[troymc]

It's easy to guess why there has been a lot of skepticism towards this approach to doing the science, i.e. gathering data from a bunch of people in different situations doing different things... it's just so unlike the standard approach of doing double-blind studies with placebos and lots of participants.

That said, if you gather enough data... maybe some sound conclusions or inferences can be drawn. Such is the hope of all "big data" projects. I sincerely hope this project has some folks who know how to analyze all the data (i.e. rigorously).

Edit: "Big data" may be a buzzword right now, but it's not a new approach. Astronomers can't experiment with planets, stars or galaxies; they "just" make boatloads of observations --- and they've been able to draw many conclusions.