Subscribe to ListverseSite Update: March 2009
- Published March 9, 2009 - 104 Comments
We have some very important stuff coming up soon – so it seemed appropriate to write an update to let you all know what is going on in the life of listverse and JFrater. This update includes a poll – we would really appreciate it if you would take the time to answer it for us.
To help me get a better idea of what you all like on the site, I would really appreciate it if you would answer the following poll. It will help me to hone the future lists to the tastes of our readers. You simply select the three topics (you can choose fewer than three if you prefer) you love the most and click “Vote”. You won’t be taken away from the page – the poll will update in front of you and show you what other people have selected. There will be some more polls to come in a while – to help me get some demographic information from you all (this will be optional of course). In one week this poll will close, and we will randomly pick one registered user who answered the poll to win any DVD featured on this site (on any of the movie lists). If you don’t want to register, you can still vote in the poll, but you won’t be entered in the competition.
[poll=2]
We have a title for the book! As you may know, a couple of months ago we were approached by an American publisher in California who want to work with us to produce a book based on the site. The contracts are now all signed, the book title has been agreed upon, the first chapter and table of contents have been submitted and we should have a book on the shelves within 12 months. It is taking a lot of energy and effort to get the chapters together for the book, so if it seems that I have been a little absent lately, that is the reason. I intend to work on reversing that trend.
On July 1, 2007, the List Universe was launched. In that time we have had a complete redesign (which will be unfamiliar to most of you no doubt) and it has served us well so far. But as the site is still growing and our needs expanding, we need to look seriously at getting a professional evaluation and even visual update done. I have been in contact with a company here that has designed some fantastic sites (such as kiwibank.co.nz) and will be meeting with them this month to begin the review process. If all goes well, I may engage them to give us a completely new look – one you will all love. If there is anything that you find difficult or annoying about the site (such as wondering where the contact information is), do let me know in the comments – it will help as we come to the design changes.
I am quite keen to introduce new competitions in April – if you have any ideas on what might make a good competition, please let me know. It would be great for people to discuss it here in the comments so we can gauge popularity. We will continue to have competitions on the lists as usual – but it would be nice to do something a bit different for a change.
I posted in December that I was moving into my new house in January. The move went extremely well and I am now settled in. There is lots of decorating to do but I am ploughing ahead and getting quite a lot done. I have a bunch of veges growing in my garden and have bottled my first lot of gherkins. Once I have the place looking the way I want it, I will upload some photos for you to all see.
Unfortunately we lost one of our main advertisers this month because someone complained about one of our lists (the suicide list). Not content to end our relationship with one of our advertisers, the person also complained to a second one. The second advertiser had the decency to write to me to tell me about the complaint and ask me to remove the list. I have (with regret) removed the list and our second advertiser is still on board. Needless to say, the loss of income is going to hit us hard – especially as our hosting fees are increasing every month due to bandwidth usage. You can rest assured, however, that the site will continue and we are trying very hard to find a replacement advertiser.
This month we have a submit a list competition. If you submit a great list, it has a chance of winning you $150.00 US. There are more details on the list submissions page which should be familiar to you all (I hope!) Maybe the poll above will help to make the choice of topic easier for you too.
It seems appropriate again for me to thank everyone involved with the site – particularly our admins Cyn, Dangorironhide, and Mom424. We appreciate the comments, emails, and help we get constantly from you all. It is you who make the site and without your support over the last year and a half we wouldn’t be here.
Have your say... [Read me first | Top of page, comments]
You must be logged in to post a comment.
March 9th, 2009 at 11:09 pm
Thanks for letting us do the poll. I love the bizarre lists! btw congrats on the move!
March 9th, 2009 at 11:21 pm
Thanks. I would have more polls in the future. That makes it nice. Is that a real picture of your home? If so…looks nice! (love the picture of the sumo’s!)
The only annoying thing for me is I can’t get into the forums. I can log in just fine here but can’t there. Your site has to hate me or something.
March 9th, 2009 at 11:49 pm
#2. oouchan
The forums act independently of the main site. So you have to sign up separately for the forms.
Grats on the move J. The loss of the ad sucks hard. It should be easy enough to find a replacement though, who would refuse such a kick ass site??
March 10th, 2009 at 12:02 am
Why would a advertiser leave over a couple of complaints. We always hear of people complaining about these sort of things, but to let these people force their views onto the rest of us is, well, BULLSHIT. If you don’t like a list, nobody here is making you read it. If you don’t like it, that’s your problem, not Jamies.
Keep up the good work, we will keep on reading.
March 10th, 2009 at 12:44 am
How does advertising revenue work? There are three google ads at the top of this page. Do you receive money if I simply click on the link and go to that page, even if I don’t do anything else once I’m there? I am prepared to click on any reasonble looking link, go to a page and immediately come back here if that helps.
Every category has its good lists and bad lists. I can’t choose any category.
March 10th, 2009 at 12:56 am
Don’t bend to consumer majority.
March 10th, 2009 at 1:13 am
Boo! I’m the only person so far who voted for travel. The only ones I don’t really care for in general are movies and sports.
Hopefully you find a new, BETTER advertiser.
March 10th, 2009 at 1:19 am
stevek (4): that is exactly what I thought. I am disgusted that a company I have had a good 1.5 year relationship with would just dump me. They haven’t returned a single email either.
March 10th, 2009 at 1:21 am
astraya: We make money when people click the google ones – the rest make money just by people loading the page (and the ads) – there are basically two types of ad – CPC (pay per click) and CPM (pay per 1,000 page loads of the same ad). A mix of both seems to be the best for revenue. I am pretty pleased that we have managed to run the site all this time with 5 figure expenses (which includes my salary of $0.00) just on the ads – without requiring subscriptions or other money-grubbing schemes
March 10th, 2009 at 1:24 am
downhighway61: that is funny actually – I thought it would score higher and it is a topic I quite enjoy writing for. Maybe after a while of voting it will rank higher
March 10th, 2009 at 3:02 am
thanks for the daily list!
March 10th, 2009 at 3:46 am
nuriko: you are welcome – thanks for acknowledging it
March 10th, 2009 at 3:56 am
thanks!!!
March 10th, 2009 at 4:07 am
I enjoy the lists and look forward to new ones whenever I surf through my Netvibe feeds.
In fact, I remember one list mentioning Hitler wasn’t really a vegetarian. It was funny because a few days later, there was mention of Hitler being a vegetarian in the Watchmen movie and I later told the hubby about Listverse and reading that it wasn’t true.
See? Learn something new everyday through these lists!
March 10th, 2009 at 4:09 am
Melody: that is our aim
There should be another Hitler related list coming soon to.
March 10th, 2009 at 4:51 am
That was hard picking my top 3 list categories. And to the person who complained because of the suicide list – i could put something nast here but i won’t. Just know i’m saddened at some people’s ignorance.
Love the site, Frater. One of the few that i check every day.
March 10th, 2009 at 7:11 am
Good luck with the ads, I’m sure you will find a new one soon.
Anyway, keep on with your list, it makes me less ignorant everyday!
March 10th, 2009 at 8:49 am
Jfrater – in the wide, WIDE world of the Interwebs, the List Universe is one of maybe a half-dozen sites that I am compelled to check EVERY day. It’s always good for a laugh and, even though I pride myself on my vast knowledge of weird and random information, I always learn something new.
Sorry to hear about you losing a major advertiser thanks to some interfering busybody. For some reason, people like that find themselves unable to just peruse another site when they get offended and instead decide to ruin things for everybody. Hope you find another advertiser soon. Keep up the great work on an awesome site!
March 10th, 2009 at 9:19 am
Hey jfrater! How about alphabetizing the lists besides subject categorizing? You know, for indexing? I love this site so much! It’s crazy that some people take some things either personal or too serious that it screws it up for others. If I don’t like something, I don’t look at it. Leaving is just a mouse click away. I bet that there are other lists somewhere else similar to and even far worse offensive than the ones that are protested here. Anyway, keep up the good work.
March 10th, 2009 at 9:43 am
Thanks for keeping us updated! It sucks that you lost one of your main advertisers due to one of your hundreds of lists.
Someone else posted it, and I just wanted to second it…Listverse is one of the two non-work sites I check every single day. The other is my gmail account. I am always excited to see what the new list is. I am so glad of your success in this site, and I hope that more opportunities come your way!
March 10th, 2009 at 11:51 am
One suggestion…It would be great to have some alternative search options on the All Lists page. It can be rather difficult to find a particular list with the sections how they currently are.
March 10th, 2009 at 12:15 pm
Well, sorry to hear about the advertisers, but I wish it were other advertisers that dropped you. Every time I go to the site, some ridiculous pop ups occur. I get a DIET.COM one every time, and a random pop up with it. I also sometimes am reading a list, and some big loud noise comes up which I cannot find on the page. The banner ads don’t move, and the source is never found. As soon as I close the tab for the list however, it dissipates. The worst part is, the sounds are like 5 loud trailers playing at once.
My pop up blocker can’t even get the pop ups, and the noises get me so frustrated with the site I just leave for the day instead of reading all the lists I want. Please fix this crap. It aggravates me. Thank you.
If this is a double post, sorry something happened.
March 10th, 2009 at 1:28 pm
JFrater:
1) I honestly think that you and your site are the best thing that has happened to the Internet in a long time. Thank you for all your efforts.
2) Hmmm… off the top of my head, I would suggest having a caption contest of some sort. They’re pretty much my favorite kind of contest. Maybe there are better-suited ideas for contests for Listverse, but I can’t come up with any right now…
3) Since you ask, I do have an itsy bitsy complaint about the site, but I don’t think it has too much to do with design.
I find that most of the lists, old and new, have items numbered as a countdown (in other words, as through and through top 10 lists), even though many of these are supposed to be “in no particular order”. I think much confusion would be avoided if new “top 10/15/etc.” lists were indeed numbered as countdowns, BUT the lists which are in no particular order were simply numbered 1, 2, 3, and so on, in order to avoid complaints about “X not being #1″ in lists that aren’t even supposed to be “top 1X” lists. Just sayin’… 
3) I’m looking forward to the book! But please take all the time you need; you shouldn’t rush genius, right?
March 10th, 2009 at 1:41 pm
Thanks for the suggestions so far everyone – I will definitely look at the archive page to see how it can be improved.
March 10th, 2009 at 2:10 pm
Just wanted to let you all know that the latest list (bizarre people) has been removed – it was not original.
March 10th, 2009 at 2:20 pm
You should host your own videos on Fliggo. There are so many lists with video clips that don’t work because whoever was hosting them at YouTube took them down. With Fliggo, you can create your own site for all of them.
March 10th, 2009 at 2:49 pm
I’m torn between Bizarre, crime, history and people as very favourite.
March 10th, 2009 at 2:51 pm
I can’t remember how I initially got tuned into this site, but I can say that this is the only site that I check daily. I try to refer anyone with any intelligence at all to the site also!
The thought of an advertiser dropping you over some douchebag complaint sucks, but as stated before, something better will come along!
I have to say that what i enjoy most is the intelligent comments/arguements/debates. There are almost too many intellects here like, but we can cope. My personal faves are the philosophy/theology, and music debates.
Keep up the great work!
March 10th, 2009 at 3:15 pm
Thanks Jamie for creating such a wonderfully addictive site, and thanks to Cyn, Dangor and Mom for ensuring we all play nice!
Can’t wait for the book. I hope it’s going to have a sample of the comments from the lists – they’re a big part of what makes this site so entertaining.
March 10th, 2009 at 3:22 pm
Lizzie: I have mentioned that to the publishers and they are okay with the idea – so fingers crossed.
March 10th, 2009 at 3:43 pm
The book wont have to have lists excluded like the suicide one right? Cause everyone likes a real intense list
March 10th, 2009 at 3:53 pm
I remember the old site… Yes, I remember it very well… Also, who is the douchebag who complained to the advertisers?
March 10th, 2009 at 4:27 pm
yup this is one of only about three sites that i check daily and i love it. i seem to learn some usful facts but also something completly random which is 9 times out of 10 funny
will this book be out in the UK? cos i want to buy it! i cant beilive that your advertiser just dumped you because someone made a complaint! if they dont like the list then they shouldnt read it!!
March 10th, 2009 at 4:39 pm
Sorry to hear about your advertiser, but good luck.
This site is the among my top ten favorites.
I’ll hurry to check out the list submission page for the first time.
March 10th, 2009 at 4:58 pm
Such a bummer that some douchenozzle lost you an advertiser!
I totally love this site, and like others have said it’s one that I check every single day!
The ONLY thing I can possibly complain about, is that when you click on a link it takes you offsite, (both on mainsite & forums), and it would be super awesome if it could open the link in a new tab or new window. The old version of the forums did this, but from what I remember the mainsite has always navigated you away. It’s not a huge deal, since it’s easy enough to right click & select “Open in new tab,” I just forget most of the time
March 10th, 2009 at 7:06 pm
Great update
… I’ve been familiar with the site for a long time (almost since the beginning I think), and I think it’s come along greatly! I’m really excited for the book! Plus I’m glad I had a chance to see the suicide list before it was taken down. Keep up the great work!
March 10th, 2009 at 7:33 pm
Bizzare??? NOOOO probably the category i skip the most…
I must say about the suicide list. I personally thought it was a serious list, however do understand the ever growing dangers of depressed people going online and looking up ways to end their life. I think it might be prudent, as a disclaimer to have an “adult” section for certain lists, I dunno just a thought.
I too was really concerned when I first saw that list, I thought it was close to crossing the line but I wouldnt complain.
March 10th, 2009 at 8:17 pm
Wow. I can’t believe someone would drop such a popular site over someones stupid complaint. All my comments are really awkward…but your site really rocks.
March 10th, 2009 at 8:19 pm
With the suicide list though its not like it said “Yo your life is worse than Amy Whimehouse’s, so kill yourself!” You can’t hold a little list on the web responsible for some little emo kid taking like 5 bottles of tylenol.
March 10th, 2009 at 8:36 pm
Pity we dont know who complained about the ad.cause a bit of tar and feathering would be the order of the day.
Thanks for the update, as for comment 37 I mentioned in a past list that mayby have a password for registered users, to open up LV or something like that
March 10th, 2009 at 9:03 pm
Ya man we need to find the snitch
March 10th, 2009 at 9:14 pm
The bizzare lists are always my favorite, they are so… well, bizzare! lol
I think it’s stupid that someone would complain about one controversial list when, lets face it, you have many lists on here that could be complained about. What happened to free speech and such? I do understand the need to placate advertisers, though, it’s just a shame that someone would complain in the first place.
Just want to say how awesome this site is, I originally found it through a friend posting a link on a forum I frequent, and only came here to read the list in question… Now this is one of my most frequented sites!
March 10th, 2009 at 9:48 pm
Cool, the 3 I voted for ended up being the most popular with everyone else. Good idea to do a poll.
March 10th, 2009 at 10:03 pm
I am finding it incredibly interesting to see how you are all voting – I think I generally agree too. Tomorrow’s list should satisfy the majority based on the results
March 10th, 2009 at 10:23 pm
Dear jfrater, I absolutely adore your site and lately have been checking for new lists every week. My favorite list is history lists by the way, the more pictures the better. Anyone who says otherwise smells funny and their mothers dress them silly. Anyway I saw that you mentioned you were using a company to redesign or makeover the website. I recently became friends with some people who run a web design company and they may be able to help you if you are not 100% on the company you already have lined up. Email me if you are interested! These people are great by the way, they do things with websites that are amazing!
March 10th, 2009 at 11:24 pm
I wish I could have chosen more categories,- I would have liked to include History and Travel.
March 11th, 2009 at 1:43 am
congratulations!!!
not only to the administrators but also to the readers!!!
we will soon have a book??
yeah!!!
yeah!!!
it’s been,,uhhh,,5 months since i discovered this site….because of “The Book of Lists 2″….
certified “Listomaniac”…
hwahahahah…
im very excited…can we shorten the waiting period for the book??like 12 days??
hehehe…
I LOVE BIZARRE lists…
thank you…
salamat..
March 11th, 2009 at 2:10 am
only three choices, that’s even tougher than cutting a list down to ten
. So voted strategically to get a better score for choices 2,3 and 4.
Thanks to Jamie, Mom, Dangor and especially Cyn, who toils tirelessly to raise the standard in the comments, for all your efforts bringing the site to us.
Two items that would really help here, would be some way to add an edit feature to the comments. I know it has been stated that this is a failing of being basically a blog format, but can something be looked at in the redesign process?
Second item, some way to prevent identity theft. I know we are not going to beat all the trolls all the time, but stopping them from being able to steal the ID of registered users would a. save the mods quite some time and b. stop people from assuming I am more of an opinionated clown than I really am.
Cheers
Lee
March 11th, 2009 at 2:23 am
k1w1taxi: both of your issues are close to my heart but so far from being possible. I will investigate the editing of comments – now that we have more highly toned code, it may be possible. We had the feature once.
March 11th, 2009 at 5:18 am
Huh. The advertiser dropped the site after only ONE complaint? It wasn’t a lot? Could you let us know which advertiser that was so we can launch a counter-complaint campaign? Seriously, it’s not just the site that would drive me to that, but the fact that it’s restriction of your right to free speech. An advertiser that removes their revenue from your site after one complaint is not worthy of my business. I would greatly appreciate it if you would let us know who it is.
I was wondering about the other list yesterday. I couldn’t load it anyway. Thanks as always for a great site.
March 11th, 2009 at 5:22 am
50. Cedestra : It’s not the fact that one advertiser dropped the site, it’s the fact that others could have. And for LV, no advertisers = no site, one list is a small price to pay IMO
March 11th, 2009 at 6:22 am
k1w1taxi -
March 11th, 2009 at 12:06 pm
Question: What two lists did you remove and are they going to be included in the book when it comes out?
I’ve been reading this site since it first came out and i think its a shame that an advertiser get upset over educational lists (for the most part). How ridiculous.
March 11th, 2009 at 1:06 pm
jFrater – Listverse has become my first stop practically every day. There’s always something new and interesting to read, regardless of subject. Very well done, and kudos!
Is there a way that authors of submitted lists could be given limited access to make corrections and updates to their own lists?
March 11th, 2009 at 1:13 pm
Another suggestion: Perhaps on the home page put an archive navigation link section in place of the “Latest Lists” on the righthand side. It would link to a specific category on the “All Lists” page:
ARCHIVES
Most Recent
Administration
Art
Bizzare
Competitions
Crime
…
It seems like the “Latest Lists” section on the home page is redundant, considering you have “Most Recent Lists” as the primary feature.
Another suggestion: comments preview and editing
March 11th, 2009 at 1:14 pm
(Er, whoops, looks like someone already suggested comment editing)
March 11th, 2009 at 1:44 pm
53. STL MO – YES, I also load LV as good as FF kicks in. Also an authors access to their lists would be great! I was just thinking about a list yesterday, which I wrote ages ago – funny how extra little points of explanation would be so helpful – but besides that – I’d love to go back and update all my annoying grammer and spelling…. (please, for the sake of the book, and my sanity/perfectionism).
As for ideas; I have lots, but No.1 would be to ask the public just as you are doing, as a thousand brains are better than one. I also used to love all the level-headed JFrater comments; the personal touch helped the site feel like extention of your world, which was welcoming. I know its hard to please/appease everybody.
As for affording to run the list, let me throw this out. If you currenty spend $xx,xxx.xx keeping the site online, surely you could just use this money to buy your own server. They are only a few thousand. I have no idea if you would lose the gimmick of not have a ‘www’ in front of the address, but as most people just bookmark the site anyway, it instantly loses any gimmick value. I currently run several web sites for just £10 a year – simply to register my .com domain names.
I could go on, but that’s not my place. What will the future hold? Well, one thing I can see clearly is a keyword search engine. If a user wants to know about ’star wars’, or ‘money’, or ‘peanut butter’ or even ‘tips’… er well there you go.
March 11th, 2009 at 1:46 pm
oh, did I say ‘as good as’, oh.. if only I could edit
March 11th, 2009 at 8:08 pm
lifeschool: the majority of the ongoing cost of the site is bandwidth – the servers are not the majority of the cost. We get a HUGE amount of traffic every day and we have to pay for it. I will definitely try to replace the other advertiser in the meantime.
As for grammar and spelling in the book – every list I put in the book is being edited (and in most cases re-written) by me as I go
March 11th, 2009 at 9:02 pm
jfrater, i can’t really say i dislike any topics here -different ones appeal on different days (i did pick 3 faves for your poll though).
comment preview & pre-post corrections would be great! but letting people go back and edit old comments -erasing “mistakes” in the debates instead of acknowledging them, etc. would be bad.
after reading this i did find the “search” feature on “all lists” that had previously escaped me. that said, a more clear way to search for a keyword would be lovely -there are a few older lists i’m following the comment evolution on and i’ve had to bookmark them in my browser (safari) as finding them on the archive page is a bit of a chore.
your mods do an amazing job, walking the line between letting people express whatever opinion they have and taking pointless spam/trolls out to the curb (on that note you really should recycle jamie!)
if you do shell out for a total site redesign, please try to keep some familiar visual elements/spacial placements, another site i visit just “upgraded” the layout and seeing everything in a new visual area of the screen is a big readjustment (and thus creating a “lost” feeling i dislike).
just my thoughts
March 11th, 2009 at 10:47 pm
60: lo – so beautifully put. And, yes, after reading this I [i] also [/i] found the “search” feature. I say “search”; as it managed to fine me 1,350 examples of the name ‘peanut butter’! Quite an in-depth search ya got there.
Oh, and ok; just before I turn in, I’d also really welcome a bunch of formatting icons on this blog form – perhaps as simple as a few smileys? Grovel Grovel.
March 12th, 2009 at 3:54 am
I am peeved about people who always complain about the rankings of the lists even though the opening paragraph explains the lists are not ranked in any order. I can understand if people do not read most of the comments, but the opening paragraph must be read. It gives the background on how the list was compiled and what are the precedents to it. In most cases it also mentions that the list is a follow up of a list published earlier, and the link is provided, but some people still complain about omissions that have been published before.
Another pet hate is when someone just comments “Nice list” just to be one of the first commentors. Or someone commenting “Oops! Not first! Poor me”. I mean ….uuurrrgggg
March 12th, 2009 at 12:11 pm
I love List Universe, and I am a full proponent of free speech, even when it makes me uncomfortable I often find it teaches me something, so when I read “Unfortunately we lost one of our main advertisers this month because someone complained about one of our lists (the suicide list)”, I saw red!
Just who does this person think they are that they can control what everyone else can read? That is NOT what LV is all about. LV has taught me a lot, and has given me an opportunity to teach a few people one or two things. It has allowed me to make friends all over the world, and via the ether, experience the world at large.
I do not tolerate fools gladly, as everyone is aware, but I never come to an argument, a debate, unprepared. I only debate on subjects on which I have knowledge and background, and am glad to turn them over to my superiors in knowledge if they appear in the debate.
As far as improving LV is concerned, I really can’t see how. It attracts an intelligent, well-educated, well-read membership, and the occasional troll who passes through quickly finds himself out of his league and departs. I do believe, Jamie, you have got it in one. There is nothing which requires fixing, so leave it alone!
Congratulations on the book. I am well aware of how difficult the book biz can be, having spent my last 5 employed years in the book biz. I did both first line editing, and publicity tours for the authors. Lots of fun! I’m sure you’ll have a wonderful time.
March 12th, 2009 at 1:57 pm
I like the bizarre lists because it gives me something to google while at work
. I also like some of the other lists but I could only choose one. Apparently (as of me writing this) other people seem to like the bizarre lists the most too!
March 12th, 2009 at 2:12 pm
jfrater – I love this site, and it is one of two that I go to daily. I, like Segue, don’t want you to change it too much! I agree with the many others who would like to keep our IDs out of the hands of Trollz, but I realize that is probably not possible. Congrats on the book – I’ll be first in line to buy one! And I hope that somewhere down the line, your salary can be raised above $0.00. You deserve to be paid, you do so much for all of us. Thank you.
March 12th, 2009 at 2:14 pm
percentages for poll are off….
March 13th, 2009 at 5:12 am
Keep it coming!
March 13th, 2009 at 1:04 pm
I know I’m not by far the first to say it but this is the one site I look at everyday. And I always learn something new and interesting.
I’m sad to see travel it’s one of the least voted for topics. I love you travel lists being a college student and all. It works as motivation for me cause that’s one thing I want to do in the future, lots and lots of travel.
I agree with one of the comenters who suggested more polls for the site. Also the caption contest to get our imagination working.
Congratulations on all the work and the best energies for the future.
March 16th, 2009 at 1:30 am
hey JF,i really wonder how you manage to do so much research on almost every other topic..anyways…great site!!
March 17th, 2009 at 4:05 pm
Continue the great work, JF!
It’s a shame that a minority view always ruins it for the rest of us. I hope you get a bigger and better sponsor. Thanks for all your hard work. I love this site!
March 18th, 2009 at 2:35 am
Is the result of the “how old are you?” survey correct? Over half the List Universe family is under 20 and 90% are under 30? Given that almost all my regular correspondents (I won’t name names) are over 30 (at the very least), I found that result very strange. Hsve I lost the knack of talking to youngsters? (No, I chatted quite happily to my nieces over dinner.)
March 18th, 2009 at 6:17 am
Cheers JFrater! Hopefully the site continues to do well without giving you massive headaches (like the advertising problem). You have our support! Oh and nice house.
March 18th, 2009 at 4:36 pm
astraya: I think it is accurate – there is no real way to check it as it is anonymous (it uses cookies and IPs to prevent duplicate votes). I was very surprised by the result too. I will be doing a few more polls – I want to get around 2,000 votes for each poll. It will help with future advertising endeavors – something we need to focus on a bit now that we lost one.
March 18th, 2009 at 4:36 pm
Thanks for all the well-wishes everyone
March 18th, 2009 at 11:29 pm
I LOVE this website! I stumbled upon it one night while I was at work, and I’ve been hooked ever since. A day simply doesn’t feel right now without checking out the latest list!
I rather ticked that certain someones decided their opinions mattered more and mucked up the ad money for you. If it’s possible, I would really like to know which sponsors pulled their ads so that I can now boycott their stupid products.
It’s really quite simple: If I come across a site while surfing that I do not like, I simply click the little x up top – problem solved! Why is that so hard?
Keep up the GREAT work.
March 19th, 2009 at 5:28 pm
Hey, keep up the good work with the site, andI hope you find an advertisers.
March 19th, 2009 at 10:33 pm
where is that survey? I got all my college roommates to regularly visit (thats 7 under 23) so Im not that surprised about the age. Also… I voted travel #1… I cant believe how many people dont wanna travel!!! or know about it. Actually jfrater, I used some of the facts I learned on those to choose destinations for my post graduation traveling arrangements so keep em up!!! plz!!!
March 20th, 2009 at 3:13 pm
At least I’m in the majority on male/female.
March 23rd, 2009 at 11:38 am
I lovee this site and cant believe you lost an advertiser over some lame persons complaint, I presume there was no gun to head forcing them to read on!! Keep up the good work xxx
March 23rd, 2009 at 2:38 pm
a book how cool!!
March 24th, 2009 at 12:10 am
I’m in the majority on ethnicity as well, and I was voter number 666.
March 24th, 2009 at 1:46 pm
I will now click on every ad I see on the site =)
March 25th, 2009 at 5:27 pm
So what does everyone think of the new front page?
March 25th, 2009 at 5:32 pm
I actually like it. Makes it more uniform. Good work.
March 25th, 2009 at 5:33 pm
oouchan: thanks
I am glad that SOMEONE likes it 
It certainly makes it obvious what the site is about. I will add a toggle for popular lists and controversial lists at some point too.
March 25th, 2009 at 5:41 pm
jfrater….that would be cool! I love the controverial lists. Gives me the giggles when reading some of the posts.
March 25th, 2009 at 7:42 pm
I kind of liked the top commentors section…. only because I was on it and it gave me a thrill to see my name. (only found out after someone told me I was there)
Can we bring that back? It was a small section….
March 25th, 2009 at 8:00 pm
So what does everyone think of the new front page?
I don’t handle change very well. I was just getting used to the new color scheme.
March 25th, 2009 at 8:11 pm
Oouchan: click “about” – the top commenters are in there now.
Maggot: fortunately it is just the front page then – there will be more bigger changes in future – but this is a smaller first step to that. There won’t be any more changes for a few months though
March 25th, 2009 at 8:18 pm
89. jfrater…Thank you!
March 25th, 2009 at 8:23 pm
ooh! I do like that it’s the Top 10 commentors now.
The new front will take a moderate amount of getting used to but I’m still liking it. It gives more facetime for recent lists. I do miss having easy access to some of the older lists I frequent but you mentioned that these will be added later so I withold judgment until then.
88. Maggot – “I don’t handle change very well.”
Poor Maggot…must’ve been a stinky baby since you clung to that diaper so long…..
March 25th, 2009 at 8:53 pm
91 gabi: You say that as if it were past tense.
March 26th, 2009 at 8:01 am
83. jfrater: So what does everyone think of the new front page?
****
I like it.
March 26th, 2009 at 8:14 am
Meh. I prefered the old one – showed the diversity of the site more easily.
I’m sure I will get to grips with this one though.
March 26th, 2009 at 6:29 pm
OK Jamie, joking aside, here’s my 2 cents about the new front page format:
Widen the intro box (“Welcome to Listverse…”) a bit just so the last word “enthralled” isn’t on the bottom line all by itself. (sorry, I’m just being anal on this one!)
The Site Search text box should be up in the green navigation bar, so it is visible upon first accessing the page, without having to scroll down for it.
With the lists shown chronologically down the middle, it makes the “Latest Lists” area off to the right side a bit redundant. Remove that area and then perhaps expand the “Recent Comments” to show more of them. Or maybe you are saving that spot to put “controversial lists” or “most popular” or something?
The Recent Comments area should be moved up too, if not to the top, then just below the “Subscribe” area (the Poll thing is kind of corny IMO, move it down, or lose it). The comments view serves as a good teaser, to draw curiosity seekers further into the site’s active lists.
Listing the lists down the center – could stand to be a bit smaller in format, so you could show more of them on the page. Reduce the font size of the title a bit, and also the size of the accompanying pic. And possibly even reduce the list intro teaser lines to only two lines.
Speaking of which – regarding the pages, and the “page 1 of xx” buttons down at the bottom. Would anyone really ever punch thru the all pages like that? Just put a link to “view all lists” there.
Well that’s all I have for now. Use or disregard as you see fit.
April 2nd, 2009 at 1:35 am
jfrater-
well, i finally came to like the new home-page enough that i’ve made it my browser LV bookmark -it used to be the “all lists” archive page.
i like seeing the comment tally on all the “home-page lists” at once.
all the best in any further update endeavors
p.s. letting us self-police…..dude, who knows where that will lead! but thanks for the free-speech props
and thanks again for the site.
April 4th, 2009 at 5:39 pm
yeah, your right. who needs a “top commenters list” on the new homepage when they comment 24/7 with their monologs.
did funny smart guy bucslim get booted from the site? haven’t seen him since….
which is strange because the new listuniverse page format looks a lot like the Oddee page format.
I liked the forums section on the previous homepage, as my few times I have responded to the forums have been due to that section. otherwise I can’t figure it out when I go straight to the forums front page.
It’s April 4, 2009 on the side of the planet where I am typing from and would like to know when the March 2009 Winning List will make its grand apearence? I didn’t enter anything,so I am not asking for that reason, but I noticed for sometime that the last competition never was finalized as to a winner. I don’t care about prizes, myself, but curiosity, because I thought that the March contest was an excellent way of getting a lot of free lists.
A count down week of lists perhaps?
April 4th, 2009 at 5:48 pm
Diogenes: bucslim is still about – he might be away this weekend as I haven’t seen him comment but he is definitely around. As for the top commenters – they are on the about page now
The March competition will be finalized and announced in the next day or two
April 4th, 2009 at 5:54 pm
cool
April 4th, 2009 at 6:09 pm
Hello. Great job. I did not expect this on a rainy Saturday. Thanks!
April 8th, 2009 at 5:37 am
I voted in the poll… predicted that “bizarre” would be the leader when it comes to the votes, and got it right.
Keep the bizarre lists going!
May 7th, 2009 at 7:56 am
i want to know who the “FUCKER” was that complained about lists…twice!!!! Don’t come to the site if you don’t like it douchebag. Your just messing it up for all the rest of us, especially the longtime veiwers. I have been around since the site was created and i know it must be a bitch to have to remove a list cause someone is to selfish to share with the rest of the free world. Wow…i am pissed…
June 7th, 2009 at 6:07 am
love the lists i will sprinkle some tinkerbel magic dust 4 u all good luck …DELISTIOUS…
January 1st, 2010 at 5:34 am
go go go go go get these boots!!!!!!!!!!!!!