Talking About Layoffs May Violate eHarmony's Terms of Service
Have your friends been laid off recently? Of course they have, almost nobody has a job anymore! Complaining about society's newfound poverty, however, is apparently a violation of eHarmony's terms of service, as the East Village Idiot recently discovered.
After revising my profile, I decided I’d try to add a bit of personality to these responses. For example, I answered:
Three things I am most thankful for:
- Having a supportive family, i.e. my mom, who makes a mean chicken soup
- Having great friends who have helped me through the thick, the thin, and the cheese-stuffed
This didn’t last long, because two minutes after submitting these responses, I got this e-mail:
Dear Chris,
During regular site maintenance, we noticed some content written by you that violates our terms and conditions. Here is what we found:
{ABOUT ME} Having a job, given the way I watch a friend get laid off nearly every week lately
Because this violates the terms and conditions that you accepted when you joined eHarmony, we have turned off your matching. You will not receive any further matches.
Yes, “get laid” is a phrase that is absolutely banned on eHarmony. Never mind that the next word is “off.” Never mind that the words preceding it as “watch a friend.” Oh, well, yeah, that’s pretty dirty. But if I was into that sort of thing, wouldn’t my matches have a right to know?
- Having a job, given the way I watch a friend get laid off nearly every week lately
Eh, it's for the best. eHarmony's "patented Compatibility Matching System," widely feared for its crusading religious zeal, only found two available matches for Chris, and both of them lived far, far away in New Jersey.
At least he was taking advantage of eHarmony's free trial instead of paying for the full below-the-bible-belt experience.
The 24 Hours I Spent as an eHarmony Member [East Village Idiot]
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Comments:
I wonder if the email was sent by robot rather than a person, which could explain the lack of intelligence. I would suggest in the future using the present tense, as "Get lay" doesn't sound as dirty. Or get very tropical and say "leied off".
@purplesun: eHarmony has always rejected me too. I guess guys aren't interested in a pretty, intelligent and funny gal.
@PinkBox: I am! I am! Pick me pick me!
Too bad about this site rejection. Then again, it's easier to get rejected online then in person.
@darkjedi26: Maybe they rejected her because they could see she a pretty, intelligent and funny gal and because of their audience, thought it would be best if she didn't go there.
@darkjedi26: They are not in the business of matching people up. They are in the business of selling a service that 'could', 'eventually' match you up. If they match up everyone they wouldn't have any monthly subscribers. Pretty, intelligent and funny gals are not desperate, sad and willing to part with money month after month.
While I was not originally rejected by eHarmony when I tried it, I bet I would now. I don't think that they like atheists too much on there, and as I don't want someone who is strongly religious, I don't think I'm about to try it again. I always got this overly religious vibe from them, it didn't sit great with me before, but now I just can't stand it.
Although I was on there, I got a few "local" matches (about 20-40 miles away) but every time I filled out the questionnaire at the first stage I got rejected. I gave up after that, thinking it was just a sham (ShamWow, maybe? :) ) (ok, I know it wasn't really a sham, but when you just keep getting rejected, it does feel like one).
It wasn't computer error they're part of the government conspiracy to deny the recession! The words "let go" are also banned.
"I put on my tinfoil hat and robe."
I have two different friends who are currently in long-term relationships via eHarmony. So it apparently works for some people. Neither of them are overly religious (if at all). This is in South Florida, so who knows...
And the automated response is probably due to "get laid", which one can't blame them for flagging. However the system should probably flag it for review by a human, rather than flag it and stop the service immediately.
@darkjedi26: A friend of mine got rejected, and it said that "unfortunately, there is a small percentage of people that we just can't find matches for". I think it was because his answers to their test were not consistent enough for the software to calibrate.
I wasn't rejected by eHarmony, but maybe I lied. Haha. Anyway, the girls that were matched with me were boring.
I like the "eHarmony rejected me because [insert snarky positive comment about oneself/negative comment about eHarmony and/or its users here]" excuse. Uh huh.
Don't fool yourself. There are plenty of cool, atheist hipsters from Blue States hooking up on eHarmony. Rather, eHarmony most likely dropped you for one or more of the following reasons:
- You smell bad
- You have a lazy eye
- Your IQ is below the 35th percentile
- Your job sucks
- You really should get that goiter treated
- That '87 Buick you drive is crap
- Needing 2 300GB external hard drives for that computer porno collection is really rather excessive
@rpm773: They probably reject a certain percentage of people at random just to give the impression that they're being exclusive.
@12-Inch Idongivafuck Sandwich: My coworker (who is not at all religious, FWIW) is about to get married to someone he met on eHarmony. It definitely works.
They are attempting to pigeonhole people.
Some people are difficult to pigeonhole.
I think it's commendable that their algorithm (and the people who wrote it) actually recognize that.
Try OkCupid, free and it's been decent enough for me so far. It's super scientific too, what with match percentages and all!
@darkjedi26: e-harmony has a track record of rejecting liberals, people from the wrong religious groups, gays and lesbians, etc. Whether intentionally or not (perhaps this is the only group they sign up enough of to make matches), it's a matchmaking site for conservative Christians.
@12-Inch Idongivafuck Sandwich:
I've been using it for a while. I haven't found true love yet, or actually met anyone in person, but I've exchanged some emails with women who seem to be reasonably sane. And plenty of the matches I get aren't religious.
Killing the account automatically is a bad move given the possibility of errors like this. It would make more sense if they had a word filter that highlighted the banned words/phrases before you submitted it.
Some of the bloggers criticisms of the service seem kind of silly. He complains that "eharmony makes you answer these multiple choice questions with no opportunity for personal expression", but those questions do actually have a blank line where you can type what you want. And he complains that all his matches were far away, but you can specify how far a radius from you you want them to send you matches from.
It's pretty spiffy that they do reject people. If they were accepting anyone and everyone, it would show that they weren't really trying to match people according to a good criteria. There are always people who simply won't match.
I've got to second OkCupid. Of course, I'm a kinky, bisexual Burning Man participant into recreational drug use and free love. I also enjoy group sex, so have relationships that involve at least some form of openness with other bisexual people into the above things.
eHarmony didn't reject me, but I was on for months with one match in Hawaii. I got off and got on OkCupid. Found people in my own neighborhood/city/region all into similar things.
I'm in a non-normal situation, sure, but eHarmony doesn't really attract fun folks into crazy lifestyles. OkCupid is filled with poly, kinky, freaky types.
YMMV.
I am an atheist and I met my fiance on e-harmony.
Definitely a 'bot just parsing for keywords and phrases. I would send them an email expressing annoyance. It would be acceptable to say that your profile would not be changed until it was reviewed by a human, but to lock you out is denying you a service you paid for and is a breach of contract on their side.
I was accepted by e-Harmony, which surprised the ever-living-daylights out of me, since I'm a magickian who was raised Christian (no loss of faith there, I just expanded my worldview) and something of a pantheist. And I didn't lie! But the matching was poor - it didn't do a good job of matching anything but income level, and I kept getting matched with men who were already in relationships or lived far away and weren't interested in meeting...nobody was contacting me, either. So, after three months, I kicked 'em to the curb and telling folks that they're probably going to be pretty lame unless you fit into a predefined demographic.
@mewyn dyner:
They definitely favor religious/spiritual people on there. If I recall, atheist/agnostic was not even an option, so you had to put "other." A lot of the questions seemed to be geared toward religious/spiritual people as well.
What about capitalism leaves you surprised with this?
You are supposed to pretend at all times that everything is alright. Doing so violates capitalism's terms of agreement.
Geez!
@purplesun: the internet tells me that for $20-$30 you can get your own.
and it will probably help you meet people even more effectively
@Maggie Champaigne: lucky for you! i used to find okcupid decent but latey i've been getting more and more crap from idiots.
i'd entertain you with some of the more recent emails i have gotten from people i have never spoken to before, but considering that if i were to repeat the content of those emails in public i'd get arrested for being lewd, i'll refrain.
but the tests are still fun!
I as a gay man, WAS rejected by eHarmony, No where in their personality profile does it allow me, a man, to select the kind of man I would like to be matched with. Or the personality traits of a man who I would like to be in a committed relationship with... or let's be honest, as a gay man.. the kind of men who turn me on that I would lay some serious pipe into on a regular basis even if I had a happy steady relationship with someone else.
@Maggie Champaigne: and apparently trying to get as ugly and useless as possible. yay for the front page updates!
@IrvCrapper: Don't be so Christophobic. Nobody's allowed to tell gays how to live their lives, so why does everybody jump on Christians?
Except the vast majority of Christians who won't let Homosexuals get married? Hmmmmm. Yah, Christians certainly don't tell gays how to live their lives at *all*.
I had to threaten them with legal action and refer them to the FTC to get them... actually some sleazy surrogate, I suppose... to stop sending me 5-10 emails every week.
I'm sorry. I don't recall telling a Christian how to live.
But when they choose to act like bigots, I will choose to call them bigots. That's not phobia. That's profound dislike.
@PorkchopSandwiches!_GitEmSteveDave:
Whether written by a person or a computer, the corporation is response-able for what they write under the auspices of the company.
No doubt, if a person had written it, you'd have said, "The corporation can't be held responsible for everything each employee says or does."
I wonder sometimes why you are here? Bored much?
I'm glad I got to use Teen Matchmaker when it was free. I met my fiancé on there when I was a young'un (well a younger young'un anyway..). I suppose it's kind of nice that more and more people are meeting each other online, getting married and such. I used to not tell people where I met my fiancé because I would get the standard "Weren't you scared he was a 60 year old pedophile????" response.
@IrvCrapper: I agree with you here. Many (not all, don't jump me!!) Christians talk of acceptance and love and "What would Jesus do?" but never really follow that, it's just said to look good I guess?
I think this Gandhi quote says it all for me:
" I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ. "
@IrvCrapper: Actually, I would have had a "WTF" if an actual human had stopped this guy from getting matches b/c he used used a phrase in the middle of a sentence like this.
That being said, since I never assigned blame in my comment, nor said who was "response-able", I wonder why you wrote YOUR comment. Mine was simply a question on who wrote the letter. A human being being super anal, or a computer which scans all recent changes.
Disclosure: I have never used E-Harmony, nor been wronged or righted by them. I do find Dr. Neil Clark Kermit to be annoying though. Also, I have nothing but praise for Buy.com, and have not had a bad transaction with them ::knocks on wood:: /Disclosure.
@DjDynasty: Just FYI: eHarmony will be opening a site in March 09 for the gay and lesbian community, called Compatible Partners.
@obamaramallama: You do know both Obama and Biden are staunchly anti-gay marriage, right? I just though I should interject that given your posting name.
Disclosure: Child of a gay parent and friend/BF/relative of more than a few Gay and Lesbian people.
I was rejected by eHarmony. :|
They should really give you a t-shirt or something when that happens.