narakpao.com (literally translated in Thai means "cute or not?") is an example of taking a service from abroad and giving it a local feel. The site is an emerging online community in Thailand that resembles hotornot.com, an online dating and rating site.
How it works?
Hotornot.com allows users to rate through a voting system the looks of people that have submitted their pictures online. As a result, over a short period of time, the average rating gets aggregated and the score represents what the community thinks of a particular picture.
The dating part is a relatively new service, it allows users to build a profile (alot like any social network, hi5, facebook) of themselves and explore the community to find people their interested in dating. Click here to visit all the testimonials of how many people's lives have changed after using hotornot.com.
How it started?
Hotornot.com was started by James Hong and Jim Young in October, 2000. They had no real plans for the service to be anything other than a fun site for a few friends. They launched the site from their house in Mountain View, California, and emailed 40 friends. By the end of the day, 40,000 people had visited the site. Today, the site has been covered by various magazines, tv shows and has already counted over 12 billion votes!
Whatever it is, the simple truth of hotornot or narakpao is that it provides everyone with a platform to look for and stare at that hot girl/guy without getting confrontational or creating a sense of uneasiness; which is what would happen if you did so out on the streets.