eSnips launches Social DNA, an inquisitive answer to friend finding

eSnips has launched a service called Social DNA, a series of quizzes created in-house to help its users connect with one another. Quizzes can have any mashup of content--although most is text--ranging from toilet etiquette to political views to current events. The service is starting out with text, pictures, and audio clips, and is expected to expand to video in the near future.

What makes Social DNA interesting is how it pairs you up with other eSnips users as you go, providing percentages of how well you match other users based on your responses to the quizzing. Those who are willing to take an entire quiz (which usually has 10 to 12 questions) will get a more precise pairing. eSnips also takes the liberty of clumping you into one of its "social genes" groups, which are quizzes put categorized by sub-genre.

Along with its Social DNA section, eSnips is integrating people's Social DNA results into their profiles, so they can compare and contrast quiz results with people they're already friends with, or when browsing any old profile. eSnips will actually break down your total "compatibility" with a person, along with the best match of a quiz you've both taken. Yael Elish, CEO and co-founder of eSnips thinks this is a far better system for finding common areas of interest with your social networking buddies compared to Facebook and MySpace, which takes any information you've entered and turns it into tags. Incidentally, the company is planning to widgetize Social DNA to let people take it off the site and onto blogs and other Web sites, which I think could lead to a standalone Facebook app if somebody takes the time to code it.

This is a nice value-adding service for eSnips users but nothing revolutionary. It's not a platform launch or an open API (application programming interface). Social quizzing services are all over the place including Tickle (formerly Emode.com), QuizFarm, and MTV-owned Quizilla, to name a few. Social DNA is, however, much easier on the eyes and more user-friendly than any of those. I also have to give eSnips a nod for their writing. Say what you will about the wonder of user-generated content, but having pros write the initial batch of these has made the quizzes both quirky and entertaining.

Related: fooWHO: social bookmarking with a pinch of eHarmony

Get your quiz on with eSnips' new Social DNA testing center. Based on your answers, it lets you know who you should befriend.

(Credit: CNET Networks)