'This equates to the ``verify-key`` call against the akismet API.
It returns ``True`` if the key is valid.
The docs state that you *ought* to call this at the start of the
transaction.
It raises ``APIKeyError`` if you have not yet set an API key.
If the connection to akismet fails, it allows the normal ``HTTPError``
or ``URLError`` to be raised.
(*akismet.py* uses `urllib2 <http://docs.python.org/lib/module-urllib2.html>`_)'

def verify_key(self):

    if (self.key is None):
        raise APIKeyError('Your    have    not    set    an    API    key.')
    data = {'key': self.key, 'blog': self.blog_url}
    url = ('http://%sverify-key' % self.baseurl)
    headers = {'User-Agent': self.user_agent}
    resp = self._safeRequest(url, urlencode(data), headers)
    if (resp.lower() == 'valid'):
        return True
    else:
        return False
