[cperciva]

If you think this is bad, try doing something involving humans. Want to have people go to a website and fill out a survey? If you're a university researcher, be prepared for 20 pages of paperwork and a 6 month delay while a research ethics committee considers your application.

Unless you find a way to hack the process, of course. In one case I know, the surveyees were signed on as co-investigators, in order to take advantage of a loophole allowing researchers to do research on themselves without ethics approval.