Litmus Test

11 Dec 2009

There are lots of lots of sites that horde and gather content on the web. Sites that offer you to maintain a photo album, video collection, bookmarks and whatnots. Each and every such site tries to gather a community of its own. How could you tell apart the sites that are worth your attention and the sites that would mean just plain waste of time? How you could see whether there is healthy community or just a bunch of uninteresting loosers?

I have figured out a three-seconds test that seems to work quite universally. Just go to the site and use the search input field to search for some controversial topic. I usually search for "nude". If the search results are just porn or a horde of flame-infested discussions, the site is uncontrolled wilderness. Avoid that site. If nothing relevant turns up or you can see just some carefully censured bikini shots, the site is too conservative to be useful or entertaining. Avoid such site as well. If the search results show decent selection of artistic nudes or some good texts on nudity, it is worth the time to explore the site further.