This is the short edition of Morales, first broadcast on the BBC World Service.

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Hello and welcome to More or Less on the BBC World Service.

I'm Tim Harford.

This week, inspired by the romantic celebrations of Valentine's Day,

we ask whether it's possible to find love by analysing the numbers.

I wasn't having any luck online dating, so rather than using conventional methods,

I decided instead to try to use some digital strategy and a little math

to see if I could reverse engineer the entire system.

But we're getting ahead of ourselves.

Before we try the online world, let's first take a look at a brutal method

of face-to-face courting, speed dating.

Where a number of singles come to an event in a bar or similar.

The men move from table to table to have a fleeting date with each woman.

Some economists are excited about speed dating events because they're perfect

for observing market forces at work.

In this case, the dating market.

There was only one reporter we could send, Charlotte McDonald.

Obviously because of my data skills and unique understanding of the human condition.

You know because you're the only person on the Morales team

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