Let's now take a more rigid scientific look at oddballs using various generic criteria. Our classmate, Gifford McLeod, has defined 3 Commandments which prove useful in analyzing websites:

1. Be Succinct
It's difficult to get to the point when you really don't HAVE much of a point. Nonetheless, most oddballs contain many trite observations or comments. Some do get a bit lengthier and tend to ramble (though it's really difficult to separate the rambling from the main "point").

2. Make It Participatory
There are many oddballs that encourage and even depend on reader participation. "You've seen the oddities, now add your own", they implore. Collections of pictures depicting strange tongue tricks, and pages of oxymorons continue to grow thanks to reader input. After all, one eccentric person alone cannot amuse the world forever.

3. Be Visual
Strange pictures, unusual kitschy drawings, and rainbows of colors often adorn oddballs. They depict the unusual, ironic, humorous, and vile better than words alone. Most oddballs will use them to enhance the text content and further highlight the foreign contextual landscape.

Though the following 6 criteria are better used to analyze specific websites, I feel they can help identify aspects of oddballs in general:

1. Credibility
Some may look it, but oddball sites are not at all credible. Just because someone describes America's new Star Wars plan doesn't mean it's for real. If they are credible, it's on a topic so remote or a level so insignificant and/or abstract, that it has no redeeming value.

2. Reliability
Never depend on an oddball site. They're not meant to be taken seriously. Information or misinformation can change anytime, and still be perfectly useless.

3. Usability
Most designers of oddball sites provide basic usability. A couple of links and navigation tools here and there. There's no need to traverse the site efficiently. You're supposed to get lost and wander around aimlessly.

4. Usefulness
Uselessness is a prime feature of pointless oddball sites. If it's useful at a meaningful level, it isn't an oddball. Yes, the complete lyrics to 99 Bottle of Beer may be perfectly accurate and stable, but does it really matter?

5. Visually Appealing
The visual focus of oddballs is towards the strange and offsetting. If a picture or graphic looks normal at first, look again. Layouts tend to encourage wandering.

6. Participatory
Many oddball sites are collections of oddities. Can you remember pi to 1000 places? Join the club! Know a friend who can lick her nose? Send in a pic!

Node by: Rumi Mohammad