HairyFish

The blog awards is looming again, February 21st is less than a month away and people’s appetites are whetted, dog minders are being sought and plans are put in motion to have the children boarded away for the weekend. Twittering and Instant Messaging is up ten fold with people trying to get the scoop on who is nominating who and what people will be wearing. I didn’t make the Blog Awards last year but I did however manage to stow away to the Irish Web Awards in 2008 and have been to a few tweet ups so I have relatively no experience but of what small knowledge I do have I will share with you. Pointers if you will:

• Don’t ask me ‘what is it you do?’ within the first 2 minutes of meeting me. If you do feel the need to talk about careers be aware there is a good chance I will lie. I was a pilot twice last year and a bin man once. Chicks dig pilots.
• For those of you who are there to ‘network’, I don’t want to talk to you. That is unless you are Paul F Walsh. You must understand I am here for the beer and to oogle.
• Don’t be put off by the fact that I will probably be standing close to Peter Donegan. We are strictly travel partners and sharing a room in a social capacity. If he falls over, it’s for attention don’t pay him any.
• Social experiments involving the swapping of name tags is encouraged. Pick someone with a half decent name or at the very least a stranger of the opposite sex is a good start and may open up the avenue of possible hand droppage at a later hour. I find if you swap a name tag early enough it gives you the right of ownership over that person. Fact.
• I will assume if you give me a business card that you are propositioning me for sex.
• Remember it only should take 1 second to read a name tag. Any longer and it looks like you are trying to count the freckles around her belly button.
• Dress casual but smart. Never sexy.
• There is a small bit of confusion floating around about the actual “winning” of a blog award. Some would have you believe that there is a pretty tough judging process that takes place and that quality consistent blogging is required, but don’t be fooled. It is surprisingly easy to rob an award on the night. Some people might even have two. They deserve to have them robbed. I went to the Irish Web Awards empty pocketed and left with 2 dvd players, a bottle of champagne and one sized 8 womans polo neck top (Dunnes Stores) but I will get back to that later. Awards are heavy and hard to carry around all night. That’s all I will say.
• If you are male buy at least one woman one beer on the night for no ulterior reasons. Let’s face it, if they hadn’t shown up you’d be stuck looking at me.
• Your friend ‘who doesn’t blog but came along anyways’ is fair game.
• Actually saying the word ‘LOL’ is acceptable at this event but will prevent you from getting laid. Talking politics probably will get you laid but with the wrong kind of person.
• If I have taken the time to come up and talk to you have the courtesy to buy me a beer and acknowledge and appreciate the bull I’ve just been shovelling you.
• The dance floor is optional and is usually reserved for the drunkest of the herd at the early stages of the night. We type, we are not dancers. Wedding rules apply here.
• Never, under any circumstances swap the top you are wearing with someone else. This is up there with those Nigerian bank account details and sort code scams. You will end up minus one really nice shirt and wearing something that is far too small for you although you will look slightly hot. But ultimately you will end up looking silly and far too many people have cameras.
• Video mode is your friend but live streaming is evil.
• Heckling is expected of you. Rick loves it.
• Never use the line ‘I’m going into prison next week….’ As a last ditch attempt. This rule also applies outside of the Blog Awards.
• If there is a chance you will win an award, take the time to figure out that you have to have your photo taken with the sponsor after your acceptance speech. Walking straight back to your seat and then begrudgingly back, muttering as you go makes you look stupid and about as useful as a speed ramp on the m50, everyone thinks this, not just me. If you have done this you deserve to have your award robbed. (See above)
• Be aware, although it might appear that he is not paying you any attention, Darragh Doyle will be live tweeting your conversation.

Others who have some pointers are Will Knott and Ken has a good post and the comments are worth a gander too!

Looking forward to seeing you all there! Don’t be afraid to say hello

Tags: funny, IBA09, irish blog awards 2009

This entry was posted on January 26, 2009 at 4:29 pm and is filed under blogging. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.