HOT or NOT

Another one of those fad sites. People submit their photos, and visitors to the site can rate them on a 1 to 10 scale of beauty. The submitters can then check the results. It was only instituted in October, but its popularity has swelled as people tell others in a good example of viral marketing.

There's something horribly fascinating about seeing the pictures of assorted random strangers one will never meet, and the idea of being rated by the citizens of Cyberia does have a strange appeal. The voting is incredibly harsh - almost no one is above a 7, no man is above a 6, and the majority is well below 5. Of course, some people on the site do deserve their score, and you wonder who was cruel enough to submit the photo in the first place.

While it could be an interesting and objective way to examine one's attractiveness, as is it's essentially worthless. First, no account is required to vote, allowing someone to vote multiple times. Second, the Internet hoi polloi are already abusing it - voting 5 for one decent looking guy left him with a total of 2.5, as someone else had unjustly given him 1. Now that it's taken off, some people are doing the exact opposite, hitting 10 a number of times to raise their total. With that in mind, you can find it at www.hotornot.com

Quite a lot of people also seem to find it funny to submit fake pictures to the site. Pictures of models, actresses etc. are not uncommon on the site. Im curious for what possible reason anyone could have for doing such a thing. You don't get money for it, and everyone with half a brain can see that the pictures are fake.

And what's even stranger is that people don't seem to mind. Pictures of sexy supermodels almost always get over 9 in the voting, although there is a nice "press here if the picture is fake instead of voting on it"-button on the page too.

Oh well, the site is a nice way to spend a extra 5 minutes, and as dragoon said, there is something strangely appealing about voting on the looks of total strangers.

I finally broke down and visited this site this morning. Unfortunately, it failed to be even the inane, guilty pleasure I had sort of hoped for.

Browsing the male listings, it wasn't just that I personally found the highest-rated guys to be very unattractive; I fully expected that. It was that after a very short time on the site, I was already getting recycled photos I had already seen and voted on (And was able to vote on them again).

But the most disappointing thing was that eventually they all began to blur into the same generic, blonde-ish, slightly goofy all-American college student with the exact same gel-spike haircut. Goatee optional.

I am not knocking the above; I had just hoped for more variety - of faces, bodies, hair, ethnicities.

In many ways, amihotornot struck me as the antithesis of E2.

How to use AmIhotornot.com to subvert the conventional idea of attractiveness

In general the problem with sites that take polls of the general public is that people tend to be sheeplike and schlump along with the herd, this is the same reason BTW that people who voted for Nader are getting yelled at by Goreistas, because they didn't vote for the winner (or the guy more likely to win). Why are Americans obsessed with being on the winning team? What happened to the underdog? All this newfound economic good luck has ruined our taste, I find. But back to Am I hot or not, all the blond skinny white girls get voted up along with the obviously stolen images of Asian pr0n girls in their underpants. Therefore all the people who already think they are hot are confirmed in this stupid idea and all the conventionally unattractive people (round, short, weird, old) are voted down, confirmed in their feelings about themselves.

We have a big problem in American culture (and other places but in America especially) with how young women view their role in the world. Many many girls think that they must look like the women in fashion magazines. This leads to sexual insecurity, to girls seeking approval in ways that are dangerous to them. To countless eating disorders (yes eating disorders on the face are such a terrible example of how culturally sick we are in the first place, but to suffer from one is a horrible horrible thing). Generally we should be trying to convince people that being unique and interesting is what is important in this world. We don't need more conventionally good looking people, we have reached saturation... To examine this look at women film stars of the 20's and 30's. Yes they had their own "look" but it was a lot more natural, and certainly not the buffed silicon sex droids that we worship now. Hell, Mae West was a sex symbol and that girl weighed 220 if she weighed a pound.

SO.. go to the site and keep a browser window open, then just vote against what you think most people are voting for. Vote down cleavage and pouty looks and girls with conventional good looks. Ruin the curve as it where. Vote up old people, vote up fat people and too skinny people and drunken trailer trash. Vote for the loonies and the sad blurry little pictures of peoples highschool sweethearts. If you don't agree with me fine, then just do it to fuck with people, that is fun too. I have this image of all these cheerleader types logging in and being a little bummed cause they only got an 8.9 instead of a 9.5 or a 10. Maybe then they will consider that chasing after the consensus view of perfection will not get them as far as they thought and maybe they will decide to use their sexuality to please themselves instead of others. Probably not though. But maybe one of the low not so good looking people will login and have jumped to a 2 and feel good knowing someone out there likes their looks, which is probably more important than having everyone like you anyway. Who knows, I like voting on things, I like looking at strange candid pictures of weirdos and I like screwing with the squares and this is a nice way to do it. And all you conventionally attractive people out there, don't worry. We still like you.

I always use amihotornot to try and spread a little sunshine throughout the world. Finding facially challenged people and giving them a ten always gives me a good feeling - it's nice to know that in some way you're brightening up peoples lives in some small way.

However I disagree with the previous opinion about downvoting the cheerleader types to teach 'em a lesson. I have a lot of female friends, some of whom are quite attractive. I'm thinking of two in particular who would easily grab perfect 10s every time if they submitted their pictures.

They are also two of the most hideously insecure people I know. One refuses to get into a relationship because she believes no man should have to suffer her company. The other has spent whole weeks in her house, refusing to go outside because she feels too ugly.

The point I'm trying to make is that there are a lot of broken people out there who may look good, but are barely surviving on the inside. Be careful what you say to them - you never know how deeply it will affect them.

In danger of making this a terribly long node with GTKY-like qualities, I will shortly sum up my own experiences with HotOrNot as it's called now.

I have never been a very extrovert person, and at 20, I still haven't been in a relationship. Not because the opportunity hasn't been there, but because I don't have the guts to go further than friendship. I recently put a picture of myself on said site, as I had a few online friends tell me I'm not that shabby-looking, and it did reach a height of 9.8 the first day, and is now resting at 9.5. That means a lot to me, being the silent type that prefers to stand in the back of the room and watch the party.

On to my opinion; while the hotornot clientelle do tend to vote in the same direction, I do not think they are sheep, as they do not know what votes a picture has amassed before they cast their vote. Personally, I prefer to vote on character, as well as looks. That is, lots of so-called average-looking people are very attractive. As an example, I recently discovered that I am a nose-guy. I like noses that many people find too big. Guess I'm funny like that, but it also means I often give 10s to people who I later see have an average of 3 or 4.

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No, you can't have my link, but go do some cyber-stalking, it should be possible to find it.

Hot or Not is a website devoted to the numerical ranking of individuals. Previously known as Am I Hot or Not?, the website was started in October of 2000. There have been modifications to the site since the appearance of the Am I Hot or Not? node. First off is obviously the title of the website, which is now just Hot or Not. Secondly, there is a Meet Me feature which makes this much like an internet personals forum.

Initially when going to this webpage, you are directed through a series of photos where you are allowed to vote 1-10 for the person shown. There are many opinions regarding this type of website on the Am I Hot or Not? node, and I welcome everyone to read them. Those comments mostly express extreme distaste for such a website and claim that it just goes to show what a sad society we live in. I propose, however, that a site like this is simply a novelty that has no impact and does not offer a dark glimpse into the shallowness of humanity. It's just a web page. I think it is very likely that most voters fly through the pages of random photos with very little thought as to what they rank the person. It's no big deal.

Now, the web page has experienced additions and changes since the change from Am I Hot or Not?. The ranking system has been modified with a normalization technique to account for extreme lows and highs in the voting. Also, there is now a Meet Me feature that allows for people to start email correspondence with others on the site. In order to use the Meet Me feature, you must sign up for a free account. However, you cannot actually email the person unless one of you is a paid member of the site. The typical cost is roughly six dollars a month.

The Meet Me function has a database searchable by keyword and location. The user is then shown a photograph and a short biography of people that fit the search criteria and they are allowed to select yes or no for the opportunity to meet the person. If the user selects yes, their profile is sent to the other person using email. If that person then selects yes, the profile is put into a double match directory and the two can email or message eachother.

Of course, there are some photos and biographies that are fakes and put up for the apparent amusement of a few individuals, but on the whole, the site appears to have a fairly honest following. It has now become a bit of a personals site without the explicit purpose of arranging dates.

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www.hotornot.com

Easter Eggs in Hot or Not!

Across the top of each page is the "HOT or NOT" banner.
Click the word "HOT" once and it will give you a short "How It Works" blurb.
Click it again and it does the same thing.
Click it a third time however...

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/msg me if you discover any others

Lured by a story on NPR, i decided to visit Hot or Not.com. In fact, I even posted a picture. So the question became, am I hot?

I expected not. I am not an ugly man. On the other hand, I'm 47, and somewhat overweight. No woman ever stopped her Ferrari to ask if I were wearing the right kind of blue jeans. Tom Selleck I'm not. I posted the best pic I had on the hard drive, which was only slightly better than my driver's license. Imagine my surprise when the results came in, that I was 'hotter' than 77% of the guys on the site. I was a 7.4 on a one to ten scale.

That struck me as odd. First of all, 7.4 was way higher than I deserved. Second, when you look up your rating they show you your votes on a bar graph. The highest number of votes shown was a 5, with 6 barely ahead of four for second place. More than a few ones, but not a single 10. I didn't have the data to calculate myself, but from the distibution I figured my score should have been about a 5.4, which would have put me dead average. So where did the seven come from?

My guess is they give people an artificial 'boost' in order to make them feel better about themselves online. Few people seek out feedback telling them that they're shaking the ugly stick. People want to think they're cute, even when they aren't. This keeps them in the game. The site FAQs say they adjust ratings of regular voters to fit voting style. Perhaps so, but that does leave room for doubt.

While I did not rate men, I can comment on the variety of women. The variety was huge. The percentage of babes probably exceeded real life. But it was no party at the Playboy Mansion. Many of the women were morbidly obese, and plenty had the face of a bulldog. Others were quite average. Women who chose revealing photos had higher scores than their more modest sisters. Cleavage seems worth at least a whole point over the equivalent, more modest women. A surprising number of transsexuals wanted to be rated. Photoshop use was plainly evident for some people who wanted a better body than God gives almost anyone.

The site is funded by an introduction serivce run by the site. Users can click on whether or not they want to meet someone, and if both people click yes, then communication is possible. If one person buys a subscription of course, which runs for a bout $10 a month. They at least warn you when the next bill is about to come due.

The site offers a guilty distraction. Women are always pleasant to look at, and the clicking gives you constant feedback. But it's net lite, without substance.

Postscript: Later on I posted a better picture, one that reflected a little weight loss and showed my face well. My score went up. Somebody even rated me a ten!. Although I know better, it felt good to think that at least somebody thinks I'm hot.