How To Hack Online Dating

Thanks to TED Talks, you can learn about pretty much anything, from fashion to robots to every imaginable subject in between. You can even learn how to hack online dating websites in order to find your perfect match. Or at least, that’s what Amy Webb, strategist and CEO of Webbmedia Group, did.

Yep, according to the Huffington Post, Webb recently gave a TED Talk centered around her experiences with online dating — and how she cracked the system and used it to her advantage. While her family complained she was being “too picky”, Webb was busy crunching numbers and applying them to the algorithms used by online dating sites. Determined to find a “Jew-ish” man interested in visiting exotic places (among many a laundry list of other “must haves” and “deal breakers”), Webb was on a mission.

After some trial and error and a lot of research and reverse-engineering, not only did Webb become the most “popular person online” but she also met her "Prince Charming," whom she eventually married and had a child with. She went on write about her experience with online dating in Data: A Love Story, which you can catch a humorous excerpt from on Slate.

As inspiring a modern love story as this is, not all of us are data analysts/CEOs of businesses that deal with Fortune 500 companies. How are simple folk like us supposed to pull off Ocean's 11-level hacking on dating sites when we barely passed high school algebra (don't judge, my mom says I'm artistic)? Well, luckily, Webb leaves us with some great universal advice:

“All you have to really do is figure out your own framework, and play by your own rules, and feel free to be as picky as you want.”

In other words, know yourself and what you want before jumping in the terrifying, creep-filled abyss that is online dating.

Feel free to check out Webb's talk at TED.com, or view it below! Happy hunting!