MARIE CLAIRE – After spending a decade at Match.com and Yahoo Personals writing compatibility formulas, psychologist Mark Thompson had fallen out of love with his work. “Early on, there was real enthusiasm that we were going to figure out how to bring people together,” he says. “But now the industry is so competitive that it’s more about what sites claim they can do than what us eggheads could actually do for people.”
Q: What made you leave e-dating?
A: I hated the way we overpromised and underdelivered. Our studies showed that the odds of meeting someone online and dating him more than a month are roughly one in 10. No computer can accurately predict whom you should be with.
Q: But isn’t blind dating always hit or miss?
A: Yes, but you don’t have to pay $30 a month to be set up by your friend. There’s a different set of expectations. When diet companies show someone who lost a bunch of weight in six weeks, they have to say, “Results not typical.” eHarmony and other sites should do the same.
Q: Do you think online dating can be fixed?
A: It really depends on people’s willingness to come back and tell us why each date didn’t work out so the system could get smarter.
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