Unless you are an absolute creep or raging puppy-kicking bastard, you are not going to only attract 1 out of 100 women that you ever talk to. Do you realize how many people that is? Go about your day and count how many people you talk to, ALL of them. Coworkers, cashiers, friends, family, everyone. The average person won't reach anywhere near 100. It would have to be a stunning amount of rejection.

The whole statistical assumption is flawed, regardless. Finding a mate is not Brownian motion. You are not two particles hoping to collide in the cold vacuum of space. Go to large gatherings of people and put the odds in your favor. More people in less time means greater opportunities. And if you have personality preferences, go to places that attract the personality type you want. Do you like artistic women? Go to art shows. The author is seeking smart women... that's fairly broad. Perhaps classical concerts, wine tastings? Those kinds of events tends to attract women with academic credentials.

Either way, he is vastly improving his odds. At a gathering like that, 30 of those 100 single women could easily catch his interest.

Then again, he lives in London...

"Google closed his Adsense account"

This guy was tempting fate. Serving ads on content hosted by the same company, allowing them to see every penny in traffic? I'm amazed some account manager with a grudge didn't pull the plug sooner.

So far we've seen the Twitter app shutdowns, Padmapper-Craigslist as chrischen noted, and now this. The established players continue to amass their information into silos, while the demands of the greater internet keep upping the water pressure.

Take a cue from banks, and add a "confidence word". The user enters a special phrase such as "myspecialword". If "myspecialword" does not appear in the corner of the dialog box, they will know it's fake. I doubt there would be many technical issues that would prevent a simple phrase like that from displaying in the corner of the box.

I hate astroturfing too, but one part of your response bothers me.

"it's depressing to think that with our current voting system in the US, everyone's vote is weighed exactly the same. Whether a logical thinker or not. Whether well read in history or ignorant. Whether you know a lot about human health or very little, a lot about biology or nothing. Whether you picked your beliefs out of thin air one day or arrived at positions after many years of careful observation and analysis: doesn't matter, all votes count the same and can cancel each other out."

I'm certainly not in favor of bigoted or ignorant people voting, but that doesn't make it any less their right to have an equal voice. If one is going to reduce someone's voting rights based on some criteria, how can one measure objectively "logical" or "well read"? The minute the government declares "these special criteria reduce a vote's weight!" someone is going to skew those criteria to marginalize others for political gain.

This idea creates more problems than it solves. It reminds me of the Three-Fifths Compromise (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three-Fifths_Compromise), an example of voting weight adjusted for political gain (in this case, for the Southern US).