Across the internet, news sites and blogs have found a sure-fire method of sending hoards of traffic in their direction: the top 10 list. It’s simple to read, almost guaranteed not to take up a large chunk of your well-budgeted time, and laid out in an organized, structured fashion. What’s not to love?

Check it out, after the jump.

The Top 10 Types of Top 10 Lists

1. The Pointless

What are the ‘Top 10 Movie Characters with Fake Italian Accents’? No self-respecting reader honestly cares, but they don’t want to hurt their brain viewing ‘Top 10 Future Biofuels.’ Cracked.com provides excellent material for those who are intelligence-challenged.

2. The Picture Slideshow

A favorite among the sites of major news networks, and video game sites like GameDaily, these involve tedious clicking through multiple pages of the list, just to see a small paragraph and a mundane picture. The information given is never useful, and reading it often results in an aortic aneurysm. Dial-up users may also feel the urge to chuck heavy objects toward their computer screen. Proceed with caution when accessing these lists.

3. The Slacker

Don’t feel like struggling to come up with the full 10 items required? No problemo! Stopping with just seven entires, or perhaps even five, is a completely acceptable list-writing technique. Keep lowering your audience’s expectations, and you may eventually get away with posting blank bullet points. Doing all of your work half-ass is both a skill and an art.

4. The Minimalist

A half-brother to ‘the slacker’, the minimalist conjures the mighty power of Zeus, to make their list so impressive, none of the items need further explanation. Just rattle off 10 Ways to Become a Better Blogger, and go back to watching Friends re-runs with your greasy hand down your pants.

5. The Novelist

Both authors and readers with no lives need something to occupy their many wasted hours. The resulting articles compare with the length of the Holy Bible, plus the footnotes of the U.S. Tax Code. These lists are useful for airport layovers, family reunions, and wasting printer ink at your dead-end job.

6. The Obvious

As soon as its unclever title makes its way onto your RSS reader, you know exactly what list item will reign at the top. “Top 10 Led Zeppelin Songs” or “Top 10 Wii Games Released in March ‘08″ are articles that will never have the opportunity to appear in my browser’s history. That’s a spot reserved for Sarcastic Gamer, Facebook, and Kara’s Adult Playground.

7. The Obvious w/ Twist

Rhetorically, let’s say Top 10 Wii Games Released in March ‘08 does get written (no doubt by Satan himself). You skim your way to the end of this doozy, and low and behold, Sega Superstars Tennis is placed in the #1 slot. The author was:

1. recently hit squarely in the head with a brick
or
2. sexually aroused by Sonic in tennis shorts

Either way, the emotions of the audience were clearly played with. I highly recommend asking for your theoretical internet money back.

8. The False, Incorrect, or otherwise Wrong

It’s not about just mixing one or two items up, or including something on the list that obviously should not have seen the light of day. It’s when the writer is so completely and astonishingly wrong, you end up ripping your cable modem right out of the wall, in an attempt to yank THEIR cord out on the other end of the internet. At least after that, your ability to view Top 10 Lists will be reduced to The Late Show with David Letterman.

9. Sportcenter Top 10 Plays

Incontestably the pinnacle of modern man.

10. The Insightful

These don’t really exist. But maybe, just maybe…someday…on a full moon…in a leap year…someone will write a list that changes the hearts and minds of the community. If the apocalypse occurs and/or jet packs for pigs happen to be invented on the same day, so be it.

Here’s to you, Sarcastic Gamer, and your future career in ‘listing’. You now have the technical capability to produce half the content currently available on the internet.

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