Saturday, March 25, 2006

A New Site Idea- To Rate --AND COMMENT ABOUT-- One's Attractiveness

Ever since I was a preteen, I have been worried about how I look, and wished for people to honestly critique just that. However, either:

  • Most of the people I've asked are either too polite and tell me that I look nice.
  • I really do look nice
  • Or some are just uncomfortable at being asked to critique another's attractiveness, and therefore refuse.
Therefore, a solution would be to start a website where anybody can upload their photos.

After uploading, a visitor (or registered member) will see below their photos a 10-button choice bar with the caption: "Rate His/Her Attractiveness." 1 would be, well you know what. 5 would be plain average, and 10 would mean one of the most attractive guys/girls one has ever seen!

Below it would have a multiple-choice menu (that you can select more than one of), with the caption stating: "How should this person look better?" The options, some available for certain genders of photos, would say something like:

  • It's the clothes you're wearing. You need a better fashion sense.
  • The pimples should go.
  • Stop piercing your face.
  • How about a better haircut?
  • You could do something about your eyebrows/unibrow.
  • You look better clean-shaven.
  • Grow a goatee.
  • You're more attractive with make-up.
  • Two words: LOSE WEIGHT.
  • Two words: GAIN MUSCLES.
  • You look anorexic/bulemic. See a doctor and eat right.
  • I don't know what to say other than "Get Plastic Surgery".
  • Other (Please fill in the comment box.)
Then there will of course be a comment box to add whatever advice they want to give that wasn't a choice, or anything else they feel like saying.

This way of rating your attractiveness would work well with those who:
  • cannot find someone honest and straightforward enough to critique them accurately
  • somehow doesn't choose to believe what people say about how nice they look
  • are too afraid to ask straightforward people of their opinion about their physical appearance
The anonymity of the Internet often brings the bluntness out of people since they don't have much to fear as far as retributions are concerned. Instead of beating around the bush, they cut it down. Instead of tact, they're more blunt, and bluntness can be useful so long as it's truthful. Also, the person who wants others to rate them won't feel as cut-down as they would in real life because it's not a personal face-to-face chat, and interactions with others online feel so distant because they usually literally are.

Therefore, I wouldn't feel anywhere near as bad if someone said I was ugly online; many people wouldn't either. Moreover, their suggestions to how I might improve the way I look could prove quite useful to me and many others.

Of course, other sites (like HotOrNot.com) already have similar rating systems, but they don't have options to indicate how we want that person to improve their appearance. They also don't have comment boxes for users to leave tips on how to look better (that weren't covered on the selectible options), as well as perhaps praises about how attractive they already are.

I need to know how to start such a website. If anyone has tips, you may leave a comment.

2 comments:

  1. Mr. Anonymous, HotOrNot.com does NOT allow us to leave comments!

    This is a one-upmanship of HotOrNot.com. With (constructive) comments, HotOrNot may go by the wayside like Yahoo did when Google came along.

    ReplyDelete