Mikko's Blog: I'm The Reason Your Internets Suck

You may have noticed sites like digg.com has become seemingly dedicated to lame top ten lists. Where did these top ten lists come from? Why are they so popular? Who is to blame? SPOILER ALERT: I am.

Top ten lists are an ad revenue goldmine for sites as they are a very easy way to create content that drives traffic to your ad driven site. You simply take something your target audience can't get enough of. For instance, guys love models in bikinis. You find pictures of 10 models in bikinis, which takes about 0.04s using images.google.com. You rank them based on your personal taste, sprinkle them across 10 pages visitors have to click through. On each page you fill all screen real estate not taken by a stolen copy of Liz Hurley in bikinis with as many ads as possible. Then you post the link to it on as many social networking sites as you can, and watch the web traffic go through the roof.

So who are these people who fall for these cheesy top ten lists day in and day out. What kind of an idiot does that? Well, for one, I do. And for as long as I, and people like me, keep visiting those pages, they will keep cropping up.

Yes, I'm a sheep. I know I'm being played like a finely tuned Stradivarius, but dammit, I have GOT to find out what this guys list of 10 Worst Movies Of All Time are, who the Hottest 10 R&B Divas Ever To Do Time are, and 10 Craziest Things You've Ever Seen Built Out Of Legos.

So there you have it. The top ten reasons one through ten for digg.com sucking these days are me and 9 other guys like me.