When you post a picture of yourself on the internet you usually want it to reflect how good looking and awesome you are. Posting an image on a social networking site may not yield a second thought. Yet a bad picture on an online resume or dating site could really blow your chances for a dream career and a hot mate.

So who do you run to? Friends might think you’re shallow for asking or end up giving you approval on photos that just don’t work. Luckily for you a new application called FaceStat sums you up based on just one picture. Attributes include age, gender, ethnicity, weight, relationship status, wealth, intelligence, intoxicated, trustworthiness, humor and attractiveness.

The company, Dolores Labs, relies on Amazon’s Mechanical Turk to collect data from dozens of strangers just waiting to judge you. You get one photo analysis per day. Pictures can be uploaded from your hard drive or pulled from FaceBook, and results take a few hours.

It’s an interesting social project. But then again, anything beginning and ending with you usually is. I thought so when I submitted a picture of what I thought was my chiseled abs, stunning features and million dollar smile. Turns out I’m not very trustworthy.

Feel like your band is too good for the street corner, but not quite ready to hit the studio on your own? Well, the world wide web combines reality and fantasy once more. SellaBand is bridging the gap between starving artist and up-and-coming star by facilitating piecemeal purchases of bands by the internet community.

Not so unlike the soccer team that recently sold 26,000 person ownership, essentially each participating band on SellaBand has their forthcoming CD broken up into 5,000 parts, priced at $10 each. Once the artist hits that magic number of $50,000, they get their pick of the high powered industry producers and studios the website has on consultancy. All money is held is escrow until the goal is hit to assure the process is legit.

13 artists/groups have thus far achieved the full monetary goal, and three tracks from their respective CDs are available as free downloads. The other tracks are to be sold for $.50 each, the profits of which are to be split evenly between the CD sponsors, the artist, and (of course) SellaBand.

Based in Germany and only incorporated in 2006, the site has gained some decent popularity quickly, especially now that the music industry crisis has been brought to the forefront of debate. Between last.fm and Yahoo! both planning to offer full track listening, and Radiohead’s business model-shattering internet distribution, now may be just the time for a delicate balance like SellaBand with a Web 2.0 community twist.

So whether you’re a struggling musician or just always wanted to say you were “with the band,” here’s your chance to buy a piece of the Music 2.0 pie.

I know what you’re thinking, all this online Web 2.0 malarkey was great when it was connecting you with old girlfriends on MySpace, but what has it done for you lately? Just remember, Internet or no Internet, strength is in numbers.

A fan base with an interest in a minor-league soccer team, Ebbsfleet United of Northfleet England, took that lesson to heart. Who needs fantasy leagues when you can just buy the team outright? Twenty-six thousand fans pitched in $70.50 each. That price bought them a place in history as the first online community to both own and manage a professional sports team.

The site is a meeting place for owners; allowing them to vote on issues such as lineups and the purchase of new players. Fans are able to watch the games via a live feed and thumb through real-time stats on each and every player. The portal will have weekly updates from the coach they select, giving them the skinny on player performances during practice.

This is where you let your mind wonder. Imagine making a bid for the Dallas Cowboys. Last time the franchise was evaluated, its price was estimated at a dizzying $923 million. Yet if 10 million people each ponied up $100 in a mass collaborative effort they’d have a shot at snatching America’s Team from Enemy No. 1, Jerry Jones, for a cool $1 billion.

So let’s sneer at the golden rule for once. Why does it have to be that ‘he’ who has the gold makes the rules. Massive projects like this one – online and off – turn that ‘he’ into a ‘we.’ And with the right motivation, buying a team no longer need be a rich man’s game.

Ever wish you could get your hands on Grays Sports Almanac from Back to the Future, rise to stardom and create your own version of Biff’s casino? There is no doubt about it, predicting the future has always had big bucks riding on it.

If you think your crystal ball is working well – in politics, economics, sports or even pop culture – you may want to check out Predictify.com. It caught my eye as an interesting concept after a friend of mine asked me to sign up last month.

It’s a simple way to pose deterministic questions to a large audience. The mob has their shot at predicting the future outcome of an event. If your prediction comes true you’ll get reputation points based on accuracy and, at times, a small monetary reward.

The more accurate your responses are the more reputation you’ll gain. But don’t bank on being the next Biff by answering questions correctly. The average payout of a correct response is $1. It may not be much, but it encourages participation and gets your appetite wet for staying in the game.

To be clear this isn’t a form of betting. It’s actually a pretty cleverly designed research tool. You can ask any question you want without putting up any dough. But if you do pay you can view graphs of profile data that include age, gender, education, political affiliation and race. With the paid method you can also choose to keep the results private.

Questions range from: Who will win the 2008 Presidential election?, How many touchdowns will Tom Brady throw this season?, to Who will win the upcoming season of American Idol?

The concept hinges on creating a competitive environment where regular Joe’s feel comfortable giving up their answer. As they’ve mentioned, studies show that a diverse crowds responses are often more accurate than a small group of experts at predicting future events. Plus they’re a hell of a lot cheaper at $1 a pop.

So I admit, I tend to tune politics out. That is, unless it involves issues I’m passionate about. Like many of you I took political science classes in school, yet I could never identify myself clearly within a political party. I tend to sway with the issues. So then who should I vote for this next coming presidential election?

The first step was to understand my political affiliations. I wanted to see a graphical chart showing where I stand. Political Compass does exactly that. It was developed by a political journalist and a professor of social history. This anonymous test places you on a grid that goes from both left-wing to right-wing and authoritarian to libertarian. It gives you modern examples of who you’d love to have a cocktail conversation with.

After I found out if I’d be sipping brandy with Stalin or Gandhi I wanted to put this newfound information to work. How can I research a 2008 presidential candidate based on the issue positions that are stressed in their campaigns?

Connect2Elect is a new website that matches your personal issues to a list of candidates with similar views. These stem from social issues (where I stand on stem cell research, the Patriot Act), political issues (military spending, trade policies) and core beliefs (flat tax, global military strength vs. diplomatic global peace).

So now that I have candidate values versus mine, I’m able to compare them with graphs and review my custom top 10 recommendations. The site’s biggest downfall is that it only references the campaign websites and doesn’t offer any open discussion.

Choosing a candidate based solely on their official public stance may also be a mistake. A solution would be to decipher their speeches and paper trails and convert them into what they are most likely to actually support when voted into office.

At least now I’ve narrowed down the field a little with a few innovative tools. Too bad they still need some sharpening.