Observer Review are overwhelmed by the response to the piece by Zoe Lewis on internet dating that ran this weekend. She has been inundated with offers of solidarity, advice and, of course, dates.
It is all reminiscent of the feature we ran last year touting our (quite unscientific) thesis that the new Bridget Jones is in fact a man called Ben. That story took on a life of its own, being followed up in other papers and on the radio. Quite uncannily, it also turned out to have a basis in fact. According to the Office for National Statistics, single men in their thirties now outnumber their female counterparts.
By coincidence - we'd love to pretend it was brilliant planning - this week we also reported new statistics showing a general rise in the number of people living on their own.
Hmm, we thought, look at all the lonely people.
So we got the Observer evil genius secret science people to draw a big venn diagram. In one set we put Single People In Their Thirties. In the other we put People Who Read the Observer. Guess what? The overlap is huge. So we passed the data on to the Observer boffin strategic editorial demographic targeting department and instructed them to work out a way to use the Observer to bring people together in a spirit of mutual respect, trust and GSOH all round.
They have yet to report their findings. All suggestions welcome.
