Early last month, the CBS-11 announced a friendly competition to crown the area's Most Valuable Bloggers. Categories include local affairs, sports, lifestyle, entertainment and dining, among others. Contestants are entered into the event through a nomination process in which anyone can participate. Currently 17 blogs have entered the food fray.
Among the collection of small, individual bloggers competing -- which includes Full Custom BBQ, Susie Drinks Dallas and Two Hot Potatoes -- several professional group blogs have been nominated. D's Side Dish and The Dallas Morning News' Eats blog are among the participants jockeying against single non-professional bloggers. Seeing these two behemoths got my gears turning. Am I missing something? Are these bloggers, or blogs?
I called Kent Chapline, the content manager at CBSDFW.com and asked him if individual bloggers should be measured against professional group blogs. He indicated that the event was intended to be inclusive, and that it intentionally pitted smaller blogs against the larger in an attempt to level the playing field. Whatever that means.
A contest like this provides an excellent opportunity to highlight some of Dallas' smaller, more passionate blogs. Perhaps Nancy Nichols, or Leslie Brenner, or their handful of supporting bloggers should be nominated on their own instead of as a group? That'd be closer to fair. As it stands now, they're competing against part-timers with no professional photography, no budget, no editorial support. What's D or the News going to do with the $50 Amazon gift card prize anyway? (Give it away on the blog, hopefully.)
You might be thinking that we City of Aters are just bitching because we're not invited to the party, but the nomination process is easy; we could have thrown our names in the hat. Many of the blogs listed were even late to the party and still accepted after the original nomination list was released. But I honestly don't think we belong in a Best Food Blogger Contest, especially when one-man-bands like our own FoodBitch are participating.
While the MVB contest is voted on by the public, Chapline says there is a second contest judged by a panel at CBSDFW.com. The panel will hand out awards based on content frequency, presentation and content quality.
As for the main event, hopefully readers will take a careful look at each blogger listed, and vote thoughtfully and often. There's no limit to how many votes you can submit over the duration of the event, so get clicking.
