The Soulmate Calculator is one of the hot schemes in the hit-n-run world of online advertising. The ads, which promise to help connect with your soulmate, are the wireless equivalent of the 1-900 number: novelty entertainment with an undisclosed bill that arrives a few weeks later. The ads are being uploaded into the social networking spaces of the internet with amazing efficiency. The affiliates of the site (I suspect grey-area PPC kingpin Shoemoney) are uploading hundreds of thousands of pay-per-click keywords to get the coverage they are now attaining.

The scheme converts well because of the one-click signup and billing that goes straight to your cellphone statement (rather than requiring the you to consciously enter a card number, e-mail, or Paypal address). A lot of folks pay their cellphone by automatic bank transfer these days, and they don’t check their statements carefully. It would be easy to milk some people for quite a while before they realize the $39.98 monthly surcharges tacked on.

Well, people should read the fine print before signing up for anything, right? Good advice, but with the Soulmate Calculator you can’t - unless you have a 900 x 1400 or higher resolution monitor. The landing screen is carefully designed so you can’t see what you’re signing up for (or the multiple charges involved) on a standard-sized screen. You’d have to scroll way down to find out – and there is no reason to, because the “next” button is up high.

I say that because of the non-sequiter selling proposition and the heavily camouflaged terms and conditions, the the Soulmate Calculator is a calculating scam. What do you think?