[erehweb]

Whenever there's an experiment, we have to weigh the costs against the benefits.

Benefits here seem slight - we relearn that women, and pretty women in particular, get more messages than men.

Costs are non-trivial - about 1000 people deceived. Admittedly a minor deception, but experimental subjects normally get some protection, and a minute of time wasted by each translates to 16 hours overall. I'm presuming he got consent to use all the photos in his experiment and on the site, but he's silent on that. At least we have a thousand small disappointments.

Experiments involving deceiving people can be useful (e.g. ones investigating whether employers / landlords discriminate), but this one doesn't seem to rise to that level.