(c) Chaim/Fred '06



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Friday, January 19, 2007

The Plan of Action

Well, now that we've established that the real JIBs won't run until around May, and have decided to devote this month to highlighting Jblogosphere in general... we need to start working on a plan of action for the future. Some ideas being discussed thus far:

1) Hosting

Some of us have suggested that the Jblogosphere blog would be a good place to host the awards for a number of reasons. Firstly, it's a blog devoted specifically to the Jblogosphere and highlighting Jewish blogs. Secondly, it's run by a number of people (as you can see in the sidebar), rather than just one person. Think about it as having a panel of jury to discuss the outcome, rather than having one judge making all the decisions. Also, the hosts of the blog have their own separate blogs and interests, so Jblogosphere IS really the place for all J-blogs and not for any individual agendas. I'm not exactly sure how that would work in terms of neutrality - does that mean that we would merely abstain from the nomination process and the blog would not be involved in the nominations either, or would that further mean that our individual blogs wouldn't be eligible either? In any case, I think the idea has merit. However, other suggestions are welcome!

2) Organizers

Well, I think all of us involved in running this blog would probably contribute in some way, but I think there's always room for other people to get involved. Perhaps we could bring in more left-wing bloggers on the "team" to make the teamwork a bit more diverse. After all, if we want to highlight Jblogs, promoting unity among Jblogs should be one of our absolute priorities. I really think that it would be more fun for more people to get involved, since the whole point is forming a community, and in the past, the competition element seemed to overshadow the "working together" part o of it.

3) Format

As Dave pointed out, the People's Choice Jblog awards digressed from the original format of JIBs. Which means that whoever is working on JIBs in the future would probably preserve the original format. Getting a large newspaper to help promote and advertise the awards, as was done in the past, would be incredibly helpful as well.

4) Categories

In the past, JIBs had a large number of categories... and nevertheless received a fair amount of criticism from various bloggers who felt left out. Well, there've been several propositions to help deal with the issue.

a) create separate categories for mega blogs
b) create numerous separate categories for smaller/lower-ranked/newer blogs, the way it was done in The Weblog Awards (if you recall, they had a number of categories, choosing the best blog of each ecosystem level).
c) create separate categories for right and left-wing blogs (or at least for the political ones)
d) perhaps include more categories - Jewish/Israeli Blawgs? More miscellaneous categories? Separate Current Events from Punditry? Different types of advocacy blogs?

5) Nominations

The goal would be to highlight the best of Jblogosphere, so diversity would be encouraged rather than discouraged. Just as in the past, the nominations and voting would be open to everyone, so that as many Jblogs as possibly could be reached, at least potentially.

6) Advertizing

Guys, that's what we really need to work on. This time around, part of the reason things didn't work out was because no one really knew about what was happening, no one was advertising, and a limited number of people was nominating and voting. I really hope that'll change in the future. I know some of you don't like the competition element of it, but come on, this is really more for fun than anything else. It's not like we're earning huge prizes or eternal fame here. The whole point is to highlight good blogs, and encourage merit and Jblogosphere in general.

7) Criticism

We've discussed the tension between being open to feedback and criticism from bloggers and the flame wars, which have erupted in the past because of a few individuals, who, um, offered less than constructive criticism. Well, trolls are just a part of life. Come on, we're way more mature than that, or at least, more than the trolls. If they want to be mean, that's their problem. We're here to have fun. Period.

I'm sure I'm leaving a lot of stuff out, so I hope to hear more ideas and suggestions from all of you. I'm hoping that we'll have learned from past mistakes, and the spirit of good sportsmanship and fun will be preserved.

Comments on "The Plan of Action"

 

Anonymous Anonymous said ... (9:17 PM) : 

I'd add blogs for differente languages, maybe Best not-in-english blog or best jblog in spanish/russian/whatever.

 

Blogger Irina Tsukerman said ... (10:19 PM) : 

Klovs, that's a good idea. Personally, I know a number of Russian-language blogs, although I'm not sure how to get people to nominate them. I know a couple of Spanish blogs, but not too many... But it's a great idea to give them more coverage.

 

Blogger Batya said ... (11:39 PM) : 

Do you really have time for all this?
We can just "carnival" more.
I don't like the competition.
As an English Teacher, I really hate the fact that there's no objective criteria for judging posts and blogs.
We don't need winners, since it makes too many losers.

 

Anonymous Anonymous said ... (1:19 AM) : 

I hate asking my readers to vote for me, and they hate my asking them to vote for me.

Why not just a revolving blog profile post/posts? If you have a fair number of people helping out, or even ask bloggers for their own profile, won't that achieve the same purpose?

I'm happy to link the posts.

 

Anonymous Anonymous said ... (1:48 AM) : 

there is nothing wrong with a little competition. It's just for a few weeks and it's supposed to be in good fun and spirits.

You dont have to beg or ask for votes, in fact i would say its better if you dont.

Regardless, the Jibs will come and go every year, but we should anyway work on promoting Haveil Havalim and more carnivals. But things that are weekly sometimes become routine.

Its good to shake things up once in a while.

 

Blogger Jack Steiner said ... (10:49 AM) : 

Harumph. Someone had to say it.

 

Anonymous Anonymous said ... (2:52 PM) : 

Hi I put quite a bit of work into potential categories for the JIB's [before it became the PCA's] that people seemed to want/asked for/debated for here's the list .

Proposed Categories 2006 Jewish and Israeli Blog Awards -


Best 'Life in Israel' Blog
Outright:123
New:Upcoming Award 1
_______________________

Best Aliyah Blog [New]
Outright:123
New:Upcoming Award 1
_______________________

Best Diaspora Blog
Outright:123
New:Upcoming Award 1
Regional [new]
USA: 1
British: 1
European: 1
Canadian: 1
South American: 1
Australian and NZ: 1
Other: 1

_______________________

Best Community/Region Blog [New]
Outright:123
New:Upcoming Award 1
_______________________

Best Jewish Religion Blog [Outright]
Outright:123
New:Upcoming Award 1

Best Orthodox Judaism Blog [new]
Outright:123
New:Upcoming Award 1

Best Conservative Judaism Blog [new]
Outright:123
New:Upcoming Award 1

Best Reform Judaism Blog [new]
Outright:123
New:Upcoming Award 1
_______________________

Best Jewish Current Events/News Blog [new]
Outright:123
New:Upcoming Award 1
_______________________

Best Politics and Current Affairs Blog
Outright:123
New:Upcoming Award 1
Best Centre:123 [new]
Best Right:123 [new]
Best Left:123 [new]
_______________________

Best Major Event Coverage [New]
Nominated Major Event: Israel Hezbollah War

BMEC Category A:
The War: Update/coverage

BMEC Category B:
The War: Best Series

BMEC Category C:
The War: Best Visual Series

BMEC Category D:
The War: Report Single story

BMEC Category E: (Defineable)
Best Response to Negative press during war.
_______________________

Best Kosher Series [new]
Outright:123
New:Upcoming Award 1
_______________________

Best Kosher Post[new]
Outright:123
New:Upcoming Award 1
_______________________

Best Media Critiquing [new]
Outright:123
New:Upcoming Award 1
_______________________

Best Single Incident Media Critiquing [new]
Outright:123
_______________________

Best Series
Outright:123
New:Upcoming Award 1
_______________________

Best Post
Outright:123
New:Upcoming Award 1
_______________________

Best Overall Blog
Outright:123
New:Upcoming Award 1
_______________________

Best Jewish Culture Blog
Outright:123
New:Upcoming Award 1
_______________________

Best Jewish Humor Blog
Outright:123
New:Upcoming Award 1
_______________________

Best Pro-Israel Advocacy Blog
Outright:123
New:Upcoming Award 1
_______________________

Best Non-Jewish Pro-Israel Advocacy Blog [new]
Outright:123
New:Upcoming Award 1
_______________________

Best Personal Blog
Outright:123
New:Upcoming Award 1
_______________________

Best Designed Blog
Outright:123
New:Upcoming Award 1
_______________________

Best New Blog 2006
Outright:123
_______________________

Best Overall 'Mega' Blog
Outright:123
New:Upcoming Award 1
_______________________

Best Podcast
Outright:123
New:Upcoming Award 1
_______________________

Best 'Student Life' Blog
Outright:123
New:Upcoming Award 1
_______________________

Best Group Blog
Outright:123
New:Upcoming Award 1
_______________________

Best Group Series [new]
Outright:123
New:Upcoming Award 1
_______________________

Best of Rest
Outright:123
New:Upcoming Award 1
_______________________

Use this as a reference point to get some discussion happening. Things like this need to be sorted months before the awards start.

regards
BagelBlogger

 

Blogger tafka PP said ... (5:14 PM) : 

Chaim just said "regardless, the JIBs will come and go every year"

- no, they won't. They won't come unless you make them, and you really shouldn't bother.

You are all overlooking the fact that there are simply too many Jblogs now to run JIB-esque awards. (Never mind all the Jewish bloggers who don't even affiliate to any type of Jewish blogging.)Aside from this, while it is sweet that you talk of bringing in "more left wing blogs", you are fighting a losing battle which doesn't actually need fighting.

Why do you need self-voting awards to prove your blogs are good?! We all know that last year's competition was a complete farce which caused nothing but stress to the organizers and brought about pretty insignificant increases in readership to blogland compared to, say, the Lebanon war.

AussieDave speaks the truth. Listen to him.

And finally, I would venture that if there were no JIBs this year or ever again, you'd all get over it very quickly.

 

Anonymous Anonymous said ... (7:33 PM) : 

tafka, there are millions of regular blogs out there and they somehow manage to conduct a few different weblog awards every year. You keep missing the point, the point of the awards is not to win an award. The point is to conduct a large scale *special" event that draws an above average amount of attention to all the Jewish Bloggers out there and to bring in new readers and make people aware that we have this little community, and in many cases people who are part of our little community have some very good or important things to say.

If you don't like it, then you and anyone else who is opposed to the Jibs can do your own thing, or do nothing at all.

It's one thing to complain that it's not being run right and that you want it to be more inclusive or whatever, it's quite another to just stomp your foot and kvetch that the whole thing must be done away with.

If you don't like it, you don't have to be a part of it, you can ignore it and continue on with your regularly scheduled life.

You know what? I never won a Jib either, and I couldn't care less, seriously. I was happy though because during the Jibs the last two years, my readership went up, and new people found my blog and I found new blogs myself.

That to me is an accomplishment. You may not think its something, but many other people do.

 

Blogger Danny said ... (10:58 PM) : 

Two things I want to add:

diversification is needed for political blogs. Otherwise, for example, our ultra-right site would be receiving 1s from leftists and 5s from the reasonable Jews. Political subcategories should include right, center, left, and preferably ultra-right and peacenick.

Two, a system of voter authentification is a must. Perhaps the voting could be limited to blog authors authenticated by urls of their posts. Perhaps by credit cards or 10 cent fee paid by paypal. Some system of authentification.

 

Blogger tafka PP said ... (3:34 PM) : 

Chaim:

Easy, tiger!

First of all, I won a JIB last year- so I'm the last person you can accuse of either complaining (or "kvetching" for that matter) or misunderstanding: I totally get the point behind the JIBs (and enjoyed canvassing for mine, and reading others')

I maintain that by taking this on- now that the Jblogosphere has eveolved into an ever-expanding behemoth- you and others will be taking on too much, for minimal effect, in comparison to previous years: And I'm not the only person who has expressed similar sentiments, if you read thru the above comments. If you took offence, I apologise. But my criticism of your original comment is valid, and was meant to be purely constructive.

 

Anonymous Anonymous said ... (3:04 AM) : 

As it stands right now, the Jblogothingie has a very heavy right-wing and Zionist bent, controlled by what I would refer to as "the old guard"; i.e. the individuals who have devoted a lot of time and effort to creating the Jblogothingie. I would suggest inviting some bloggers with extremely different viewpoints than you, both from the "old guard" (like DovBear) and younger/newer ones like (Y-Love).
...But not the author of this insignificant microBizayon.

 

Blogger Irina Tsukerman said ... (6:53 AM) : 

Tafka: I'm sure JIBs won't change the course of the blogosphere. It's just one of the many ways to promote Jewish blogs. That doesn't mean we'll stop doing other things which may be more effective. But we find it fun, and many other people seemed to enjoy a little competition.

Bagel Blogger: That seems like a great list... I think I'll put it up as a separate post so that more people could look at it and make suggestions.

Danny1961: Well, we're planning to create separate categories for left and right-wing blogs, probably modeling on Weblog Awards. However, I'm not sure that including categories for "ultra right wing" is a good idea, because some people who you might feel fit the description might not actually consider themselves such.

Also, good point on the necessity for a system of verification. Personally, I don't feel comfortable asking people for their financial information. However, we'll definitely have to think of something. Perhaps getting people to sign in with their own password that can only be used once... not sure how to do that, though.

Sholom: Well, DovBear was nominated for a number of awards last year, and I think, won something. But you're right, we do need to highlight some of the smaller/lesser-known left-wing blogs... that's why we're hoping to bring in as many people as we can, who'll be willing nominate. Thanks for the recommendations.

 

Blogger Richard said ... (10:45 PM) : 

"We've discussed the tension between being open to feedback and criticism from bloggers and the flame wars, which have erupted in the past because of a few individuals, who, um, offered less than constructive criticism. Well, trolls are just a part of life."

Just like Robert Duvall's character in Apocalypse Now who said: "Oh I do love the smell of napalm in the morning;" I do so love it when you guys get so defensive that you have to accuse some of yr fellow Jewish bloggers of being "trolls." Since Aussie Dave and I engaged in some hot & heavy disagreements 2 yrs ago about his pseudo representative version of Jewish & Israeli blog awards, I can only assume you're referring to me.

So go ahead & flame away if you choose instead of focussing on the passage you wrote below:

"Perhaps we could bring in more left-wing bloggers on the "team" to make the teamwork a bit more diverse. After all, if we want to highlight Jblogs, promoting unity among Jblogs should be one of our absolute priorities."

What will you be doing to make the progressive Jewish bloggers (of whom there are many btw in case you didn't know) welcome in yr competition? And who will be representing progressive bloggers within the confines of the organizers of this competition?

BTW, having "pro-Israel advocacy" categories isn't the best way of making us feel more included unless you can in good conscience include progressive Jewish blogs like mine (Tikun Olam) within that rubric.

And in case any of you are sincerely interested in being truly inclusive you should take a look at the Jewish/Israeli peace blogs featured at my aggregator, Israel-Palestine Blogs:
http://israelpalestineblogs.com/
All of those blogs should be encouraged to participate & included in the nomination process.

In short, I believe you should do yr best to be non-ideolgogical in running this competition, voting, nomination & creating competition categories. You may not even realize it but JIBA was highly ideolgical & I worry that the upcoming competition will reproduce the worst offenses of that process.

Hey btw, Muzzlewatch & Tikun Olam & a host of other Jewish bloggers will be watching to see how this unfolds.

 

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