TDAVIS.ORG

By L. Kate Crawford
(82.8 percent pure)
Editor in chief

Welcome to Politically Correct University. Leave your labels at the door.

After all, this is the generation of "Don't Ask, Don't Tell." Nobody's perverted -- and if they are, it's nobody's business but their own.

Enter the Unisex, Omnisexual Purity Test (www.puritytest.org). With 500 questions and instant (anonymous) scoring, nobody will ever know just how deviant you really are.

PurityTest.org's webmaster Troy Davis, a junior management information systems major at The U of M, said PurityTest.org is a revival of the original purity test, which began at MIT in 1982 with only 100 questions each for males and females. That version underwent a number of revisions before the current 500-question version became popular at Yale University.

A number of Internet versions of the original purity test exist, and Davis even lists five on a page of PurityTest.org links. However, he notes underneath the links, "Accept no imitations. PurityTest.org is where you want to go for all your purity test needs."

It seems quite a few people agree: over 28,500 people have completed his version of the popular test so far.

Such pop culture success is a far cry from Davis' humble programming beginnings in the mid-1980s.

According to Davis, he received his first computer -- along with a few books about the programming language BASIC -- at 5 years old.

"Mom had taught me to read at an early age," Davis said, "so it was just a matter of pecking out what was in those books, typing 'RUN,' and hitting enter."

Although Davis wouldn't program his web version of the Purity Test for another 13 years, it didn't take him long to start writing BASIC programs for his own amusement.

"When I was, like, 8 or 9, I wrote a program in BASIC on my uncle's computer to autoexecute when he started the computer," he said. "And what it did was display a very official looking login screen, and it actually accepted any username and password that the user put in." Davis said the site then displayed a screen saying the username was invalid, and the computer's unauthorized usage had been noted by the CIA.

Davis said his uncle "freaked out," until the young programmer admitted he had created the faux warning.

Besides PurityTest.org, Davis has worked on a number of other sites, including ones for current employer Bluff City Sports and former employer 92.9 WMFS.

Davis said he was employed as an intern for Memphis radio station WMFS, when he noticed the site had not been updated in a long time.

"The general manager was reluctant -- let's put it that way -- because it meant I intended to be paid sometime in the future for the continued work," Davis said. "But eventually, through the coercion of other employees I was allowed (to work on it)."

Besides PurityTest.org, Davis maintains two other personal sites: a tribute to musician Steve Taylor called Sock Heaven (www.sockheaven.org), and his personal homepage (www.tdavis.org).

The personal site contains an eclectic blend of humor and information, a commentary on profanity, media articles featuring his websites, photos from a Weird Al concert and access to Davis' personal web camera, called the Phobecam.

So, does the 21-year-old have any hobbies other than his computer?

"Not on the computer?" Davis asks musingly. "I get up in the morning and check my e-mail. At work, I'm on a computer all day. I have classes where I'm on a computer the whole time. I get home and use the computer. I watch movies and listen to music through the computer. ... Seriously, any hobby I have is almost directly related to computers in one way or another. The few times I venture away from it, it's usually to hang out with friends at coffee shops or go to parties and other college-person-type stuff."

Davis' few forays off the computer are not funded by his sites, because, he states matter-of-factly, he is not making any money off any of them. He gets free web hosting through an out-of-state friend and is committed to keeping his sites banner-free.

"The day I have to start putting banner ads up on my site is the day (the sites) come down," Davis said. "Purity Test is free and will remain free."

So what motivates him to keep the sites going?

"Purity Test I did just for kicks," Davis said, grinning. "And it just exploded, and I'm proud of it."

Davis says traffic to PurityTest.org is "slowly starting to pick up," reaching about 5,500 hits in the past month.

And the site has reached another milestone -- its 100,000th visitor.

"Well, I feel like a proud parent today," reads the April 1 update at PurityTest.org. "The site which you are gazing upon right now just broke 100,000 hits."

The 100,000th viewer was sent to a special page asking for information. So Sharon from Southern California (58 percent pure) wrote back to tell him, "One time I duct taped a shoe to my head and sang 'I Will Survive' for 300 kids at camp."

That isn't the only confession Davis has heard in response to PurityTest.org. A message board on the site allows visitors to comment (read: brag) about their scores.

"Any 'confessions' have to be taken with a grain of salt," Davis said. "My guess would be that the people who have real confessions to make definitely aren't the ones that actually post to the message board."

According to Davis, the average score for the over 28,500 Unisex, Omnisexual Purity Tests completed is about 63 percent.

"The average person answers yes to 185 of the things on that test," he mused. "And I don't think that 185 of the questions are of the tame, banal 'Have you ever kissed on the first date?' type."

However, Davis admits he really doesn't have any room to talk -- he's only 54.8 percent pure.

"That means there's 226 things I've answered 'yes' to."

Of course, it's really nobody's business WHICH 226 questions he answered.