Expert: Ahmed Salami - 1/10/2009

Question
QUESTION: Hi Ahmed,

I have been a member on a dating website since 10/29/2008.

I've noticed every week or so since Oct. 29th when I tallied up how many replys I had received from women, it came out to my receiving approximately one message reply every 2 days,if figured over any number of days period.

I'm just wondering why I don't receive replys every day, 3 days, or 4 days occassionally. It just seems strange that it comes out consistently to one reply coming in every 2 days.

Is there some kind of mysterious universal law or probability principal at play here? Just curious & this is really a serious question.

Best Regards,

Mark P.


ANSWER: Hi Mark,
You're wondering why you dont receive replies everyday? Is this your question, as it is outside the scope of what i do here, or you do receive replies randomly and the average reply per day stays the same and you want to know why?
I can help you with probabilities, but your question has to be direct and concise.

Regards.

---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: Thank you Ahmed, for your latest reply. I really meant...average reply per day stays the same and you want to know why?

In other words, here's an example:

Based on any 1 to 30 day calendar period since Oct. 29th,08, whether I receive 1 message every other day or two messages every 4 days or 3 messages every 6 days, or whatever frequency they happen to arrive on, my replys average over the course of a 30 day period to 1 message reply every 2 days.

It's come out to roughly 1 message reply every 2 days for for any 30 day period between Oct. 29th,08 up to the present date. I'm not complaining that I'm not getting enough replies. I'm just curious as to why that sometimes my message replys over a 30 day period do not reveal 1 message reply every day, or every 3 days, or sometimes evey 4 days. No..I'm not complaining that I'm getting too many replys or not enough. For example:

Given any 6 day period I might get 2 messages on day 1 and 1 message on day 4. That comes out to 2 messages per day.

Now the next 6 day period I might get 1 reply on day 2, 1 on day 3, and 1 on day 6. That comes out to 2 messages per day.

Now the next 6 day period I might get 1 reply on day 2 and 2 replies on day 5. That comes out to 2 messages per day.

That's what I mean about no matter how randomly my replies come in, after usually any 6 day period or more, it comes out to 1 reply every 2 days for any given period.

In other words, if the replys are being sent to me randomly as readers read them and respond, then why don't I have some 6 day periods where I average 1 every 3 days or 1 every 4 days...even 1 every 5 or 1 every 6 days?

Hope that makes my question less confusing.

Thank you again,

Mark P.  

Answer
Ok Mark,
This makes your question less confusing.
In your '6 day period' paragraphs, i'm sure you meant to write '1 message every 2 days' and not '2 messages per day'.
Well, all i can say is that this is not even a problem of probability. Of course, from everything you've written you do average 1 reply every 2 days, constantly in 6-day periods. This could be purely coincidental, which i doubt though, or a kind of control by the administrator of the web service. Maybe you're on some kind of limited package or so, i cant tell.

Regards.