Since then, the site made notorious by that little spat, Truemors, has declined to give up the ghost, surrender its wicket or wander off into the sunset. Instead, it capitalised on the traffic generation supercharger provided by our story, took the criticism and continued. When founder Guy Kawasaki blogged about how the story had actually done him a favour, others even sat up and asked for similar punishment.

We're big enough to admit that Truemors is definitely not the world's worst web site any longer. And we recognized that after a full and frank exchange of views by email, it was time to sit down, look each other in the eyes like men and talk. Or at least to send some questions by email and analyse what will always be known as Truemorgate...

Q. What was your initial reaction when you read The INQUIRER story about Truemors: 'Worst Ever Web Site Discovered'?

A. My initial reaction was abject horror and depression until I looked at the traffic it generated. My mood quickly turned to euphoric elation. That's how it goes in the Web 2.0 world that we live in. You should know that your site is more powerful than TechCrunch's in terms of driving traffic.

Q. Was the interest in the site generated by the story a fair trade-off for the criticism?

A. The human mind has a funny way of coping with adversity and remaking bugs into features, but the criticism certainly built awareness. For example, I have tinnitus (a constant ringing in my ear). It's like having a white-noise generator in your head but I can't say that I like tinnitus. Tens of thousands of your readers took a look at it because your reamed us. Now I hope they'll look again because Truemors has come a long, long way in a few months. It is now an eclectic melting pot of news, rumours, and human-interest stories. It has enabled many people to express their views and it certainly can make people more interesting. I guarantee that if your readers check it out once a day, Truemors will make them more interesting people. They will have more to talk about to their friends, colleagues, and spouses, and they will never lack for something to talk about at a cocktail party or when the maintenance workers for the Tube are on strike.

Q. We British have a reputation for cynicism and scepticism but one of the interesting things about web coverage of technology is that the US can be pretty brutal too. Agree?

A. Agree that the Brits are cynics and sceptics or agree that web coverage in the US can be brutal? Certainly the Brits are cynics and sceptics. Anyone would turn into a cynic and sceptic if you had to eat what you guys eat. My theory is that you're so good at brewing beer because your food sucks so badly. I must admit, however, that I love Wagamama, and the tuna sandwiches at the Grosvenor House are the best in the world. But I digress. The coverage of technology can be brutal because on the internet anyone can more or less say anything. My theory is that most bloggers are living with their moms, have never had a date, and have Buzz Lightyear sheets. Of all people, Brits should like Truemors because the reporting is so sardonic and we take many shots at the powers that be. In fact, a very large percentage of our readers are from the UK. And two of the three co-founders of Truemors are decidedly British.

Q. One thing that I didn't really appreciate until the web gave it voice was the phenomenon of the fanboy. You were a big shot marketer/evangelist at Apple. Can you understand that kind of passion for particular companies and brands, and is it healthy?

A. What do you think I'll say? This is like asking the Pope if Catholicism is a good thing. Plus, you're the country that sent us Mr. and Mrs. Beckham. Whose fault is that? The passion for Apple is based primarily on the coolness of its products. When people think what Apple sells is cool, Apple does well - like now. When it doesn't, it doesn't. But even when it doesn't, customers and evangelists of Apple love it so much that their passion carries the company through the down times until the good times. This is certainly a good thing for a company. It's hard for Brits to relate to this since you haven't invented any cool technology for a few hundred years.

Q. How's the site going now?

A. Do you know what the definition of chutzpah is? A boy murders his parents and asks the court for leniency because he's an orphan. You called my site the worst in the world and now you want to know how it's doing? Rather fine, thank you, despite your efforts. We still haven't proven it's a real business, but we're making more progress than many companies that raised millions of dollars.

Q. What are you going to do with it next?

A. It's steady as she goes. We just added pictures to illustrate postings. We've changed the interface to emphasize subject categories. We have found some great "truemorists" to gather and generate stories. Now we need to establish a positioning that is something more lofty than the "world's worst site ever."

Q. Is it paying?

A. Are you kidding? Making money is so Web 1.0. Actually, we are doing fairly well here, but that's mostly because we have kept our overhead down and because we spent only $12,000 or so to get it started and, like many founders, we aren't paying ourselves. This is an important part of the Truemors story: now you can start a company for one twentieth of what it took a few years ago in one fourth the time. It used to take millions of dollars and many man-months but technologies like MySQL, Ruby on Rails, and WordPress have changed the game.

Q. We slated your site so we're going to let you hit back. What do you think of The INQUIRER?

A. It's the second worst site on the web, but we do agree on one thing: "Art is making something out of nothing and selling it." - Lewis Carroll. I want to tell your readership one last thing - I love London. I lived in London for six weeks a few years ago, and I would move to London in a second. Wagamama is reason alone.

L'INQS
World's worst website ever discovered
Web 2.0 sites plead for INQ lash