For many students, the weekend means time to pack up and go home. Are there no exciting things to do in DeKalb on the weekends? For students who want to know what other people are doing this weekend, or just some reassurance that NIU can be fun, check out www.collegescene.net

The Web site claims to be the “exclusive online entertainment company that puts you on center stage,” meaning that the main feature of the Web site is pictures of college students at various places around campus.

The Web site began in fall 2001 and has been evolving ever since.

“I’ve been around the college environment for seven years now, and there was a real need to show college students where to go and what to do,” said Jim D’Ambrosio, part owner and NIU alumnus.

All you need to do is login, and you can see what college students all over the country do for fun. In addition to NIU, the Web site shows students at Illinois State University, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, Western Illinois University, University of Wisconsin, University of Nevada Las Vegas, University of Illinois Chicago, Bradley University, Arizona State University, University of Arizona and Northern Arizona University.

The gallery of pictures for NIU shows students hanging out in DeKalb at places such as Molly’s, Amnesia, Starbusters and Fatty’s.

The site contains more than just pictures. It also has the latest events at NIU, the top places to go, contests, polls, phone numbers and coupons for local businesses.

There also are articles that would be of interest to the typical college student, like “Top 10 Campus Hookup Spots” and “Interview like a Pro.”

A new addition to the site is the personals section, where you can upload your own picture and people can rate it.

“Seven out of 10 people want their picture taken, one out of 10 don’t and two out of 10 are indifferent,” D’Ambrosio said.

D’Ambrosio said that they get a lot of good feedback about the site.

“The Web site is cool, but at the same time it’s weird having someone walking around taking pictures of me,” said Danielle Gualandi, a sophomore health and human sciences major.

The Web site not only is a good source for students, but also is beneficial to the local businesses featured.

“It can be good for business,” said Oscar Gutierrez, a bartender at Molly’s. “Because people see people having fun and think Molly’s is a fun place to be.”

The owners of the site just bought out WhatsHotAZ.com, a site similar to collegescene.net that shows what students are doing at Arizona State University, which was just voted the No. 1 party school in the nation.

D’Ambrosio said that they are using NIU to test which features of the Web site students want in order to improve WhatsHotAZ.com.

Collegescene.net still is expanding. Future plans for the site include more weekly surveys and more career planning sources.

“We would like to be the Consumer Reports for college students,” said D’Ambrosio. “We want it to be the college site that students can go to that enhances the college experience.”