TIME.com's 5 worst websites.

[Blandy vs Terrorism]

eHarmony.com

Our main beef with this online dating site is its power to cause utter despair. eHarmony claims its more "scientific" approach to matchmaking differentiates it from competitors — its users complete extensive personality questionnaires, in order to connect them to others based on compatibility. In early 2006, eHarmony announced that more than 16,000 couples had married during the previous year as a result of meeting on the site, citing a 2005 Harris Interactive poll. That's about 90 people finding love every day, a track record bound to inflate expectations. On a more typical dating site, where users are prone to making snap judgments based on photos and sketchy profiles, if you don't find that special someone you're less likely to take it personally. It's easier to shake off because, after all, that's hardly the real you up there on that site. But if you've taken the time to answer eHarmony's 436 compatibility survey questions and paid its premium charges ($21 to $60 a month, depending on how many months you prepay), and the site then delivers terrible recommendations — or worse, rejects you as unmatchable — what do you tell yourself then? The company's advice, to stick with it for several months to improve your odds of finding a soul mate, sounds all too self-serving (the longer you use the site the more you pay). The site also discriminates against gays. (http://www.time.com/time/business/article/0,8599,1627585,00.html)

[Blandy vs Terrorism]

Evite.com

We're only mad at Evite because we need it so much, and we know it could be so much better. The site, in short, is crying out for an overhaul. With more and more sites emphasizing flexibility and user control over content, Evite's fill-in-the-blanks approach feels clumsy and dated. The ads are intrusive and navigation's a drag. The service has also been slow to adopt some of the media sharing tools that have become standard ways of the Web. You can upload photos but only after the party, and you can forget music and video. The company says these features are in development. We can't wait.

[Blandy vs Terrorism]

Meez.com

It has become trendy to tack poems, photos, icons, logos and other digital flotsam and jetsam onto email messages. We understand that digital signatures have a practical use, particularly when they provide the kind of info you'd see on a business card. And we don't doubt that, for some people, a U2 lyric can express how they feel better than they could. But the 3-D animations and other digital doodads created with the help of Meez and other sites of its ilk — Blingee, Iconator — are just plain annoying. They also clog the recipient's inbox with unnecessary bits. Sites like Smiley Central, which offers a seemingly endless assortment of cutesy creatures for dressing up email, instant messages and blog posts, require you to download a browser plug-in. The company insists the app is neither spyware nor adware, but it can still slow your computer down.

[Blandy vs Terrorism]

MySpace.com

It's by far the most popular social network, and one of the top ten online destinations overall. And, yes, Time.com named MySpace one of our 50 Coolest Websites of 2006. But since then, things have taken an ugly turn, and we're not just talking about poor page design. It seems the community has become infested with marketers and other opportunists who create false profiles and essentially spam other users, all under the guise of "making friends." Of course, there have always been loads of MySpace profiles of fictional characters, created to help market a movie or promote some other brand. But it's the bait-and-switch tactics from these leeches (Want to be my friend? Buy a ring tone! Fill out this survey!) that have taken things to a whole new—and sad—level.

[Blandy vs Terrorism]

SecondLife.com

We're sure that somebody out there is enjoying Second Life, but why? Visually, this vast virtual world can be quite impressive, but it's notoriously slow to load (it runs on free software you have to download) and difficult to navigate, even with a broadband connection. You interact in the space through an avatar, but creating and personalizing this animated representation of yourself is tedious. Movements feel clunky and there can be a terrible lag. As on many sites, there's a learning curve for novices, but Second Life's is simply too steep. And there are crazy people around every corner — disruptive types that spread graffiti and get in your way and throw you off your groove. Fans praise Second Life as a virtual hangout where you can meet and chat and buy sneakers and real estate (that's fake stuff for real money) and dance and go bowling and have sex — suggesting that "virtual humans" doing "human things" online in Second Life is somehow less pathetic than, say, cooking Kaldorei spider kabobs or making magic pantaloons in World of Warcraft. The corporate world's embrace of the place as a venue for staff meetings and training sessions does seem to lend Second Life a layer of legitimacy. But maybe it's a case of some CEOs trying too hard to be hip.

[Marc Lombardi]

Whew....at least Jinxworld didn't make the list....

[Evan Wiener]

Whew....at least Jinxworld didn't make the list....

:) We're WAY under the radar to bother complaining about. Although Brian Reed was a little bitter with some spam bots a while back. I think that's been cleared up, so Jinxworld is still my hot spot for getting my geek on.

[auritech]

This list is not true, for I do not see www.partytentcity.com anywhere.

[ZombieSpeedball]

The Myspace one could not be more correct. Jesus, I looked in my favorites yesterday and instead of the normal myspace icon next to the words, there was a circuit city icon. My God. Selling out was never done to these extremes.

[Hate_Prime]

Hate: Still a proud Myspace non-user.

[Garth]

No www.njguido.com ?

[Shwicaz]

The Myspace one could not be more correct. Jesus, I looked in my favorites yesterday and instead of the normal myspace icon next to the words, there was a circuit city icon. My God. Selling out was never done to these extremes.



I hear all my friends complain that all their 'friends' on myspace are a bunch of spammers/bots/etc.

That never happened to me, though, because I didn't approve every single friend request that came along like they did.

Of course, I realised that I am not on the computer much anymore, and decided to cancel my myspace account.

Now I just hang here. :D

[Ryan F]

I've got no issues with evite - it's a simple site, but it does a simple job.

MySpace is Hell. It has also always run extremely slow for me and been very buggy.

[Brian Defferding]

Yeah, MySpace needs drastic improvement, I still get those "unexpected error" messages just by clicking on normal links navigating around the site. The spambots aren't an obstacle for me at all, the site just needs to stop being so goddamn clunky.

[Jerome Gibbons]

MySpace.com

It's by far the most popular social network, and one of the top ten online destinations overall. And, yes, Time.com named MySpace one of our 50 Coolest Websites of 2006. But since then, things have taken an ugly turn, and we're not just talking about poor page design. It seems the community has become infested with marketers and other opportunists who create false profiles and essentially spam other users, all under the guise of "making friends." Of course, there have always been loads of MySpace profiles of fictional characters, created to help market a movie or promote some other brand. But it's the bait-and-switch tactics from these leeches (Want to be my friend? Buy a ring tone! Fill out this survey!) that have taken things to a whole new—and sad—level.


SecondLife.com

We're sure that somebody out there is enjoying Second Life, but why? Visually, this vast virtual world can be quite impressive, but it's notoriously slow to load (it runs on free software you have to download) and difficult to navigate, even with a broadband connection. You interact in the space through an avatar, but creating and personalizing this animated representation of yourself is tedious. Movements feel clunky and there can be a terrible lag. As on many sites, there's a learning curve for novices, but Second Life's is simply too steep. And there are crazy people around every corner — disruptive types that spread graffiti and get in your way and throw you off your groove. Fans praise Second Life as a virtual hangout where you can meet and chat and buy sneakers and real estate (that's fake stuff for real money) and dance and go bowling and have sex — suggesting that "virtual humans" doing "human things" online in Second Life is somehow less pathetic than, say, cooking Kaldorei spider kabobs or making magic pantaloons in World of Warcraft. The corporate world's embrace of the place as a venue for staff meetings and training sessions does seem to lend Second Life a layer of legitimacy. But maybe it's a case of some CEOs trying too hard to be hip.

Oh man, but Warren Ellis loves these!

[Patrick J]

with no mention of zwinky.com this list is invalid

[Joe Henderson]

I'm happy to see them mention evite. Evite's such a helpful tool, but the current website design has some major glitches, including not letting me copy previous invites' e-mail addresses. I send out evites to 1,000+ people, and it sucks to have to go through them manually every single fucking time...

[Albert]

with no mention of zwinky.com this list is invalid

GET ZWINKY

GET ZWINKY

GET ZWINKY

GET ZWINKY

GET ZWINKY

[Black Roman]

Is Time.com one of them?

[Jerome Gibbons]

They should have added that new design Wizard had for their website for like seventeen minutes.

[Whip]

OMG your sig picture. For the love of... GYAAAH!!

[Len Snark]

That sig is too big.

Also, Time Magazine didn't list any furry sites, so I can't respect their opinion.

[Fourthman]

The list is flawed in that it's named wrong. It should be the top 5 sites that aren't using their full potential. It seems like the problems they have are easily rectified or ignored. But hey, Time is so vanilla it's sampling from Queen (and David Bowie).

[Masculine Todd]

MySpace.com

And, yes, Time.com named MySpace one of our 50 Coolest Websites of 2006. But since then, things have taken an ugly turn, a.

Way back in 2006 (I know, it's hard to go back that far), things wern't any different. There were still sketchy people cyber-stalking and soliciting, false profiles with no intent outside advertising a product, and spam profiles. It has become much more popular to criticize and flame the site now, so Time is latching on after a mere six months since they called it one of the coolest websites of '06. Look, I'm not trying to become the great champion of Myspace, I don't even own an account. However, this is just a magazine jumping on a (hypocritical) bandwagon 'cause it's much more cool now to bash Myspace than to call it hip.

[Dan McLellan]

If you want an alternative to myspace that is better run and more secure I'd suggest facebook.

[Fourthman]

Here's an article boingboing posted a few weeks ago (http://www.danah.org/papers/essays/ClassDivisions.html) theorizing about new class divisions between Myspace and Facebook. I thought it was pretty good, but I've rarely seen or used either site.

[Dan McLellan]

Here's an article boingboing posted a few weeks ago (http://www.danah.org/papers/essays/ClassDivisions.html) theorizing about new class divisions between Myspace and Facebook. I thought it was pretty good, but I've rarely seen or used either site.

Interesting but since neither site has any discrimination practices, more of an article on personal taste of the user than true economic division. It was more accurate when Facebook was college only, as those who go to college are almost universally in a better financial situation than those who don't, but now that Facebook is open to high schools, I don't think it holds as true anymore.

Honestly I think myspace.com is just ugly and poorly designed as opposed to facebook.

[DeleriumTremens]

The worst thing on that list was the horrible sig that followed each entry here.