Date Baiters Get Sued

I never did like Match.com. Although I hear that with new ownership, Spring Streets/Nerve is acting a little shady lately. From Reuters.

Match.com, a unit of IAC/Interactive Corp. is accused in a federal lawsuit of goading members into renewing their subscriptions through bogus romantic e-mails sent out by company employees. In some instances, the suit contends, people on the Match payroll even went on sham dates with subscribers as a marketing ploy.

Match isn't the only shady dater on the block. And no, I'm not talking about that guy who keeps sending you the weird text messages.

In a separate suit, Yahoo Inc.'s personals service is accused of posting profiles of fictitious potential dating partners on its Web site to make it look as though many more singles subscribe to the service than actually do.

One thing that stands out in the story.

U.S. consumers spent $245.2 million on online personals and dating services in the first half of 2005, up 7.6 percent from a year earlier, according to the Online Publishers Association.

Hey, you CAN put a price tag on desperation.