Hey, Listopia - what's your philosophy? Do you even have one, or are you a poorly-visualised attempt to spin out something you did that was funny eight years ago?

Have anyone ever said the word "strawberry" to you? If they have, did you mishear it as "Straw Brie"? Then did you think "oh, I wonder if any other fruit have cheeses in their names," then become incapable of conversation for two weeks while you tried to think of one? Did you finally come up with "St Agur-ooseberry" before writing it off as a shit idea?

Listopia is for you! We're a hundred pub conversations where no-one had anything to say, we're a thousand tiny brain sponges. Mopping up all the thoughts you could have used to save the world. Come here if you're bored - just don't expect to leave any less bored.

So is this like a website of a Channel 4 show or what?

Permit us the luxury of inviting you to fuck off. Whereas those "100 Best Movies Where A Bicycle Flies In Front Of A Moon" programmes are often surprisingly enjoyable, Listopia works simply by wearing you out. They're like a hundred tiny slivers of cake - we're like eating ten thousand olives.

Hang on - I've seen some of these lists before, and I submitted to them, and my submission is there, and what the fuck?

Quite possibly! This site was inspired by the proper ace but unfunct Idiotica. The user-contributed lists of Idiotica have long been buried up to their bullet points in a warren of forum posts, and every sane and loving human knew that they deserved a site of their own. The original lists have their own Idiotican tag, and can be found here.

If you find items you submitted, and wish to claim the credit like some baffling, hungry bear, let us know. You can email Log or Neil if you're logged in.

Tags! Is that like new internet?

Turns out that tags are a bit of an effort, so we've partially removed them now. We'll reinstate them with user-specified tags, when we can be arsed. In the battle of control vs effort, we decided that less effort is much more fun than more control. Tags will eventually be a list of adjectives that could describe the content, style or quality of the list, and you can't make your own tags like "BEN IS BMX IDST".

I'm not sure what friends are all about.

Friends at Listopia are more like MySpace friends than Facebook friends. If you add someone as a friend, all it means is that you trust them not to fuck up your lists. You can allow your friends to submit to your lists - and when it's big enough, or you're bored, you can throw it open to all members.

Someone's ruining my list! I hate them!

We're going to introduce banning if the site gets larger. It's way too small to have members banning each other at the moment, so content yourself with leaving unpleasant comments on their entries. (If it's your list, you can also reject entries, which means you're pretty powerful, right?)

THUMBS

Thumb War lists are organised by how popular the entries are with users. Only users can thumb up and down. Thumbing down excessively is considered rude, and an abuse. If you thumb down a lot more than you thumb up, your thumbs will have less effect.

Items that have been heavily thumbed down will be greyed out. This is your punishment for being shit - your items will be slightly harder to read.

My list doesn't appear unless I'm logged in.

Lists you start yourself can only be seen by members. They need to be checked before they go public and all spiderable.

Hey up, I can't even start a list.

That's a power you earn by contributing productively to lists (you'll be penalised if we have to delete your entries, much less so if we just reject them). Otherwise, you can boost your esteem by having your submissions liked, getting added as a friend, and having people submit to your lists. Trying to abuse this system is pointless - the benefits are negligible, and we'll only ban you for being a cunt.

I'm not sure I understand how and when I can see or contribute to a list.

OK, right. Yes. Lists have three visibility settings. At first, only the person who created the list will be able to see it. This stops the site getting cluttered with empty lists. Once you've got to five items, you can make it visible to anyone who's logged in.

You don't have to let everyone add to it, though - no-one's more aware of the hell of user-generated content in a world full of cunts. You can just open the list for submission to people you've added as a friend. Everyone else'll still be able to discuss the list, but your precious list proper will be free of their desperate gas.

I have been banned, that's a bit harsh. All I did was make a few duff entries, use the lists as a way of commenting on the previous items, post format-breaking chunks of text and email other users with offers of cheap Cialis.

A comedy list is a delicate creature; she can only be ridden for brief periods by a spastic before she becomes terminally ill. If you're persistently shit, stupid, or miss the point out of all proportion with your good and funny submissions, we encourage you to start your own fucking website where you're the king.

I have found a bug, and what's more I've got a suggestion.

Log in, and add them to the members-only Known Issues list - it's our work in progress beta area for nice people.