The Freakonomics economists had a look at some of the facts and stats behind online dating:

• Looks matter, no surprises there. According to the OkCupid blog, “A hot woman receives roughly four times the messages an average-looking woman gets and 25 times as many as an ugly one.”
• Men have a ‘superstar effect’. The hottest 5% of men receive twice as many messages as those just below them (the second-hottest 5%)
• All other things being equal, a man making $250,000 a year is contacted two and a half times as often as a man who earns $50,000.
• Looks matter much more than weight; two people of comparable looks receive the same number of messages regardless of body size.
• A study form the university of Chicago found that in the real world, relationships where the man earns less than the woman tend to be less stable and happy
• The more details you fill in, the better. If you have children, to some people this is a game changer. So best to be up front about it now.

For more details, including what happened when a young lady started putting racist information on her dating profile and why New York is good for straight men, check out their podcast (audio) or (text)

Source: Freakonomics

Allie Jones took a look at competitive cheerleading:

• Cheerleading is more than just the dancers we see performing at the sidelines of sporting events. The best cheerleaders compete in feats of gymnastic excellence mixed with high intensity dance routines.
• The most famous are “flyers” – those who are do flips and are thrown in the air.
• The “bases” and “back spots” on the other hand get very little attention since their faces aren’t that visible.
• The best get their own cosmetic and clothing lines.
• It requires money to be one of the top contenders. The uniforms, the training, and the travel to competition locations can cost up to $10,000 a year.
• It’s mostly high school and college aged girls who perform in the competitions and the sport can bring unwanted scrutiny of their personal lives.

Read more about some of the most famous cheerleaders, what the job entails, and more over here.

Source: The Wire

1970s pop group ABBA was known for many things including their extreme outfits. Decades later Simon Bowers uncovered the reason for the iconic style:

• The Swedish tax code allowed the cost of outfits to be claimed as a tax deduction…as long as the outfits were too ridiculous to be worn on a typical day.
• This quirk in the code help contribute to ABBA’s style and gave a distinct personality to the group.
• Björn Ulvaeus (extreme left) states that he felt the group “looked like nuts” and was “badly dressed”.

Read more here.

Source: The Guardian

Chris Gayomali wrote about a new app that could aid your dating life…or foretell the end of society and civilization as we know it:

• Crowdpilot turns on a phone’s microphone and allows a community of users to listen in on your date.
• The users can be your Facebook friends or random strangers and they offer advice based on the progress of the date.
• Advice might include “you’re talking about yourself too much” or “you’re eating too quickly”.
• Supporters point out that people often ask each other for dating related advice. This just makes the feedback more instant.
• Critics argue that it’s another step towards a society where people are always glued to their phones and are unable to talk with new people.
• Users of the app are advised to inform their date that the date is being monitored and projected over the internet.

Read more about the app, how it works, the value of the advice, and if you should get it over here.

Source: Fast Company

Via: Marginal Revolution

Magazine covers are designed in fascinating ways:

• Magazines have to make it clear to customers that what they’re seeing on the newsstand is a new issue. They do this by having vastly different colour schemes from issue to issue.
• They started putting giant photographs on the front cover in 1962. These connect with the reader through a recognizable celebrity face.
• In 1965 Cosmopolitan started the era of magazines with a lot of text surrounding the main picture. This gave buyers a sneak peek of what was in the magazine.
• Celebrity gossip magazines always have yellow text on the cover because yellow draws attention at newsstands.
• On newsstands in the US magazines are generally arranged in a waterfall formation with their top third showing. Therefore the main headline is put close to the top.
• In the UK magazines have their edges overlaid upon one another and thus the main headlines go on the left.

The full article is fascinating and shows examples of each of the things mentioned above. It also talks about how magazines have continued to evolve, why titles like Atlantic and Time have a different look and much more. You should read it here.

Source: Slate

Yes. We’re single.

No. We’re not bitter about it.

Irrespective of whether you believe us or not Jeffrey Ball writes that Valentine’s Day is bad for the environment:

• After Christmas, Valentine’s Day is the biggest card-selling holiday.
• According to one study each card produces 600 times as much carbon dioxide as the simple act of sending an e-Valentine’s Day card.
• This includes the cost of making the card, putting it in an envelope, and transporting it to its destination.
• Various companies sell environmentally friendly cards but more often than not they don’t fully take into account the carbon footprint of the card.

Read more over here.

Source: New Republic

Last year Kate Upton got all the attention in the Sports Illustrated swimsuit edition. This year it seems like it’s going to be Barbie. Mae Anderson wrote:

• It’s the 50^th anniversary swimsuit edition issue for Sports Illustrated and it will be celebrated with the iconic Barbie doll in its pages.
• This is the latest attempt to revive interest in Barbie. Sales fell 13% in the latest quarter.
• Barbie is worth $1.3 billion to Mattel and other attempts to generate media buzz for the doll included a breakup with her boyfriend Ken.
• The media campaign will be called “unapologetic” to represent the company’s response to the criticism that Barbie promotes an unhealthy body image.
• Dolls which sport the swimming costume that Barbie will model in Sports Illustrated will, of course, be sold.

Read more about why Barbie is now “one step away from Playboy magazine”, the dolls that Barbie is now competing against and more over here.

Source: ABC News

Read more of Centives’ coverage of the economics of Sports Illustrated here.

Could Google Glass be the future of air travel? Nick Summers wrote:

• The airline Virgin Atlantic is trialing Google Glass for attendants that serve upper-class passengers.
• The technology allows service staff to answer questions about destination and weather, and to track dietary requirements and other personal preferences.
• It will also help staff to translate things from other languages.
• Virgin Atlantic decided to initiate a trial of the glasses after surveys found that travelers felt air travel was less glamorous than it used to be.

Read more about how long the trial will last and other commercial uses for Google Glass here.

Source: TNW

Brian Fung writes that we have NBC to thank for funding the Olympics:

• In the United States NBC has become the network known for carrying coverage of Olympic Games.
• It pays handsomely for this privilege – exclusive broadcast rights to the Winter Games in Sochi cost $775 million.
• This makes up 62% of the International Olympic Committee’s (IOC) broadcast revenue for the games.
• In fact if you look at past summer and winter games NBC is responsible for about half of the IOC’s broadcast revenue.
• This is despite the fact that there are 22 other broadcasters who pay for exclusive rights in other countries.
• This ultimately means that NBC is subsidizing a large portion of The Olympics.

See the share that NBC has paid for the Olympics over the years, and more statistics over here.

Source: The Washington Post

Jay Leno is known for opening every “Tonight Show” with a monologue that consist of a series of one liners about current news events. Upon taking over Jimmy Fallon should abandon the practice writes Esther Breger:

• When the monologue first started it was a fun and useful way to contextualize the news and make it humourous.
• However in the age of Facebook and Twitter people read funny one liners about events as they’re happening. By the time the Tonight Show starts jokes about news events seem old.
• Instead what gets people fired up are viral videos and bits that spread like wildfire across video sharing sites and social news feeds.
• Jay Leno was trained in stand-up comedy. Jimmy Fallon is trained in improv comedy and he should stamp his signature on the show by playing to his strengths.

See examples of the differences in style sand read more over here.

Source: New Republic