inqk.net

I had an idea a few weeks ago now for a new web site that will undoubtedly take the world by storm. This site, not to be confused with all the other sites I’ve started that failed to take the world by storm, is relatively straightforward and simple and began mainly as a project I could work on to learn Ruby on Rails.

Some of you may be familiar with Hot or Not. The concept of Hot or Not is simple: people upload images, other people rate the images between 1 and 10. It provides the user uploading images with feedback on how good they look and gives the user rating people a sense of power. Hot or Not is, however, a dating site. Users can flag their interest to contact the person in the photo. This person can then accept that invitation. If not, then the two are not connected by the site.

It was on thinking of the limitations imposed by the dating element that I came up with the concept of Be Honest. Before I begin, however, I want to make it clear that I am not under any illusions that this is an original idea. The purpose of beginning with a discussion of Hot or Not was to highlight the debt I owe to that site in particular.

Now where was I? Oh, yes: limitations. It seemed to me that there was room for a site that would go a bit further than a rating from 1 to 10. Indeed, I could see how being able to have comments could be quite useful. For instance, just before I left for Japan I purchased a new pair of glasses. While I think said glasses look pretty spiffy it occurred to me how difficult it was to get an honest opinion on them. I didn’t feel I could trust the store clerk, whose job afterall is to sell the glasses to me. I didn’t feel like I could trust my friends who I didn’t trust not to pull punches or to be able to evaluate the glasses without the bias of knowing what I looked like in my previous set of glasses. I could upload a photo of me wearing the new glasses to Hot or Not but that wouldn’t really answer my question either. What I needed was to know what the innocent bystander would think.

And so we have Be Honest. Users upload images of themselves and ask for comments, either about a particular feature (eg. glasses) or just general feedback. Other users go through the site and write comments about the photos that they see. Although both actions require an account with the site, both are anonymous. That is, the users leaving comments don’t know who the person in the photo is (unless they happen to know the person of course) and the user uploading the photo only receives the comments, no indication of who has left them. Both sets of users can flag images and comments for attention should they be offensive in some way. I would endeavour to employ some sort of filtration mechanism to try to catch the worse offenders before anything is put up for public consumption.

I should note that in addition to the comments being anonymous, only the user who has uploaded the image can even view the comments. This is part of a strategy to prevent comments which are excessively cruel or offensive by denying the author an audience. So far I have come up with two ways in which the site can be monetised. The first is to use inline advertising. Preferably the advertisements would be contextually chosen. So, for instance, if in the comments to your image someone suggests that you need to put some gel in your hair an advertisment for hair gel might appear. The second method is to offer a basic user package and a premium user package. This idea is a little hazy at this stage but what as an example, the basic user might only be able to upload two images on one account while the premium user is able to upload, say, 10. Anyone who has used services such as Flickr or LiveJournal will be familiar with this strategy.

Initially I thought that this would be ideal for the teenage girl demographic but after conversations regarding the idea with a few different people I’m now of the opinion that a number of different demographics would utilise the service. As a result I have moved to make the entire project gender neutral.

Finally, I want to make this project in Ruby on Rails. I haven’t ever used Ruby or Rails before but I figure it’s always best to learn on the job and so, hopefully, that will be the case here. As the project develops I shall endeavour to keep you all up to date via the blog. Fingers crossed!