Are you implying that the bots were using the site to conduct illicit affairs?
As opposed to conducting research projects?
As opposed to having licit extramarital affairs, or finding casual sex partners while unmarried, or the like.
I was wondering about the question in the post, too. 37 million sounds like way too many people who are actually looking to cheat.
I'm also trying to square my sense that gawker is a bunch of assholes with my desire to see the entire database leaked.
Googling to remind myself what the hell Ashley Madison is and seeing the latest news I'd now have to say we're about to find out.
Also, there was a bot userbase?
I'm also trying to square my sense that gawker is a bunch of assholes with my desire to see the entire database leaked.
The solution to this equation is "ogged is also an asshole", maybe.
That's probably it. I hadn't heard of the site (or if I had, I thought they sold eyeglasses) which seems like the kind of thing I would have heard about.
My guess would be that at least 1/3 are aspiring "tempters" not in a relationship but looking to scam desperate people. I remember hearing radio ads for this site and thinking that they should just rename it baddecisions.com.
With that said, life sentences for the hackers are appropriate.
baddecisions.com.
Reminds me of this.
I know I've heard of AM, but can't recall -- is it explicitly targeted at people looking for extramarital partners, or is the targeting somehow deniable? If the latter, maybe there were a lot of users who just didn't get it?
11 -- the radio ads were pretty explicit that it was for cheaters or people looking to meet cheaters.
or is the targeting somehow deniable?
No. It's explicit.
9: There's a bar in a nearby neighborhood called Bad Decisions. I've never been in, but it looks appropriately dreary from the outside.
9.1 Another blow to my view of human nature. If you can't trust cheaters, who can you trust?
I know one of the women in this article. She certainly was using it for its intended purpose, and certainly got a lot of value out of it.
14: There's a nearby shitty bar called Teabags, with the tagline "Always in hot water." The logo is a grinning teabag wearing sunglasses.
It's been around forever, so therefore before the wide knowledge, and possible coining, of the salacious meaning of the term. But still.
14, 17 -- there's a bar in Detroit called "O'Blivion's" which seemed extremely appropriate to its setting.
5: Extra-marital affairs are pretty common, at least according to most studies. I suspect that that article is right about a lot of them overestimating the numbers, or at least I'd hope so, but that's still a pretty massive number of people given the married/otherwise-coupled population in the US.
But like a lot of other people have said there's probably a large percentage of people using that site who are looking to sleep with married people even if they aren't married themselves.
AIMHMHB there used to be a gay bar in Boston called the Rockin' Ramrod. Which I believe someone responded to with a bar in New Orleans called the White Swallow.
The name of the place is Cheater's Heaven.
21: the Ramrod is still a gay bar in Boston. Never heard it called the "Rockin' Ramrod", though.
As opposed to having licit extramarital affairs, or finding casual sex partners while unmarried, or the like.
Or, cough, fantasizing.
Can someone go to the Fair Housing thread and tell me if my comment showed up? It's in the sidebar, and the comment count on the FP says it should be there, and I previewed to see it before clicking away, but when I go to the thread it's not there.
Where's Will? This is in his wheelhouse. Presumably this is going to lead to an explosion of business for him once the information is more widely distributed.
16: I wonder how carefully that author of that article protected the identity of his source "Megan" given this description:
I thank her for meeting me. She says it's no big deal. It is, though--if her identity were somehow unmasked, it could torpedo her high-powered career: She's worked for one of the most prominent political figures in the country and nearly ended up in Obama's administration.
Given that they are meeting up in NYC, I'd say the identity of that "prominent political figure" is likely to be one of Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton, or Charles Schumer. Maybe Cuomo. Combining that with her physical description and age, I'd be surprised if insiders who work in those offices don't have a pretty good guess at her identity.
Given that they are meeting up in NYC, I'd say the identity of that "prominent political figure" is likely to be one of Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton, or Charles Schumer. Maybe Cuomo.
Or Anthony Weiner.
Also, it says "She's worked for" that prominent figure. Maybe that was for one week.
8 and 11 are surprising, since Ashley Madison has been the subject of at least one front page post on this blog. (Even though I'm not finding a link right now.)
I hadn't heard of the site (or if I had, I thought they sold eyeglasses)
You're thinking of Warby Parker.
Paisley Parkeline Posey Madison's Poking and Sunglasses Hut.
She certainly was using it for its intended purpose, and certainly got a lot of value out of it.
It's not what you think! I'm not having an affair, I'm adding value!
As opposed to having licit extramarital affairs, or finding casual sex partners while unmarried, or the like.
If this was your intention, why not just be openly non-monogamous on a regular dating site? Does Ashley Madison provide some extra level of protection if you don't want to be "out" as non-monogamous?
I'm guessing it does do that, but even better it isolates the group of people who are going to see it to a specific set of people and (probably) makes it less likely it's going to come out more generally if someone who knows you runs across it. "Holy cow guys I just saw that so-and-so lists themselves as non-monogamous on okcupid!" is probably something people are more willing to say than "Holy cow guys I just saw that so-and-so lists themselves as nonmonogamous on that site where people pay for private accounts so they can arrange to cheat on their spouses!" There's an element of mutually assured destruction on sites that are openly about adultery.
This seems relevant to both this and the Snowden thread where ogged expressed surprise that encryption may only delay things.
35: 36 is one possibility. Some more come to mind: some people may enjoy the thrill of something illicit, even if they don't have a partner on their side to make it illicit; it may seem like a more reliable guarantee that the sex will be no-strings-attached; and prostitutes looking for johns.
You may not currently want to have an affair, but you can be fairly confident from observing the behaviour of others that, when you start, you will not want to stop having one; therefore the rational thing to do is to force yourself to have an affair qua transformative experience. (Paul, op. cit.)
Let's all try this line out in bars and see how well it works.
"If I told you your body was a transformative experience would you hold it against me?"
How many affairs end well? Genuine question. Realize there's probably not much good data on this.
41: I think opting later for "Was it transformative for you?" works better, but actually it probably doesn't.
42 - Depends on what counts as ending well. As far as not horrible consequences (for the cheaters) go it's either (1) eventually it fizzled and no one else found out or (2) there was at least one divorce and the people involved got married to each other. And the first one is probably a substantial/majority part of the people who admit when surveyed to having cheated on their current partner in the past. (It's not all of them, obviously, but I'd guess more than not.)
"My wife doesn't understand my qualia."
I'm not the only one who gets word-meld between qualia and genitalia, then.
45, 43: So yeah, I should have used "qualia" to make 41 semi rather than totally lame.
45: oh, you pronounce it as though it were a comparative adjective meaning "more similar to a quail"? I would have used a long a, "quahlia".
I've only heard qualia as in quality but I wouldn't be surprised if there are a range of pronunciations, or regional differences like with "Kant".
47: I'm pretty sure I've never heard it spoken outloud.
Qualia isn't an experience, though.
Qualia reminds me more of labia than genitalia.
That's just me, isn't it.