Last night, approximately 250 people gathered at a bar in Vancouver to celebrate, recognize and award their favourite blogs that are written by folks in the Metro Vancouver region. There were hundreds of blogs nominated, and almost 6,000 votes. The people of our city have some very strong feelings about the blogs here and their writers!

Personally, I’m totally ok with that because Buzznetworker was what a few in the crowd were calling “the upset of the night” when I won the Best Tech Site category, over the assumed winner, Techvibes. Buzznetworker pulled in 21% of the overall votes for the category, which is fantastic and totally exciting.

As Rebecca put so perfectly, “I want to thank everyone that attended, those who voted, and every single person that has inspired me to keep doing all of this day in and day out - whether they are aware of it or not.”

Thank you to everyone who voted for me and for helping me make what BuzzNetworker is today, and watch this space for more award winning content coming your way!

(Best of 604 Winner Image: courtesy Miss604 on Flickr; Image of me, Nadia, Larry, Steve and an unknown guy, courtesy Raul on Flickr)

The Pulitzer Prize criteria has expanded to include news organizations which publish only online, the Board announced today. The Pulitzer is a holy grail in journalism, and has traditionally been available to American journalists whose work has appeared in print only.

The Board also will allow entries made up entirely of online content to be submitted in all 14 Pulitzer journalism categories.

All material entered must still come from United States newspapers or news organizations which publish weekly at a minimum. These outlets must also be “primarily dedicated to original news reporting and coverage of ongoing stories,” and that “adhere to the highest journalistic principles.”

The Board will continue to exclude entries from print magazines and broadcast media and their sites.  I’m also bugged a bit by the fact that it’s only American-based publications.

“This is an important step forward, reflecting our continued commitment to American newspapers as well as our willingness to adapt to the remarkable growth of online journalism,” said Sig Gissler, administrator of the Prizes. “The new rules enlarge the Pulitzer tent and recognize more fully the role of the Web, while underscoring the enduring value of words and of serious reporting.”

The Board, Gissler said, hopes that the change will encourage the submission of more online material in the competition.
(image courtesy Pulitzer Prize Organization)

OK, this is cool. I don’t know who did it, but I’ve been nominated for the Hot Blogger Calendar. They’re only taking nominations till tonight, and they’re basing it on how many nominations the person gets. I’m up against some pretty stiff competition, so get’cher ass over to the site and nominate me!

I want to go to New York for the shoot!

See? Hot. Smart. Funny. Heck, you guys keep reading me! Go nominate me please!

Local social media company, Invoke Media, cleaned up at the annual PopVox Awards (BC New Media Awards) on Friday night.

Invoke was nominated for the New Media BC’s People’s Choice 2008 Award for Best User Generated Content or Crowdsourced Content Site for memelabs.com.

Photo Credit: Phillip Jeffery on Flickr.

MemeLabs is fantastic and they run some pretty wicked contests. If you’ve got any sort of video prowess and no shame, go check them out and join in.

Invoke was up against some excellent competition. There were some awesome teams and some excellent work up for the awards.

• • BussPass: Travels in Urbanity
  • Changeeverything.ca
  • Dare to be Digital: The Online Learning Challenge
  • NowPublic.com
  • Planetwide Media: Speed Racer Comic Book
  • Protagonize: Story Writing Community
  • Strutta
  • Zeros 2 Heros: The Peoples Publisher

Other winners at the PopVox Awards include:

• Best Digital Animated Short: PSYOP, for Coca-Cola “Happiness Factory, the Movie”
• Best Digital VFX: Ubisoft, for Assassin’s Creed
• Best Game (Console/PC): Metanet Software and Slick Entertainment, for N+ on Xbox 360 / XBLA
• Best Game (Casual): Acronym Games, for Rocketmen: Axis of Evil
• Best Mobile (Game): The Saints, for NavBall
• Best Mobile (Application): CellMap Inc, for CellMap
• Best Digital Campaign: Rainmaker Entertainment and Zeros2Heroes Media, for A ReBoot ReLaunch
• Best Digital Score: Clicktoy Interactive Inc., for The Meadow
• Best Do-Gooder site (Social Change Initiative): smashLAB, for DesignCanChange.org
• Homegrown Award (Best BC-based Venture): smashLAB, for MakeFive.com