Wow! It’s RottenNeighbor.com
RottenNeighbor.com is a fairly new web service, launched in July, that is out to provide web users with insight into the which neighborhoods around the United States have experienced reports of bad neighbors. To do this, the website implements Google Maps to provide users with where unfriendly neighbors are located, as posted by other users.
The layout is simple and easy to use, but Rotten Neighbor does have its flaws, beginning with the seemingly excessive use of Google Ads on every page.
Starting at the homepage, users can search for any area by the zip code. It would have been nice to see the ability to search by city or at least county, but ZIP is the only option.
Once a zip code is entered, users are taken to a page with a Google Map with small pink bubbles around it, graphically notifying users of the areas where postings have been made. Beneath the map is a scrollable text area that provides a title and clickable link for each of the listings, which, when clicked, displays the entire contents of the post within the Google Map above.
The bad news, though, is that it seems that the system has already been flooded with a variety of useless messages and spam which has yet to be removed, most likely meaning that there are no moderators at Rotten Neighbor.
Just look at this simple search for the “90210″ area code. There are hundreds of pink markings covering the map in the screenshot.
In one posting, entitled “sam cassady, like to get renters to drive out people who help the cops,” the following statement was left:
“In the past years in the Ventu Park area, there has been a rise in crime rate. After a recent attack on local residents police arrested Michael Messner regarding terrorism acts and vandalism. He attacked a family on 188 elm road and when he attempted to break in the house. The owner used a gun to drive the attacker away. Also Sam Cassady along with his various tenets in his 15 houses is under investigation for their involvement. Also a Lisa Messner and an Arda Manokian are the center of attention due to acts of witness harassment and purgery acts in court. The police are looking to see if this is an “organized” crime or a petty act to get revenge. There is currently a civil and criminal case against him and his tenants. His homes have had a lot of criminal activity with renters requiring police action against them due to prostitution, tax evasion, and other criminal acts…”
Not only was there this listing about Sam Cassady, but there were at least 8 others, all with different titles, but the same message contained within. I am not saying that this information is not true and I can’t be certain, but I would assume that most (if not all) of these postings came from one person who seems to have a grudge against someone. How beneficial is that in getting help finding the right neighborhood to move into.
Rotten Neighbor has developed an interesting idea with its service, and one that could potentially be very useful to the real estate market, but it is flawed in its underplanned community aspect. The lack of some kind of monitoring and removal of pure spam from the system leaves it littered with useless information.
There is a lot that needs to be learned from YouTube’s current troubles and the mass editing conspiracy going on at Wikipedia. It is great that web 2.0 brings the community to the forefront, but there is a limit and there should be (at least) moderate oversight, because there are spammers, hackers, and the like, who do attempt to abuse the privileges that these services provide.
With that said, RottenNeighbor.com has some replanning to do, if it wants to be the “exceptionally smart assistant” that it wants to be when people are looking to move into a new neighborhood.
