Some things are only funny when you’re young.

And many college students may think it’s a great idea to submit their picture to a rating Web site where millions will vote on how ugly they are.

College also can be the perfect time to photograph your drunken or passed out roommate surrounded by kinky props and display it on a site for everyone to see.

The availability of Internet access to college students has led to the creation of sites with the sole purpose of hours of mindless entertainment.

One Web site, www.hotornot.com, is a popular time-killing hobby for college students. It rates the attractiveness of participants.

James Hong, 28, one of the creators of the site, said the idea originated one uneventful evening in early October 2000.

“Basically my roommate, brother and I were hanging out in the living room one day and my roommate said this girl was a perfect 10. We were drinking beers, and that’s about it,” he said. “We talked about it for a while, just decided to build it, and we did.”

On Oct. 9, the site was officially launched, and it began to receive attention almost immediately.

“We had a lot of press within the first two months,” Hong said. “Within a week we had a million hits a day.”

He said hotornot.com has also been featured in magazines such as Entertainment Weekly, Time and Newsweek.

Hong said he is surprised at the popularity of the site and the millions of photographs that have been submitted for those curious as to how hot they are.

“We built it as a joke and sent it on to friends,” he said. “We just thought it was funny and good for a laugh. But it just totally took off and we didn’t expect it. It was pretty cool.”

Hong said the popularity of the Internet and its easy access are prime factors of the success of hotornot.com and entertainment-based sites like it.

“The Internet’s really cool because you can just come up with an idea, build it and people start hearing about it through word-of-mouth,” he said. “Before the Internet, you couldn’t do that.

“It’s a good place for people to be creative and have their work count for something.”

Hairong Li, an assistant professor of advertising, has studied the increased use of the Internet by Americans and now teaches PRO 101, a freshman seminar called The Internet and Society.

Li said the Internet has revolutionized the way people can promote their different interests, careerwise or entertainmentwise.

“Some students are looking for experience or for a career and put their portfolio on the Web, so when they’re looking for a job they have something impressive, but other students put up funny graphics for entertainment,” he said. “The Internet makes publishing possible, and that’s a big change from a cultural perspective.”

Li said the enjoyment college students receive from Web sites like hotornot.com is not surprising.

“That’s probably part of the Internet culture among students,” he said. “It’s sort of a peer grouping. They’re very popular among students because they’re a special group. That’s my perception.”

One site created by and for college students is www.collegehumor.com.

The co-founder of the site, Josh Abramson, 20, started the site two years ago to highlight the antics of college life through submitted pictures and videos.

“It’s been pretty fun,” said the University of Richmond junior. “It kind of went from nothing to something in a matter of three or four months, and now it’s something we take pretty seriously.”

Abramson said he spends at least 30 hours a week working on CollegeHumor.com and has hired several employees to help juggle maintaining the site and taking classes at the same time.

He said more than 750,000 fans visit the site monthly.

“It was kind of just for fun and to get some experience in the beginning,” Abramson said. “It started to get pretty popular and we got written up in my school’s local newspaper and TV news stations, which sent quite a bit of traffic to the site.”

Although the majority of the pictures, letters and video clips available on the site involve alcohol, drugs or sex, Abramson said complaints have been minimal.

“We’ve gotten complaints, but not to much of an extreme,” he said. “We’ve had some Christian organizations file an online petition to try to get us kicked off the Internet, but we always say the worst possible thing on the site is not nearly as bad as the least edgy thing on thousands of other sites.”

Telecommunication Professor Charles Steinfield said many college students use the Internet primarily for e-mail and instant messaging, but that the popularity of entertainment-based Web sites is increasing.

“What’s happening with students is that there’s so much word-of-mouth as a means of spreading the news about interesting sites to go to,” he said. “I think you can get to these sites that spring up without promotion or a large marketing budget simply because of the power of the Internet - things spread really fast.”

Steinfield said “viral marketing,” or giving incentives to students who e-mail information about particular Web sites to their friends is one way unusual sites can become popular.

“In order for you to use it, you have to get your friends to sign up,” he said. “It starts off with a few people, and they go off and infect other people, so to speak.

“That maybe explains why you have these kind of student-oriented sites that perhaps have low budgets and become hugely popular.”

Criminal justice freshman Sean Vergowven started working as a CollegeHumor.com college representative during the beginning of the school year and helps to promote the site around MSU.

“I put up posters, and if someone has something they want on it, they talk to me and I send it to them,” he said. “I’ve had a really fun experience.”

Vergowven said college students tend to seek out a different kind of humor than most people.

“A lot of sites are out there that no sane person would look at, so they’re really popular with college students,” he said. “Some of the stuff is really out there.”

Vergowven said he looked at some of the entertainment offered on CollegeHumor.com when he was in high school, but didn’t quite understand the kind of humor on the site until this year.

“It’s funnier now that I’m in college,” he said. “I realize it’s so true, and that’s what makes it funny. It’s a really great site.”