Entertainment / Lifestyle
Dating site dumps 30 000 'ugly' people
20 Jun 2011 at 10:24hrs | Views
London – The dating and networking community BeautifulPeople.com which is exclusively for "good-looking people" has dumped 30 000 "ugly" people after it was hit by a virus.
According to the site normally, everyone must pass a strict "rating" stage, where existing members vote on whether new applicants are beautiful enough to join the site.
But the rating module was brought down last month, allowing anyone – regardless of looks – to be accepted.
Greg Hodge, managing director of BeautifulPeople.com, said: "We got suspicious when tens of thousands of new members were accepted over a six-week period, many of whom were no oil painting."
"We responded immediately, repairing the damage from the 'Shrek Virus' and putting every new member back into the rating module for a legitimate and democratic vote. The result is that we have lost over 30 000 recent members."
The origin of the 'Shrek Virus' is still being investigated internally. It was initially thought to be one of the 5.5 million BeautifulPeople.com rejects, the site claims. Further investigations point to a former employee who placed the virus before leaving the team in May.
Hodge said it has upped security at the site which claims to have over 700 000 members worldwide.
On average, one in seven applicants is accepted.
The majority of successful new members come from the US, Denmark and France.
The countries with the highest rate of rejections are the UK, Russia and Poland with the UK and Russia having the least attractive male applicants in the world.
According to the site normally, everyone must pass a strict "rating" stage, where existing members vote on whether new applicants are beautiful enough to join the site.
But the rating module was brought down last month, allowing anyone – regardless of looks – to be accepted.
Greg Hodge, managing director of BeautifulPeople.com, said: "We got suspicious when tens of thousands of new members were accepted over a six-week period, many of whom were no oil painting."
"We responded immediately, repairing the damage from the 'Shrek Virus' and putting every new member back into the rating module for a legitimate and democratic vote. The result is that we have lost over 30 000 recent members."
Hodge said it has upped security at the site which claims to have over 700 000 members worldwide.
On average, one in seven applicants is accepted.
The majority of successful new members come from the US, Denmark and France.
The countries with the highest rate of rejections are the UK, Russia and Poland with the UK and Russia having the least attractive male applicants in the world.
Source - City Press
