Other than pornography (and those who have seen “Avenue Q” know that reference), the Internet is full of lists.

A radio station in Rockford, for instance, posted this list:

Most people when they talk about Wisconsin, brag about the state. Of course, anywhere is better than Illinois, right? Well, every state has it’s favorite towns, but some towns don’t seem to measure up.

For a lot of Illinoisians, we try to “escape to Wisconsin”, especially on the weekends. For those in Packer country, some towns are better than others. …

Here is the list of the 25 Worst Places to Live in Wisconsin

1. Merrill
2. Rhinelander
3. Beloit
4. Ashland
5. Marinette
6. Wisconsin Rapids
7. Waupaca
8. Rice Lake
9. Antigo
10. Racine
11. Stevens Point
12. Green Bay
13. Milwaukee
14. Baraboo
15. Wausau
16. Chippewa Falls
17. Prairie Du Chien
18. Berlin
19. New London
20. Portage
21. Fond Du lac
22. Tomah
23. Shawano
24. Marshfield
25. Manitowoc

That list is apparently a longer version of this list:

Just like every other state, Wisconsin has its trouble spots. The purpose of this post is to use science and data to determine which cities in the Badger State are the least desirable to live in. …

In order to rank the worst cities to live in Wisconsin, we had to determine what criteria people like or dislike about a place. It isn’t a stretch to assume that people like low crime, solid education, great weather, things to do and a stable economy.

So we scraped the internet for those criteria, asked for the opposite of those, and it spit out the answer. Like magic.

How we crunched the numbers

We threw a lot of criteria at this one in order to get the best, most complete results possible. Using FBI crime data, the government census, Bureau of Labor Statistics and Sperling’s Best Places, this is the criteria we used:

• Population Density (The lower the worse)
• Highest Unemployment Rates
• Adjusted Median Income (Median income adjusted for the cost of living)
• High Housing Vacancy Rate
• Education (Low expenditures per student and high Student Teacher Ratio)
• High Crime

… Additional note: We get the crime numbers from the FBI, which gets its crime numbers from the cities themselves. This list is based on data, and is entirely unbiased.

Really? At the end is this note:

Disclaimer: This article is an opinion based on data. It should not be taken as fact.

So it’s fact, but it’s not. Obviously your list is going to be skewed by, among other factors, what data you use, and how much you weigh each piece of data.

Flipped around, the top 10 of these 165 communities are:

1. Waunakee.
2. Town of Harrison, Calumet County.
3. Cottage Grove.
4. Verona.
5. Oregon.
6. Elm Grove.
7. McFarland.
8. Whitefish Bay.
9. Caledonia in Racine County.
10. Mount Horeb.

Note that six of these communities are in Dane County, though none of them are in Madison.

As for where we have lived before: Appleton ranks 35th worst, or 131st best. (I think. Remember that journalism is the opposite of math.) Ripon ranks 43rd worst, or 123rd best. Platteville ranks 69th worst, or 97th best. Madison, where I was born, ranks 132nd worst, or 34th best. Richland Center, where my father grew up, ranks 37th worst, or 129th best. My parents now live in Waupaca, the community that housed the corporate headquarters that ended my business magazine career; the land of the Chain o’ Lakes rather amazingly ranks seventh worst. I worked for a year in Menasha (83rd worst), a year in New London (19th worst), and a year in Oshkosh (38th worst), and before all that seven years in Fond du Lac (21st worst).

Based on both a perusal of the original list and the comments on this list, there are some problems with the list. Bellevue, Kronenwetter, Hobart, Pewaukee and Suamico are on the list twice. (And I know where all of those communities are.) Superior, the 27th largest city in Wisconsin, isn’t on the list at all, which is a major omission if this list really is of the 165 largest communities in Wisconsin.

Those are the obvious issues. Any list like this that uses objective data is still subjective because of value judgments over what’s important. To simply use crime numbers makes having your bicycle stolen the same thing as being, you know, murdered. Violent crime is probably a bigger issue to most people than non-violent crime. Crime numbers can also be skewed in, for instance, tourist areas (like Waupaca) where there are more people, and more people usually means more crime, whereas crime rates are based on population, not population plus visitor numbers. To say that lower population density makes a place worse to live is based on nothing more than bias against rural areas and in favor of large cities.

Notice that the list makes no attempt to rate communities based on property taxes. Maybe property taxes aren’t an issue in Illinois (though I doubt that); they are only the most hated tax in Wisconsin. There are also better ways to rank schools than on class size and per-pupil spending — namely the state Department of Public Instruction school report cards. If per-pupil spending was an accurate measure, Milwaukee Public Schools would be the best school district in the state, instead of the worst.

There is nothing else here that attempts to measure quality of life — just off the top of my head, presence of a university (because college towns have amenities that towns of similar size don’t), proximity to a pro sports team or college sports program, presence of or distance from museums, number of parks, number of national restaurant chains, or the number of microbreweries. Or how about this one: Measure population growth from one U.S. Census to the next. People vote with their feet.