I’m taking a break from my usual Monday profiles to address the FBFF awards, back to usual next week.
I spent a good portion of my Friday, Saturday and Sunday going through all the FBFF blog posts to note the blogs nominated, check out new-to-me blogs and leave my comments; so it wasn’t until Sunday evening as I was making my rounds to read some of my usual blogs that I realized a number of FBFF members opted out of the award nominations. Some had a really hard time narrowing down the field of amazing blogs to pick just one per category. Others felt the awards were unfair, superficial and petty. Ouch! I had no idea about these concerns until after the fact. The questions had been presented to the members more than three weeks ago, but unfortunately no one felt they could bring their concerns to my attention. Luckily and gratefully, three (that I am aware of) bloggers voiced their apprehension about the event through their blogs on Friday. I read through the well-written posts and all the comments left by other FBFF members and decided as a result to call an end to the FBFF awards.
First, my reasons for the awards in the first places:
Earlier in the year a couple of us bloggers were talking about some of the blogging awards being given out and saying that the tragedy in all of it is that the same mega-blogs get nominated year after year and that none of the amazing littler blogs get any recognition. We came up with the idea to create our own, giving the FBFF members, who are now 500 talented and dedicated bloggers, a chance to nominate their personal favorites – many of whom would not be the superstars of the fashion blogging world. I was hoping this would introduce us to a ton of new blogs and give encouragement to those who blog day after day without much feedback or encouragement. I thought the fact that the FBFFers would nominate the blogs would make it more fair and balanced, instead of a couple of us picking the tops in each category and then letting people vote.
What was good about the awards:
- I got a number of emails and comments from people saying a single nomination helped turn a bad day/week around. They appreciated the fact that someone recognized their hard work.
- It drew a lot of attention to our blogs and FBFF, thanks to all the Tweets, link-love, etc…
- I met some great new bloggers that I had never even heard of before. I added at least a dozen more bloggers to my Google Reader.
- More than 340 different blogs were named as part of these award nominations.
Why I’m canceling the awards:
FBFF was created with two big goals in mind – to prove there is more to a fashion/beauty blogger than superficiality and materialism; and to bond bloggers together giving them a built-in community of supporters. It’s always been about that. But these awards seem to be detracting from that purpose and aim. We are supposed to be building each other up instead of doing anything that could cut one another down. If just the nominations have caused some heart-ache the voting process could be even more detrimental.
I still want to be able to draw attention to the blogs and bloggers I think are excelling. I want the FBFFers to be able to give kudos to the blogs they love. But it needs to be done in a way that is supportive and uplifting. So sorry, to anyone that’s been hurt in this process. Unfortunately blogging is a big learning process and I’ve still got a lot to learn.
Weigh in and give me your thoughts on blogger awards. If you have ideas about about how we can tweak this let me know.
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{ 118 comments… read them below or add one }
Hi Katy,
I’m saddened to hear the blog awards were canceled and NOT because I was nominated on a few blogs.
I feel you did nothing wrong with the awards or the nomination process. This week in the FBFF group was just like any other week, members had the choice of participating or not, nothing more, nothing less.
I too, saw a few of those posts where people said they were not participating.
I chocked that response up to the post taking longer than most weeks, not about cutting people down.
In my opinion, there is nothing wrong with being pointed out by your group of peers, it happens everyday in everyday life. The majority of the posts I read from the FBFF group were very positive and people were excited to nominate their favorite blogs in each category.
It’s unfortunate that something that was supposed to be fun, turned into so many hurt feelings.
At the the end of the day, a FBFF blogger award doesn’t change who you and your blog are.
Just my two cents…………..
Collette Osuna recently posted..Links ala Mode- Feb 24 & EL Vintage Winner
I completely agree that these FBFF awards do not change the innate worth of a blogger or all the time he/she spends on perfecting the craft. Especially considering that FBFF is just a drop in the bucket when it comes to the fashion blogging community – these awards are no big deal. But it was a shame that people were hurt as a result, which is why I ultimately went with ending the awards before they got further out of control. Thanks for your thoughts Collette!
As we’ve already discussed, everyone should know your reasons were good and pure for suggesting fbff awards. Anyone that upset shouldve said something weeks ago. maybe they didn’t think about how difficult it could be, who knows?
That being said, I’m sad the fbff awards were cancelled as well, but I understand and stand by you in this descision. If people were this distraught and upset, it shouldn’t continue. Blogging is a learning process and you learned to not add an award to fbff
Sadly, someone is always going to be upset about having to choose; sad and hurt they weren’t picked; or feeling like it’s a popularity contest. Let me tell you, as one of the people that both made picks, and had herself picked, it was hard to narrow people down. But seeing my name listed in a few categories showed me that 2 years in, I’ve got some great friends out there. But, we all know that’s not what blogging is about. I think Linda said it best, “it feels great to be nominated, but that (awards) are not what blogging is about.”
You did what you felt was best and no one should faultyou for that.
XO
Suze
(ps- wrote this on myphone, so apologies for any gaffs)
Suze recently posted..A quick outfit- update and FBFF blogger nominations!
Suze – the comment looks great, especially having been written from your phone! Thanks for your thoughts on the matter and sorry you are disappointed that they are canceled. it’s very true I learned a good lesson about FBFF and it’s members. Here’s to moving on and starting March with a new set of stellar questions and topics.
I’m one of those who deliberately did not participate, kind of because I felt like I didn’t want to single out only a handful of blogs for nominations that are put to a vote, and also because these days, I just don’t have that much time. At the end of last year, I selected some blogs I thought had made major achievements, but they were my selections, not the result of a vote, and I may or may not do that again this year.
That said, I don’t think that it’s that big of a deal for those who want to participate. To each his own, you know? Anyone not interested in it could have sat it out if they wanted. Or as you pointed out, could have raised the issue WELL before last Friday.
I thought the categories chosen were quite clever and aspirational. For me it wasn’t that it was a bad thing; but sometimes I feel like people get tired of hearing bloggers (like me) mention the same faves over and over.
Since #FBFF is your baby, you’re totally entitled to do what you want. Anyone who doesn’t like it can not participate. It’s that simple. Don’t even worry about this, Katy. Seriously.
••V••
http://www.gritandglamour.com
@gritandglamour
GRIT & GLAMOUR recently posted..Rated VG by Casee Marie
V, I was interested to hear your opinion since you did do the end of the year awards on your blog. And I agree, for those who didn’t feel comfortable with it there is always the opt out option, which many people took this week. I’m not worrying about it anymore. It’s done and over with and we are moving on to next week’s topic. (Although yesterday was an interesting evening of self reflection. Thanks for your thoughts. – Katy
i have to agree with you V. i already emailed Katy about this, but for me, I didn’t have any real objections to the awards, but honestly it’s just not really my thing. this happens to me a lot since i’m not a personal style blogger, but i do understand the motivations behind the awards and i stand behind Katy’s reasoning for creating them. but i think that in the end, you’re never going to please everyone, especially in a group of over 500 bloggers! i can’t say i’m disappointed they were cancelled, but i’m not ecstatic either. maybe by this time next year, there can be a better system in place so that we can recognize the bloggers who are chugging away and all the great work they’re doing, without offending anyone else in the process.
Cate recently posted..Editorial- Adriana Lima by Vincent Peters for Vogue Italia February 2011
Hi Katy,
I also agree with Vahni.
I want to tell you that I really appreciate your good intentions about doing the awards. What you are doing, with highlighting and connecting all of us bloggers is wonderful and meaningful.
To be honest I am relieved that the awards are not going ahead. I felt very conflicted about doing them, and if I had to do it again I wouldn`t. I do think it is ok to highlight good work, and there are a lot of bloggers out there who are doing fab work. Thank you again for all of your hard work and great heart.
xx Anika
Katy, You’re a class act! Your post is well written and absolutely comes across as thoughtful and well intentioned. I did not participate in the awards. My feelings about them weren’t real strong one way or the other; but I just didn’t want to start trying to name “bests”. Every now and then, blogging will feel like HS to me. There’s always the “cool girls”. LOL Maybe that’s just in my head or maybe there are others that feel the same. I just want EVERYONE to feel like a “cool girl” and not give anyone reason to feel less than anyone else.
Again, girly, you’re just plain classy!
~Serene
Serene – Thanks for your sweet words! I agree that blogging is often like high school. Funny thing is I was NEVER cool in high school and I think this week made it seem like I was the leader of the cool pack – a role I never wanted to play. Thanks again for your thoughts on the matter.
Katy, You are a lady with alot of class!!! I will OFFICIALLY join the FBFF group today and perhaps be 501!! I have been participating without official credentials…but your assistance will help me to do that! Thanks for your sweet heart!
Pam@over50feeling40 recently posted..Look What I Found at the Grocery StoreStylists Extraordinaire!
Pam – Thanks! Too funny that this whole issue is making you officially join FBFF. I was worried it was going to drive people away. Welcome, officially, to the group!
Katy, I was one of the FBFF members who didn’t participate in the nominations last week, but only because I feel too new to this blogging world to really know who to nominate! My blog is a few years old, but only since January have I been focusing on fashion/style blogging there, and since I have so many other things going on with work and life, I can’t network and tweet and meet other bloggers as quickly as I’d like to. I’m slowly getting there- commenting on more blogs and reaching out, but it’s a slow process!
I thought your awards were just fine and I never saw any malicious intent. I’m sad that you canceled them, but after reading your post, I completely understand why you would do so. Thanks for the open, honest post!
Displaced Urbanite recently posted..coming next week- color palette blog walk!
Thanks for your thoughts on the matter! And I’m glad it comes across that I had no ill will in the issue. To me it was just something simple and fun to do.
Katy,
I was trying to explain my thoughts a little on twitter yesterday but the 140 character limit got me every time.
I understand how it can make some upset. I didn’t think the act of making nominations would upset so many people. It was a little challenging. I wanted to give 3 honorable mentions in some areas but just stuck to one. (I saw you did honorable mentions and that was great. I should have checked out your blog before doing mine but I did not want to sway my awardees because I know how my mind works and it would have.)
So then I felt a little bad not nominating some that were a close second. Then to find out some that I didn’t get to nominating were some of the ones that did not like the awards because of the letdown when not nominated. The whole ordeal did make me start creating my blogroll page. I did not finish so it is not posted on my tabs at the top of the page. I made some categories. I may revamp it. But I feel that was something good that came out of this.
I was talking to Kimberly (Fashion Momma) about how I felt bad in the voting process because only the super popular ones were going to be in the top few for the voting. I was telling her I wished that there was some way to recognize everyone who even got a nomination. Kimberly mentioned that that was too many to name. She is right, but I couldn’t think of anything else to do.
I even feel bad doing my monthly spotlight because I feel like I can only showcase one and there are so many good ones.
Maybe I’m not cut out for this.
I think you did nothing wrong. So many participated. Also I actually looked at more of the FBFF posts than I normally get to. I could skim for new blogs. I did spend a lot of time looking at the new blogs. I still have a long way to go to make it through your list and I’m excited to go back and look at the rest. Usually if I don’t get to all the posts on the weekend, I just forget about the rest of them. Also I’ll note I’m looking at them not because I think I won or think I should have but because I want to discover some new talent.
Sorry if this is wordy and doesn’t make much sense. My brain jumps around a lot.
Colleen recently posted..2 Runs
Colleen – I’m glad to hear that this whole thing made you create a blogroll. Can’t wait to see it when you set it to go live. There truly are so many amazing blogs that I read weekly that it is hard to narrow down the field to personal favorites in each category. I should have thought more of the people who may not be nominated and the way that would make them feel about blogging. Our success in this should not be based on silly awards. It’s about the heart and soul we put in to what we do. If we like it and it brings joy to us – that’s the real purpose.
Thanks for sharing your thoughts on the matter last night and this morning. – Katy
Oh thats a shame things have turned out this way
. I thought the fbff awards was a lovely idea and I know several bloggers felt delighted to have received nominations….
I’m surprised there was anyone left feeling discontented in some way and more surprised they felt unable to express this earlier.
You do a FAB job with FBFF Katy, and I really appreciate it.
Sophie recently posted..30×30 Days 25- 26 & 27
I was surprised people did not feel they could express their thoughts on this earlier as well. I try to keep the communication channels open. But it sounds like each person made the decision for him/herself and didn’t realize there were similar opinions until the day of. Thanks for sharing your opinion.
Katy,
I just joined FBFF on Friday, and I find nothing wrong with the awards. Reading the different award nominations allowed me to learn about new blogs and further peaked my interests in the group! I am sorry that some people did not like the idea of FBFF awards, but truth is, you can’t please everyone. Thanks for being so open about your intentions and reasons for canceling the awards; maybe we can try it again some other time
**Rocquelle**
http://www.considermelovely.com
Twitter: @ConsiderMeLuvly
Rocquelle – Welcome to the group. You picked quiet the week to get involved – the first ever FBFF debacle. Looking forward to seeing what you have to say in the week’s ahead when we return to the normal one topic/five question approach. – Katy
Katy, I didn’t participate, but I didn’t post about why I did not either. I mentioned to you on Twitter that I didn’t feel right about participating. I think there are enough contests in life as it is, and for me blogging is a hobby and a creative outlet and anything that makes it less fun, I tend to avoid. I didn’t want to have to make choices, because I felt like for every person I picked in a category there would be many who I did not pick and their feelings might have been hurt. One of the reasons that I love FBFF is that it is such a strong community builder, but I just felt like this past Friday was out of that scope.
That said, I didn’t write to you about it because it seemed that many bloggers were excited about doing this. Everyone has a different perspective on blogging and that’s fine.
Thanks for your tact, kindness, inspiration, and for bringing so many of us together every Friday, Katy. As someone above said, you are a class act.
La Historiadora de Moda recently posted..GAADfly – Two Month Check In
Thanks! Please know you are more than welcome to write/email/tweet me about anything FBFF related. Especially if you have any reservations about what is going on. I agree that the FBFF award post deviated a little from the initial community building aspect. Initially it had such great potential to highlight amazing blogs, but it did turn into a naming of the same few blogs and more a popularity/comparison contest that anything uplifting and encouraging. Thanks again for your thoughts. – Katy
Hi Katy,
I want to thank you, as many have above, for putting together a sincere and honest post addressing the situation with the awards. I read lots of the buzz about it on twitter last night, but didn’t want to comment because it felt like a private(ish) discussion between friends. I participated in the awards and at first didn’t see anything awry with the process, although like many found it very difficult to narrow it down and it did cross my mind that I could have listed several blogs in each category. I know the awards were not ill intended and that you only had the best of intentions. I hope that after this post everyone is willing to give you the benefit of the doubt.
Sometimes the simplest reasons explain things the best. The most popular blogs are consistently chosen because they have more exposure and a higher volume of readership, therefore more bloggers read them and are more apt to select them for an award. It’s no one’s fault, just a fact of life, and not something anyone should blame you for. In exploring others’ posts I found several new blogs myself. So if, even a little, the awards did serve their purpose.
Thanks again for your candor and honesty about the situation.
Lindsay
Lindsay recently posted..Cold Front
Lindsay – Thanks for sharing your thoughts on the matter. I’m glad you were able to find several new blogs to follow, as I did as well. That is one of the great upsides of this whole thing. So in a way I am grateful. – Katy
I have to echo LHdM’s last two thoughts in her comment – you truly do such an amazing job of bringing so many of us together every Friday, and you do it with such grace and class and tact. I appreciate your continued interest in this community — you have made it so much more inclusive and connected — and I know many many other bloggers feel the same way.
One of the many things I love about FBFF is that it’s voluntary, and I can decide whether or not I want to participate, or I can skip a week if I don’t have the time to put real thought into my responses, and I can read what others who do have the words and the time have to say. That’s why I didn’t contact you about my personal decision not to participate in the awards.
I hope that reconsidering the awards and canceling them hasn’t caused you any heartache or stress. I admire you more for being so open and thoughtful and genuine about how you’ve decided to handle it all.
I look forward to joining in future FBFF conversations, Katy!
Sara – Thanks for your words of encouragement. I’m glad to hear that you and other bloggers feel FBFF is inclusive. I don’t want these awards to come off as anything that detracts from that networking community.
And you are so right, FBFF is completely voluntary, which is one of the benefits of the group. If you don’t want to participate you don’t have to.
– Katy
Hi Katy -
Forgive me, I might be repeating what has been said in other comments because I don’t have time to read them now…
I appreciate your spirit behind the awards – to me, it was very apparent that you wanted smaller blogs to be nominated (OBVIOUSLY bloggers who have written books or are professional bloggers are doing a good job – they don’t need an award). I don’t think it was interpreted that way by the masses, though.
I was on the fence about participating just because in general I HATE having to pick people for anything – I never want anyone to feel left out. When the posts that were going up started continuously naming the same, more “famous” bloggers, it just left a sour taste in my mouth about the whole situation, so I chose not to participate.
It was a lovely confidence booster when I saw my name mentioned, but I can’t help but think about all the wonderful bloggers I read and love who didn’t get a mention at all. I just felt bad for them. I’m a bleeding heart, though, so I feel bad for everyone all the time.
Again, I don’t think you (or any of the participants) were in the wrong – I just didn’t personally like how skewed they were getting.
Ashley recently posted..22211
Ashley, what you said is exactly why I chose not to participate. Since I’m new to fashion/style blogging, I only know most of the bigger, more popular blogs, and I didn’t think that was the point of this particular award idea. I didn’t want to just mention the larger blogs (although they are awesome!) and I didn’t feel like I had enough information to nominate the smaller bloggers.
Displaced Urbanite recently posted..coming next week- color palette blog walk!
Ashley – What an interesting commentary. It’s true a lot of the participants named the same few blogs and I applauded those who thought outside the box like Wiley Wiley. For me, I honestly expected to see more of the big name bloggers mentioned, but for the most part they were left alone in favor of smaller blogs and new ones. The thing I did realize through all my reading is that FBFF has created a bit of a blogging community in which so many of us support the others, which means naturally we would go ahead and vote for the ones who tend to stand out in that community. I suppose using the FBFF members as the nominators created a bit of a predictable outcome that would not have been present if some how I could have reached the more universal blogging community. – Katy
Katy,
I’m so sad that the blog awards were canceled. Honestly, the comments we made to each other on Twitter, Friday, were very real and I thought everyone (yes, everyone is a stretch… but most of us) understood that this was a fun project. You tweeted about how you thought it was strange that there wore more FBFF tweets than ever, but far less post entries than in recent weeks. In reply, (@fashionsmaven and) I said:
@katy_rose1 I think the people who participated were really excited and wanted to shout out to their nominees!
@katy_rose1 And I also think it took a lot of work and extra thinking and being choosy, which a lot of people may not have felt comfy with..
@fashionsmaven @katy_rose1 agree! I wish everyone would do it for fun like high school senior superlatives!
… and to @fashionsmaven and me, you said:
@FashionMomma22 @fashionsmaven could be. But this is just #FBFF not any big-time honor so we might as well have fun with it. IMO
In said “conversation,” I felt like we all “got it.” In life, NO ONE is comfortable with EVERYTHING. I think there were far more people that were excited and happy to basically play the Oscars with the blog awards. It’s fun. Who doesn’t love an awards show? I’m pretty sure just because Amy Adams lost the Oscar for “Best Supporting Actress” last night to one of her very own costars, she didn’t go home and cancel her taping for the next movie. Because she knows her movie and her role were great.
I simply feel upset, because for those of us who weren’t offended by the blog awards (because it was fun), we lost a lot of time and hard work and deep thought on the project. And for those bloggers who are calling the nominations and awards “petty” and “high school-like,” I think blowing to this sort of proportion brings it more to the middle and elementary level, rather than just agreeing to disagree and moving on. That’s just my opinion.
Thanks,
Kimberly
Fashion Momma recently posted..Train Travelin & GIVEAWAY!!!
Kimberly – Sorry to hear you feel your time was wasted! (I know how you feel since I spent a number of hours tallying everything, checking out new blogs, etc…) but if you were comfortable with the awards and giving the shout-outs to your favorites then I don’t think that was a wasted post. You honored some of the bloggers who have impacted you and hopefully you have introduced a few new blogs to your readers.
I agree too that there were a number of bloggers who loved the awards and had a great time playing along. But after thinking about it all afternoon/night yesterday I decided it would be better to error on the side of charity than a good time. – Katy
Kimberly, I love your comparison to Amy Adams. Although that girl does annoy me, so on a personal level I’d be happy if she canceled every movie.
Ashley recently posted..22211
I caught on to the buzz too and I completely understand both sides of the argument. I did find it difficult to nominate bloggers for awards but I did see it as a opportunity to show some blog love to the those people I read regularly and give them props for what they do. And yes, it would become obvious who would get the win in a few of the categories and that’s okay. Those bloggers do an awesome job and should be recognized for what they do. On the other hand, there are also many great bloggers who don’t get recognized that should. So awards are a very tricky thing.
Though I didn’t make it into the top three, it would’ve been cool to see who won and I would’ve been happy for whoever took it home – but I understand that we do have to think of the bigger FBFF picture. So maybe instead of awards, we can look for ways to just promote each other and introduce the group to great blogs that we simply didn’t know about!
MJ recently posted..Outfit 22 of 30- Easy Breezy
I completely agree with your last sentence. I’m brainstorming ways to do that now, but it’s easier said then done. Got to figure out a way to give props to some great blogs both big and small without alienating others and turning it into a popularity contest.
As someone who was not a fan of the awards, I feel I should explain.
I have no problem with awards. In fact, I really love the idea of recognition for hard work and success. You will not find me giving awards to students just because “everyone deserves one.” An award is something you earn. And there are certainly bloggers who deserve recognition for their hard work. That said, the cream already rises to the top. We all know who the big bloggers are. We can see in their sites themselves. We vote everyday with our visits, our comments, and our google-friending.
I just didn’t see the point of explicitly giving blogging awards. We all do this for different reasons and with different time constraints. For someone like me, I blog to learn how to dress. Others blog because they already have the perfect style and want to show it off. For some, this is a full-time job. For others, it is something that is squeezed into an already busy schedule. But the thing about blogging is that it is a shared space for everyone, regardless of how or why they blog. To essentially put all the very different types of bloggers into the same category for a vote just doesn’t make sense. It would be like putting the lead actor of your high school drama club against Natalie Portman.
I don’t say this as someone who was a sore loser. I was nominated quite a few times (more than I ever would have guessed) and it felt great. I REALLY appreciate all the people who mentioned me. Seriously, my fella had to squeeze my newly big head through the door at the end of the day. I am sure others who were nominated felt the same way. But just because I was lucky enough to be recognized, doesn’t mean I think it was a good idea from the start.
I also was not advocating canceling the next step of the process. While I wish the process had never been started, it has. And people invested time and energy into choosing their nominees. It seems like canceling the rest of the awards now is a letdown for those people and also might make them feel as though they wasted their time.
I just think we should learn from this for the future and think about what the blogging community is really about.
Linda W recently posted..The Outfit is Alright
Linda – I’m glad you chimed in since I read your comments on several other blogs on the topic. I do wish you would have mentioned this to me sooner so I could have thought through the process and the awards from this new perspective. In my way of thinking the big name blogs weren’t going to be nominated and we were going to be a place for all of us ‘underdog’ blogs if you will. For the most part that is what happened. Hardly any of the multiple-thousand follower blogs even made the cut and so many newer and highly motivated blogs were mentioned.
With the backlash and not realizing people were so hurt by this, I found the only real solution was to cancel the voting process and more along. There was no sense in turning this into an alienating and side-taking topic. FBFF is about bringing us all together, about discussion and community. If people feel the awards detract from that then they do not belong in the mix.
Thanks for sharing!!
- Katy
I think it’s great that you canceled the “awards.” This isn’t high school anymore so why is there a need to “rank” blogs in the first place? I chose not to participate because there are so many wonderful blogs out there and placing them in a specific category, takes the fun out of reading them in the first place. No worries on making any mistakes or whatnot, I’m still looking forward to the weekly questions for this week(: (:
Rocio Lie recently posted..I ♥ my jeans
Thanks Rocio – Glad to hear the whole thing hasn’t turned you off from participating in FBFF!
First of all – I’m kind of annoyed everyone has already called you a class act b/c that was going to be my line.
No really I’m glad people have acknowledged it b/c if there were an award for Classiest Blogger I’d nominate you in a heartbeat, without fear of hurt feelings on the part of others. Exceptional individuals deserve exceptional recognition (two cents, for free). We all have favorites that we choose to pat on the back via different channels (hello, blogroll! features! following!) while “excluding” others, but who wants to look at it that way? Why does the word “award” conjure up some sort of necessarily exclusionary connotation more so than, say, “shoutout?” I’m happy you’ve identified your goals for this feature and abandoned the project because it veered from those goals – and NOT because there was a small slip in participation and an even smaller constituency of objection.
Thanks for the idea, Katy. As a small blogger who managed to benefit from a boost in readership as a result of these nominations, I can very gratefully attest that your original goal was in some way a success.
MONKEYFACE recently posted..oscar wild
Thanks Monk! I’m thrilled to hear you found benefit in the awards. And you and your blog were exactly what I had in mind when this started. You’re new to the blogging world, you don’t have tons of followers, but you’ve got a great thing going on and you deserve recognition for that. We do make a lot of single-out choices of who we will feature and list in our blogroll, but I suppose putting a title on that and making it more blatant was the issue. Thanks for your sweet words about being a class act – it’s a work in progress. LOL – Katy
I am not a FBFF blogger but follow/read many FBFF blogs (still trying to get my act together for regular posting and pics, ah the craziness of life). I think the awards were a very positive thing and you were not wrong nor should you be criticized for proposing them; if fact I added another 5 bloggers to my google reader discovered through these nominations that I may not have found, which is a very positive thing and fully reflects in my opinion the spirit and mission of FBFF.
Recognition of some should not be seen as taking away from others. I have never understood this attitude. Obviously FBFF is a very talented group of bloggers overall; I have yet to see one that was not worthwhile. All may not be to my taste but I appreciate the point of view and style of each. Letting people recognize and pay tribute to bloggers they enjoy and appreciate should never be construed as negative and as many bloggers said, if you could recognize an infinite number, they would. I guess I don’t understand taking this as a negative (ie no one picked me) as opposed to the opportunity to celebrate the positive. I realize self esteem for some can be fragile (and many of these bloggers reflect on this eloquently and I completely empathize), but again it’s not about dwelling on yourself and but spreading the work of great bloggers and stressing the positive. My 2 cents.
Keep up the great work and please don’t let this get you down.
Ericka – This is great to hear, especially from someone who does not participate but who does read the posts. I always wondered if there were any non-members who paid attention to this stuff. And I agree I added a number of new bloggers to my reader as well! There are so many out there it is hard to know about everyone and see all the amazing things being done! Thanks for sharing your opinion about this. – Katy
Hi Katy,
I will admit that my initial reaction to the awards was “Great – the same 10 popular blogs are going to win because they’ve got the big readership.” But I decided I’d move ahead with it, in the name of team spirit. As the days progressed, I realized part of the reason I was feeling so negative about the awards was because it’s been hard being a more veteran blogger (I’ve been at this for over 2 years) and seeing newer bloggers achieve greatness pretty much overnight. But since those are my personal issues, I took the time to truly think about each of my nominations and select them NOT just because: “They have to be the best, they have 600 followers” but because I truly connect with their blogs. In fact, I altered some categories slightly to highlight blogs that shine in not-the-traditional-way.
I think that it would have been great if the awards really could have highlighted the smaller but stellar blogs (I’m not saying mine in particular, as I know many bloggers with smaller following that I could learn a lot from!), but I think with a group of 500 bloggers, that simply wasn’t possible. Even when I try to check out other FBFF bloggers regular post, without considering nominations, it gets overwhelming. The only solution to this problem I can think of is insanely time consuming: selecting an “academy” to follow all FBFF blogs for a time period, nominate and award blogs. But no one has that kind of time!
I will admit, the whole time I was secretly hoping that we’d open our browsers one day to find a post from you saying: “Here are all the winners” and having each blog nominated highlighted rather than selecting just one. After all, being nominated would have been a great honour for me, even if it had been just one person. But that post would have taken a lot of work
- C
Cara – I thought about listing the over 340 blogs that were mentioned but realized that too could cause some hurt feelings and while that wouldn’t be the aim that would be the product. And I totally feel what you are saying about looking at newer blogs that are excelling and wondering how that happened when I have been working so hard at this for so much longer. Who knows how these things happen?! It is encouraging to see so many bloggers named and meet so many new sites I wasn’t aware of before. – Katy
Katy- This was my first week joining FBFF, and one of the reasons that I finally decided to join was because I thought it was so wonderful that you were giving us a chance to share our appreciation for the blogs that inspire us! I think everyone who knows you at all will understand that your intentions were absolutely pure and with a goal of lifting each other up. I am looking forward to participating in next week’s events!
Laura recently posted..And the award goes to
Laura – how interesting that it was this topic that made you interested in participating. Well, I’m glad you are one board now and you will be able to take part in the other topics in the weeks ahead. This group is really great and full of honest supportive people. It’s a pleasure to work and blog with all of them.
“I simply feel upset, because for those of us who weren’t offended by the blog awards (because it was fun), we lost a lot of time and hard work and deep thought on the project. And for those bloggers who are calling the nominations and awards “petty” and “high school-like,” I think blowing to this sort of proportion brings it more to the middle and elementary level, rather than just agreeing to disagree and moving on. That’s just my opinion.”
THIS THIS THIS! i agree with fashion momma COMPLETELY.
i was excited to have joined FBFF and now THIS seems high school (elementary) to me. i was introduced to a TON of new blogs because of the FBFF awards and now i just feel rather annoyed. i too wish that people would have voiced their opinions way before a lot of people put time and effort into making sure to vote not only for the BIG bloggers but also for the new ones. thanks Katy for all of the work you put into this.
Thanks Jenn for your thoughts and I truly am sorry for all the wasted time – my own included. I completely understand the feeling of this harking back to high school. The bummer is that it wasn’t meant to go there, but it did and now we can move on and all be a little wiser as a result. And I agree I met so many new great bloggers as a result of this.
Interesting thoughts here. I’m not an FBFF blogger (just don’t have the time) but I really really really LOVE reading the responses each week and Katy, I think you do an amazing job of bringing the community together in a really inclusive way. I thought the blog awards/nominations were fun and, like many said, should be taken like senior superlatives. While, yes, there were some more popular blogs that stood out, they are popular for a reason, and I think it’s sort of silly to not want a popular blogger to be highlighted just because they’re popular (this is a commentary on the naysayers, not you). There is rather little pay-off for blogging (for those of us–most of us–who don’t have sponsors, free garb, advertising, etc.), and I think an award from fellow bloggers is quite an honor. I got nominated a couple of times (definitely not enough to win anything), but I don’t hold any grudge against any other blog that has more followers or more nominations. We don’t blog for the recognition.
I know there were a crapload of blogs nominated, but I would be sort of interested in seeing a list of all the nominations in each category–if someone (even one person) thinks a blog is nod-worthy, I’d like to check it out. But I think another, equally viable option, is just to direct people to the original list of participating blogs, which will bring attention not only to the nominees but to the FBFF bloggers. Just an idea.
So sorry to see you caught up in drama–I think you had a great idea and I applaud you for your consideration of others once the issue was brought to your attention.
Angeline recently posted..Executive Summary Links for your weekend 022511
Angeline – Thanks for your thoughts. I’m also glad to see that you like reading through the FBFF posts even though you don’t have the time to participate. I’m still in debate over what to do with the nominated blogs that are new to me. I might just use them for my Monday profiles mixing them in with the others for the rest of the year, which would highlight some great blogs without creating a ‘cool’ list.
Maybe you should just post all 340 blogs that were recognized in one way or another and leave it at that. Personally, I used it as a way to find so many new blogs to read! And I had people recommending others to me and it was fun! I felt bad about the whole voting thing but after seeing clever posts I wanted to join in. I think you shouldn’t let your project go to waste, but maybe take out the “award” element?!
Hayley
Hayley recently posted..It Might or Might not be Snowing Today
I certainly do not want to let it all go to waste and I am considering new ways to include the nominees and the nominators into posts in the future. It’s a complicated thing to try and coordinate. The meeting of new bloggers was totally a highlight in all of this for me. It’s like the 30 for 30, some of the most rewarding parts of participating is the new blogs I meet as a result.
I know your heart was to lift up and spotlight some hardworking bloggers. That is to be commended and celebrated! Your intentions were kind and generous and no one can say that anything you did was malicious or thoughtless. You put a lot of thought and care into it and I hope everyone appreciates it!
I appreciate you, I appreciate what you’re doing and I appreciate your good thoughts. I don’t at all think that you shouldn’t have done the awards. So many people had a lot of fun with them and that’s a good thing. Those of us who don’t find the picking and choosing to be as much fun had the option to sit out and we did, and that’s okay for people to have different opinions.
But please don’t let anyone’s different opinions make you feel like anything you did was wrong. You didn’t do anything wrong.
Thanks Melissa – I’m actually completely ok with this whole thing. To me it is so much better that we have the chance to talk about this in an open, honest, sincere and charitable way instead of resorting to bickering and backbiting. Even this little debate proves what FBFF is all about – great bloggers sharing their honest opinions. I’m so grateful the bloggers who spoke up did so and brought this issue to light. I was oblivious to it all.
I am going to apologize in advance because I am writing this from my iPhone and have no idea how the formatting will look so I hope it is somewhat legible
First of all, I want to thank you, Katy, for running with the FBFF award idea. I remember seeing the idea come to life on twitter and I think that the final result, and the categories selected, were brilliant. As is true of all FBFF posts, everyone was able to chose whether or not they would participate and it is evident many did. I missed the most recent twitter chatter (blizzards and flooding wreak havoc on Internet time!) but I have to say I was really surprised to read this post and I am sorry that you felt that the best course of action was canceling the awards. That being said, I do understand your decision and think you, yet again, showed how classy you are and how important this community is to you.
I do feel that much of this could have been avoided if the individuals who had specific issues with the awards had broached them early on.
I have missed the last few FBFF posts because i take these posts quite seriously and put a lot of effort into them. I haven’t been able to dedicate the time I would like to them so I haven’t participated. The same is true in this case. These Awards required a lot of thought and work and I simply didn’t have that available. On the flipside, I don’t know that I would have participated HAD I been able because I truly don’t know if I wod have been able to narrow down my favorites enough. I try to recognize the bloggers I love and admire in my own ways, but I was beyond honored to learn my name was nominated a few times.
I think what the naysayers may be missing is the fact that these awards were a community building event. They were a way to introduce others to new bloggers and spread the love. You could chose to participate or sit it out, but all the nomination phase did was BUILD this community. Although I respect everyones opinion, I wish the naysayers would have viewed it from that angle. You can never go wrong when you are helping to build and strengthen this community. Fortunately for those that did participate, there time spent wasn’t a waste because they did just that, as did you.
And now I REALLY hope my ramblings made some sense at least!
Beautifully Invisible recently posted..LINK LOVE with a TWIST- February 28- 2011
Thanks B – A lot of this does boil down to the perception of things. And unfortunately, it is hard to know when planning all of this what the reactions will be. I try to avoid issues and topics that could cause a marked divide among the members and I really do think these topics and questions through in depth before just throwing them out to the whole group. For me the most surprising thing was how something that was meant to build up and support bloggers end up being something that also hurt bloggers. That’s where my issue came in and that is why I called an end to it.
I chose not to participate this week, but I never thought that you had anything other than positive intentions about the FBFF blogger awards. With a big group like FBFF, there will occasionally be topics that aren’t my style, and there is nothing wrong with that. Although I didn’t participate in the awards, I also chose not to write about it on my blog because others were having fun with the topic.
Rebecca recently posted..24 of 30 – Wax Lips
So true. There are questions that apply to your blog and there are questions that don’t. We all (well except me – LOL) get to pick which weeks to participate in and which to sit out. There is nothing wrong with that and I encourage the bloggers to be selective of the topics that work for them and their community of readers.
Hi Katy,
It’s such a shame that the FBFF Awards were cancelled. I’m just as amazed as you said you were when you posted that people were complaining, because I didn’t read anything negative in any of the replies concerning this discussion topic.
Maybe you could start a discussion topic of what topics the rest of the members can come up with/ if they just liked the ones you came up with. That way other members can’t say that the award titles aren’t fair/petty.
I really liked the ones you came up with though!!
Sarah Ashley recently posted..Stepping out of your College Safety Bubble
Thanks for your thoughts on this. I don’t think it is so much that they weren’t happy with my topics. Some of the bloggers who opted out are some of the most faithful FBFF members and the ones that have been super supportive of the whole things from the early days. I don’t see their thoughts on this as complaining as much as it is stating their apprehension about the issue. And I am truthfully happy they brought it to light.
I did like the award categories and thought they were pretty darn creative. These just need to be worked on in another way that won’t hurt others.
katy,
while i am in full support of you doing what ever your heart desires with these awards (since you are the mastermind behind fbff afterall), i can see why some bloggers weren’t interested in participating. it is hard sometimes to feel like we need to keep up with a few big bloggers who seem to have it all, and as i noticed on a lot of the entries, these are the same bloggers that were voted for over and over again.
when i orginially read the challenge i was excited to post on a number of bloggers that i love, but who i know don’t have crazy readerships and haven’t completely been ‘discovered’ yet. but on this same note, some of the catagories made it difficult not to pick a ‘big-name blogger’ (ie. most connected or tribe leader).
i stand behind your choice to not post the final results. i think it’s fun to go through each blog myself, and it becomes quite clear who the winners would be in most of the fields.
let’s all just take this opportunity to celebrate one another and get to know each others’ blogs, and the blogs we each highlighted.
and katy, you are a doll for taking the time each week and putting so much heart into fbff. i look forward to the posts every single week and my readers love checking them out!
xoxo
b
Thanks Wiley! I was impressed with your list because you did manage to name a ton of bloggers who weren’t named on every list. That was what I foresaw these awards looking like. A bunch of crazy eclectic mixes of a bloggers personal favorites regardless of popularity or media play.
Katy
PS We missed seeing you on Saturday night!
I’m sad that the FBFF awards were canceled, and I do understand the intentions behind the cancellation. I think the nominations were great and it was a good way to recognize everyone’s favorite blogs. Of course we were going to see the big-name bloggers over and over again, because, yes, they have thousands of followers because people love their blogs, and not many of the small time bloggers because they just haven’t been discovered yet. Isn’t that how all awards are run though? You can’t please everyone and recognize every single blogger out there. I think it’s sad that people felt the awards were hurting peoples feelings, because it made my day when someone nominated me.
Anyway, maybe in the future, you can just leave it at that, to recognize your favorite bloggers. I think the tallying up and voting on the top three would have been too much of a popularity contest, but just the act of nominating others I thought was good!
kimmie recently posted..Mrs Levi
Interesting thought… maybe we can just do an occasional post on recognizing our current favorites. That way there would be no tallying, we are just giving kudos where kudos are due. I like it.
Hey Katy,
Sundays are my no computer day, so I had no idea about the cancellation of the awards or all of the twitter debate leading up to it. I was excited about the award because it was my first ff. I have only been blogging for about 6 months and I struggled with the nominations because as I am new at blogging, I am also new at blog reading and felt like maybe I didnt know enough blogs to nominate for each category and I also nominated a lot of ‘bigger blogs’ as really they ARE the most helpful, the most fashionable, the leader’s of the pack etc… I did at the time think that perhaps nominating the bigger blogs was a bit unfair to the smaller ones, but, like i said, these blogs really did fit the bill!
I think they way Vahni has mentioned, in that she personally gave a mention to some of her favorites is the way to go. If we had all been asked to just name our favorite blogger for each category and there wasn’t an accompanying award, it would have been just a fun way for the FF group to just go around seeing who got named and maybe finding some new blogs to read and enjoy. Each to their own, no harm done, just bloggers naming some of their favorite reads, cause lets face it, we ALL have our favorite reads!
Either way, thanks for doing this and I look forward to participating next week!
Jessica, you and Kimmie had the same idea and I like that. We can just on occasion name some of our current favs or new finds. That would facilitate the community growth and networking without being a popularity contest. Great idea.
Hi Katy,
I just wanted to stop by and say this post is one of the warm fuzziest things I’ve seen on the internet in a while. I liked the FBFF nominations and am excited to look through new blogs as well. But the fact that you have taken such concern for people’s feelings, and are willing to change the plan for something you had promoted, is really showing your integrity & leadership. You’re such a softy at heart. Happy blogging,
Anna
Aww…. thanks! *blushing*
First I wanted to thank you for nominating me for an FBFF award. It meant so much, and I have to say that it meant so much to be nominated by others as well. For that reason as well as the pleasure I derived from clicking through the posts and reading about other blogs — discovering many new favorites — I really enjoyed the FBFF awards, even though it was short-lived.
I agree with all that’s been said above by Collette and Vahni about if other people had issues, they should have just sat it out or voiced their concern weeks ago. The fact that others whine about not being included…that just makes me laugh. Everything about an award, from selection to voting, is completely subjective. There’s no way it can’t be anything but subjective. It’s opinions (gasp!)! It’s frivolous! It’s fun! The fact that others decry it because they feel excluded or have some other issue with it is ridiculous. It’s all for a bit of fun, folks. No harm done.
I stand by your decision to cancel them – although I would’ve loved to see how it would have panned out, and would’ve loved to see some of my favorite (non-mega) blogs get the limelight they deserve, I respect your decision completely. On to the next great topic! Thanks again Katy and keep up the great work.
Kristina | Pretty Shiny Sparkly recently posted..Histrionic
Thanks Kristina and I couldn’t agree more with your last sentence – we can now move on and get on to the next set of FBFF questions and what this group is really all about.
I normally participate in FBFF but my reasons for not this week were simply that I haven’t been blogging long enough in my mind to decide. I felt like I didn’t know enough about bloggers or blogging for that matter to make an informed decision. I’ve never met anyone in person or talked to anyone that much since I’m so new. I looked at some of the other blogs who had nominations and I thought there was quite a good variety. I obviously didn’t agree with some of the blogs that were chosen for certain categories but the whole point was to allow for differing opinions. I don’t see how anyone’s feelings could be hurt by something as fun and silly as this. I am a brand new blogger and I wasn’t chosen as a newbie in any of the posts I read. My feelings weren’t hurt at all and I actually found some new blogs I had never read before.
Keep up the good work!
Erin
Erin – you have a great attitude and mindset about the whole thing and I am glad to hear that you found a lot of positive aspects in the whole nomination process.
I didn’t participate in the awards, for many of the same reasons that V and La Historiadora de Moda have given, so I won’t repeat what they’ve already said so well, but I just wanted to say that I hope this hasn’t caused you any stress or unhappiness, Katy: while I felt the awards weren’t for me personally, it was clear to me that they were well-intentioned, and that you were trying to do something positive for us all with it, so I just made a mental note to pick up with FBFF the next week, and forgot about it. I really admire you for posting so honestly about this, too: thanks for working so hard to build this community
Thanks Amber. I’m glad you opted not to participate because it didn’t work for you and that you see the awards as the positive thing they were meant to be. Now I just need to come up with questions for this Friday.
I am bit slow to catch on apparently. I didn’t know they were actually nominations for “awards” I thought people were just doing shout outs to blogs they like. I saw my name once or twice and thought hey cool thanks! I think I might have had a different reaction knowing I was being nominated for something because I don’t like being judged and ranked, we get that enough in life we don’t need to volunteer to be ranked even more. I have been at this a long time. (9 years) and it does bother me when things like this happen and it is the same few bloggers over and over which I certainly did see and honestly I just skipped over and didn’t even read them.
hillary recently posted..22811
Hillary – the initial idea was that it would end up more like a positive shout-out to blogs that are not super mainstream. But you are right, the same few were named multiple times and I too skimmed through those posts, only stopping at the blog names I didn’t recognize. If this topic were to be re-visited it would need to be more focused on the kudos for a good job than trying to pick bloggers to eventually pit against each other.
Hey Katy
Sorry all this brouhaha was stirred by the awards.
Personally, I didn’t participate because I didn’t want to single out some and not others.
I think the idea behind the awards was super, find new blogs that you might not have known about.
Unfortunately the blogs I came across that did participate named the same “big” blogs that most people already know about.
Anyway, just wanted to let you know there were no hard feelings here and I opted out for my own personal reasons, not because I thought anything “bad” about the concept.
Brett
Thanks for all that you do.
Brett
brett recently posted..Final Day Of February!
Brett – thanks for explaining why you opted out and the kind words to me. Good for you for doing what worked best for you and for your blog.
I think you made a wise choice, although I had no problem with the FBFF awards process. In fact, I was honored to be on the nominated list with a deep group of quality bloggers. But we all know that you’ve really created a strong community with FBFF and the last thing anyone wants is a divisive community. So the over-used, but completely apt word of CLASSY comes to mind when I see your response.
Awards are awesome and frustrating. Someone made the point of pitting a high school actor against Natalie Portman and there’s a bit of truth to that. A sharp blogger with a readership of 60 can not compete in a numbers game against a sharp blogger with 2000 followers. For me, my reward was the good fortune of having your people appreciate my blog. I hope I gained a few new peeps in the process.
The one department I was DYING to know the winner was the tribe leader- because even before this award event, I had been thinking how essential YOU and Kendi of Kendi Everyday have been to creating a vast yet tight-knit blogging community. Throw the amazing Jennine of IFB and the Coveted, and Sally from Already Pretty and I wanted to see what was going to come of it. But in the end we don’t need a #1. I am so pleased (and overwhelmed) by the plethora of strong leaders, great bloggers and engaging blogs, that I am fine with the cancellation, as long as its acknowledged that the spirit of the event was 100% positive. Because it was.
A quick thank-you for all the extra effort that you do in your creation and organization of FBFF. The quality of content from the particiapants is stellar and it has done much to increase interesting content in the blogosphere, as well as creating a powerful and vocal blogging community.
Bella Q recently posted..eBabe
Bella – Thank You! This is a superbly written comment and very much a welcome read for me. You explained things perfectly – being able to see both sides and also understanding the reasons behind all of this. Thanks for your support. And hopefully you did gain some new readers as a result.
Hi Katy, first of all I respect your decision, I don’ t like it, but it’s fine.
The FBFF group as a team, and every team needs a leader, no matter how good the cooperation and interaction i between the members. That leader is you, and I totally respect the fact that you want to cancel the Awards. You are a classy lady!
Second, I didn’t stumble myself upon any destructive criticism about the Awards….and I never even thought that there would be any!
My blog is the reflection of me, right? So everything I post there is filtered through me…the texts express my opinions, the pictures are seen and taken through me eye….the links are about things I love or think are worth reading about. So were the Awards, well, the nominations for them!
Of course I know so many fashion bloggers, but choosing one for each category was not hard! It took me two hours to put my post together on Friday! I wanted my readers to check out new and interesting blogs that rock my socks!
I chose the ones that I love the most and came into mind right away! There were some bloggers with thousands of followers, and there were bloggers with 100-200…and that’s the point! I chose the ones I think fit best the category FOR ME. I can really not understand how people felt hurt during this process…it’s a shame we won’t go through with the Awards…I hope that maybe we can find a solution that pleases the majority of the bloggers (you can’t please them all…..)
Kathrine recently posted..Better late than never 20 & 21 – 30
Kathrine – I too, picked blogs that had thousands of followers and only a hundred. It wasn’t about reader numbers it was about what I thought of first when I thought of the category. Many bloggers did that. But I can totally understand the let-down this can be for some of the FBFF participants who work so hard at what they do, have an amazing product and perhaps didn’t get the recognition they deserved because we were limiting the nominations to one per category.
I’m still mulling over alternatives to do with the list of nominees. We’ll see what comes of that.
Sorry about the typos!
Kathrine recently posted..Better late than never 20 & 21 – 30
Hi Katy,
I feel like I’m going to voice an unpopular opinion here by admitting that I was one of those people who did feel a little sad once I saw the posts this past Friday. I’m a little scared to post this comment as I don’t want people to come down on me for it, but I feel like I might be able to give some insight into why some people didn’t tell you how they were feeling.
First of all I want to start by saying that I think you did absolutely nothing wrong, nothing at all. Your intentions were very pure and just all about rewarding people, strengthening the community and focusing on everyone, I love that! I love FBFF overall and I think everything that goes on in the group, including the FBFF questions as well as all the communications, is brilliant. Everyone works so well together, helping eachother improve, giving advice and answering questions and it’s just a really great atmosphere.
One thing I did notice for the awards was that it did seem to sort of turn into people nominating the same people over and over again, even though it wasn’t meant to be like that. The blogs that did get nominated a lot are fantastic, I saw that Vahni got nominated a lot for example and she deserves it! Everyone who got nominated did. Even so once I’d read quite a few I did notice that a lot of the people in the catagories were the same and I feel like that might have glossed over what you intended, for us to be able to find out about new blogs and reward everyone. For me seeing the same people all over did make me feel a little put out, not because I don’t feel that they deserve it, but more because it felt a bit like… there are a lot of people who are working really hard and didn’t get any notice, and I suppose I was also a bit sad that I didn’t get mentioned anywhere (narcissistic maybe, but honest). I think people did struggle to just select one or two people and because there are so many of us it’s just natural that a lot of people didn’t get mentioned, the posts would just be massive otherwise! It’s just a part of being a big community, you can’t possibly look at everyone and mention everyone all the time, there’s nothing wrong with that. I place no blame on you or anyone for the way it made me feel and I hope others didn’t either, please know that it’s not your fault that it happened that way.
Now onto why people might not have said anything, this is just my two cents!
1. My main thought is that, to be honest it’s REALLY scary to stand up and say you don’t like the idea of something, or it makes you uneasy, or that the idea upsets you… anything that goes against the grain. There are so many people involved in FBFF and everyone seemed so excited about the awards that I feel like anyone who might have felt differently might just have been too scared to say anything in fear of being attacked and their reputation being damaged, feeling like they ruined it for everyone or things like that. I can honestly say I wouldn’t have been able to go into a post on FBFF and say these things (although I just chose to sit that post out, I wasn’t just sitting on it.), I would have been terrified! It’s completely nonsensical as all the people involved in FBFF are lovely and I’m sure you personally wouldn’t have let anyone be bullied, but it’s just a natural fear and doesn’t go with logic.
I feel like for the same reason people might not have wanted to email you, FBFF is your baby and it’s so great that people might have been scared they would offend or upset you if they said anything about it.
2. People might have just not realised they weren’t the only people feeling that way, that can happen sometimes in the blogosphere no matter how connected we are. As such they might have just not bought it up, feeling they would be the only one and then once again they would seem like the bad guy.
I hope none of this upsets you Katy, I truly and genuinely don’t mean any of this to be hurtful or offensive to you or to anyone who took part in the awards. I think they were a great idea, they just didn’t work out for some of us in the long run.
Juliet recently posted..The Crow Princess
Juliet –
Thanks for your thoughts and explanation. I hope FBFFers would feel they could write me about this, because while FBFF is my brainchild I want it to stay true to what it is. If people felt this was deviating from the purpose and goal, I want them to tell me. And I hope that the community would at least give everyone the benefit of the doubt and listen to what they have to say instead of jumping on them – thankfully we have yet to encounter anything like that.
Thanks for going out a limb and talking about this on here.
Katy
Katy,
Little controversies like this one remind me that blogging is such a funny hobby. It’s both a personal outlet for creative endeavors as well as a social medium for connecting with others. This dual nature brings about many unanticipated complications, and I don’t think any of us will ever have a complete handle on all the (potential) issues that come about through blogging. The FBFF awards were a great idea- I loved the chance to highlight some of my favorite non-mainstream bloggers. I think it was a good way to expose FBFFers to one another and I found so many awesome new blogs through the Awards. I can understand how some might have felt that the awards were unfair, but let’s be honest: blogging isn’t all friendship bracelets and group hugs. We all want to be popular bloggers, and for some it can take longer than others. That’s just how it is. It doesn’t help that most of us are female, and by our nature we are socially competitive creatures. To knock the FBFF awards as superficial or petty- well to those bloggers I would ask why they only include certain blogs on their blogroll. Why not every blog you visit? Because there are a few that you feel warrant special recognition. I respect the decision of those who chose not to participate- nothing is mandatory in the blogosphere- but the implication that the awards would be preferential to certain bloggers seems to contradict the intention that the awards began with. It was a great way to expose the FBFF community to some of its own fabulous blogs.
And by the way, the thing that makes you a great Tribe Leader is your mindfulness of your followers’ feelings- the fact that you were mature enough to consider all the sides of this thing and come to a thoughtful and considerate conclusion speaks volumes about who you are as a person (and blogger).
Tiffany recently posted..worth a thousand words 25-30
err, to clarify: I’m not coming down on anyone for voicing their opinions as to why they didn’t dig the FBFF awards, nor am I implying that people who sat out had the motivations that I described. I’m just responding to one negative view of the awards. No blogger in particular. To each her own.
Tiffany recently posted..worth a thousand words 25-30
Thanks Tiffany for your sweet words about being a good Tribe Leader. And you are right blogging is a funny hobby. It’s part personal obsession and part community interaction. At times that is a very difficult balance. Thanks for giving your opinion on the matter.
Katy, I think you’ve taken the high road well out of an unexpectedly touchy situation, and I commend you for that, and for making transparent your reasons for doing so. I offer my sympathies to those who came away from the nomination process with hurt feelings, and to those who feel let-down about the cancellation of the final voting.
Personally, I sat out of the nomination process. Since reading about the FBFF award topic a few weeks ago, I’d gone from feeling ambivalent about them to somewhat uneasy about them, and ultimately decided not to participate. I didn’t find them offensive, but I did feel there was potential for those who were left out to feel hurt, and they just didn’t feel like the right fit for my blog. While they weren’t for me, I didn’t mind those who were excited about them having fun with it, so I saw no reason to raise any objections – I still don’t, but I did want to explain my reasons for sitting out.
Many fans of the awards above have likened them favorably to high school superlatives, but in my experience, the nature of superlatives is to reward popularity. This doesn’t mean the system is wrong or unfair – for the most part, the ‘big’ blogs got that way because they are great – it just doesn’t make for a very interesting conversation. When reading this week’s FBFF posts, I too skimmed looking for blogs I hadn’t seen before, and was a little disappointed at how similar the lists started to look. This kind of superlative award system just doesn’t lead to the kinds of posts I was looking for.
All that said, I do love the idea of coming up with more ways to spotlight our favorite bloggers, particularly those ‘undiscovered gems’ that we may not all have heard of. Despite strong differences of opinion on the topic of blogger awards, there seems to be a lot of consensus on the fun of finding great new blogs to read, and on how flattering it is to have our hard work recognized by others in this community. (I know my grinchy heart grew three sizes when I saw my little blog nominated in Wily Wiley’s post!) There have been a number of FBFF questions in the past offering the chance to give a shout-out to some bloggers who exemplify a certain topic, and I think prompts like that are a great way to give credit to other awesome bloggers, big and small. You could even take this further and use an FBFF post as an opportunity for a guest post or interview with another blogger, or host a group discussion with blog-buddies on the topic of the week!
the other emily recently posted..pinkerton
Great ideas!! I like what you mentioned there at the end!!
I suspect that I am one of the “complainers”, although this is what I wrote, cut & pasted from Friday’s blog post: “I’ve decided to sit out awards week for Fashion-Beauty-Friend Friday this week. It’s not that I don’t recognize bloggers I think worthy of the awards; it IS that I want to avoid being divisive by giving an award to one and seemingly ignoring another. Hope FBFF-ers will understand.” I EXPLAINED rather than complained. I stated that there were many worthy bloggers!
I did not even read the week’s questions until last Thursday. You were on vacation and unavailable for discussion. Unlike previous weeks when I did not participate, this time I stated WHY.
I am a baby blogger. I’ve been at it for approximately six months. I have worked hard to build my readership. When I thought about naming names, it was my regular readers that I wanted to nominate, but with only ten awards, that would have left out more than 100 other bloggers.
Because I am older and many of my readers are older, it takes a lot of courage to blog about personal style, appearance, etc. in the first place. We know that our middles are thick, our hair is greying, our skin is wrinkling…we are beyond competition. Perhaps, we have a hard-won sense that comparison, which selecting blogs for these awards inevitably involves, serves no purpose.
That said, I highly value the questions you have faithfully generated each week. I look forward most weeks to developing my answers and then reading the variety of responses. This past week, I skipped reading each post that named awards. The success of the same handful of bloggers has the tendency to shrink the possibilities for amazing variety of bloggers who blog and blog without a comment or a visitor. I vote with my comments and the blogs I follow.
I think the reduced number of participants this past week spoke for itself–just 78. The week before 126 of us took part and the week before that 118 of us did. I hope that I can remain as a member in good standing of FBFF. I value the community I have found there, in spite of the reputation I may be developing. I appreciate your considerate response to these concerns.
Terri recently posted..What do Women Want
Terri – I don’t want you to think I labeled you or considered you a complainer. Not at all. I am grateful that you voiced your opinion even if it would appear contrary. If it were not for you and a couple other bloggers who had the strength to write about the issue I would be totally oblivious to hurt feelings. The way you explained your sitting out was well written and completely thoughtful. I completely understand and respect your reasons for sitting the awards out and love the fact that you didn’t post them because they wouldn’t work with the feel and focus on your blog. Kudos to you.
I’m also glad to hear that you value FBFF and the weekly questions. And there is no reputation that you are gaining. FBFF is all about the friendly discussion and we do not all have to agree with each other in order to have a conversation. You, of course, are still a member in good standing and I hope that none of the other FBFF members or myself have made you feel otherwise.
Katy,
First, thank you for the heart you put into FBFF. I am sure most of us don’t have a clue how much of your time, energy and HEART go into this week to week.
Secondly, I am going to have to agree with Kristina on this, and the others who said people should have voiced this weeks ago. I know it’s difficult to “go against the grain”and possibly feel like the odd one out and all, but if you feel that strongly about something, you should be willing to be the “odd one out” and stand up for what you believe is right from the start. On top of that, I think if someone isn’t looking to get something out of it, their feelings aren’t likely to be hurt. I don’t know, I think it’s sad they had to be cancelled, but I respect your decision, and I have to agree with everyone who said you handled this with CLASS. You certainly did! Bravo!!
The only difficulty I had was that there were several bloggers in certain categories, that I wanted to recognize, and I could only choose one.
I think great things came from this for every0ne! My lowly little blog gained significantly more readership, and a few more followers, so I can only imagine how this boosted readership for others. Also, I was SO EXCITED to do that post even though it took so long. I find it simply delightful to recognize others’ hard work publicly. I really do… it simply feels good!
Props to you, lady!
I too wish this was brought to my attention earlier as so much of this could have been avoided, but I do understand that it would be hard to voice your thoughts in a forum that seemed to be full of bloggers backing the idea. I’m glad it was beneficial to you and to your blog growth.
I’m so sorry things didn’t work out with the awards, but I certainly understand why you felt the need to cancel them. It’s a shame, as has been said, that people couldn’t simply pass on posting if they weren’t interested. For me, the nomination part was terrific fun because I just really enjoyed recognizing blogs for each category and those I singled out were genuinely appreciative. Some even said they were going to check out the other blogs I spotlighted, so it was just a successful way to spread the love for some of my favorite bloggers. So in all it was a great experience and I’m glad you went with the idea to begin with!
I found it to be a lot of fun to compose and read through as well. Glad you enjoyed the experience and I’ll try to think of something similar in the months ahead.
Hi Katy –
I am a newbie blogger (8 months new), just getting a following and had no expectations whatsoever about my own blog, let alone these awards, so I am very sad to see them not come to fruition. However, I do respect your decision because it’s yours to make for whatever reasons you see fit. You have a great group with FBFF and I loved reading the posts in some of my favorite blogs so much I decided to join the group. I thought this was a great “initiation” into this blogging group and was very happy to participate.
I actually chose blogs that participated in the most recent FBFFs and went through a lot blogs that I had never checked out before to make some of my decisions. Others, I simply chose from ones that I follow. If those happened to be the “big blogs”, then for me, there was a reason that they are “big”, right?
Either way, I’m sorry that the awards were canceled, but I do understand. If it causes more strife than delight, then maybe it is best to stop now rather than face the backlash when the winners are announced.
Cheers Katy, looking forward to many more FBFFs to come!
xoxo
Cyrillynn recently posted..Happy Birthday to Our Beautiful Little Boy!
Great that you picked FBFF members and sorry that I decided to cancel the awards. The posts were great to read through and I totally found some great ones to follow as a result.
all i have to say is thank you for the FBFF awards. i’m a new blogger and not only did i gain encouragement but i discovered at least twenty new blogs i instantly fell in love with. so thank you
and i hope you have a lovely week!
xoxo
aaez
ashley recently posted..23- 24- 25 down 5 to go
Hi Katy, I didn’t participate because these sorts of things aren’t really my thing. I get those chain letter awards things every so often coming round and I find them hard enough to deal with. But this should not be a reflection whatsoever on you or your reasons for running them. Just wasn’t right for me.
I felt that that for the same reasons as La Historia de Moda and Terri that it just didn’t feel appropriate for my blog. I have a small and cherished readership where I already provide support and recieve support through the normal blogging channels of commenting, following and mentioning others in posts which is plenty enough for me. Like Terri I felt like doing something like this felt potentially and unecessarily divisive. I also know that several of the bloggers I regularly interact with find the popularity contest aspect of fashion blogging quite tiresome – it felt wrong to shove a list of award nominees in their faces. I blog for a hobby and as La Historia de Moda has said there is enough competition in every other facet of life to make awards ceremonies and the like for something I do for pleasure and to escape the pressures of my off line life feel like a bit of an invasion.
Having said that I didn’t post about my reasons nor actually did I feel particularly strongly about them that I would have complained about it to you to stop the awards going ahead and I’m sorry to hear that people made you feel bad about running them. If I don’t feel comfortable or that I can contribute meaningfully to a particular Friend Friday I just sit the Friday out and this was just one of those. Just because I wasn’t going to participate didn’t mean I didn’t want other people to participate or enjoy the awards. Each to their own I say. I don’t want to feel bad about making a decision that was right for me because I do enjoy the Friend Friday posts and I recognise that you always put a lot of hard work into FBFF and I know that your intentions running these awards were only the very best.
Veshoevius recently posted..London Fashion Week- Mawi
I appreciate and actually love the fact that so many of the FBFFers felt this did not fit with their blogs and therefore didn’t write on it. It’s amazing that everyone can identify what belongs so perfectly on their own blogs and what does not.
Katy, i sure hope i have your guts when i’m faced with making an unpopular choice in order to stand by my principles. To me it’s obvious that the easy thing to do would’ve been to let the awards go forward – so many people had put in time and effort. And the people who had different feelings….well, those are just feelings, right? and why didn’t they say anything before things got rolling?
But you were at the hub of things and saw that this topic wasn’t bringing people together. You stood up for your principles – FBFF is about building community, that has been your clearly stated goal from the start. You have the wisdom to see that people’s feelings are key to making a group work. So you took the hard road and got FBFF back on track.
re: curiosity about the results – anyone can search out the posts and tally them up for themselves. the time and effort it takes you to do this will give you an idea of Katy’s commitment to FBFF’s ideals. Katy, i’m filing this away for inspiration the next time i’m tempted to take the easy way out – in admiration, steph
tiny junco recently posted..The Dudeette Abides
Aww… thanks. It was a difficult decision to make, but I’m glad in the end that I did and that it is all behind us now, with the ability to move on.
In the end I think the intention still achieved something great: there was a flurry of people checking out new blogs they had never heard of and some new blogger connections were made. I can hear both sides of the argument–frankly, who couldn’t with all the lovely, articulate bloggers out there?–and support your decision. Power to you and know that from this small part of your community you only are showered with admiration and appreciation.
(S) recently posted..S So Close I Can Taste It
Thanks! The responses have really been very positive overall.
Wow! Lots of good comments. I unfortunately don’t have the time to read through all of them but I will say that I agree with the first handful of thoughts. I thought the awards were well-meaning, bringing exposure to blogs I had not heard of. I’m a big believer in that the choice to support and participate in any activity is mine, if I don’t sanction it then I can exclude myself from that activity. I’m sad that it was cancelled but feel that you did what was right for you and your intention in fostering this community.
My thoughts in participating was that although there would be no way for me to know exactly which blog or blogger was the absolute end-all be-all best but I could nominate one of several who I thought did it well based on my exposure at the moment. If it draws others to those blogs then that’s a win. I’m sorry people felt hurt or thought it was not an inclusive event. You’re never going to be able to please everyone, Katy, the only thing you can do is what you feel is right in your heart. I support your decision completely.
Fabienne Jach recently posted..Project ReStyle
I feel similarly to V, LaHdeModa, and Ashley.
I definitely did not want to leave anyone out and I just didn’t participate because of that reason. There were too many for me to do a whole post devoted to it (plus, I was late doing my friday post anyhow).
Katy- I think you do a great job with FBFF and I applaud you for how you have responded to this with grace.
andie recently posted..Lazy Weekend Wear
Thanks Andie. The support from the FBFF members has been wonderful.
Hi again Katy, I have now read every post and your every answer, and I really want to give you a big hug. Thank your for being so wise, generous, and honest. I always believe there are lessons we can learn from what we experience, and this whole experience has really highlighted what a diverse group we all are. The one thing that we all have in common though, is that we CARE. Isn`t that a beautiful thing?
xx Anika
this would have been so fun but because i was nominated by someone, haha
I can see both sides though and understand why it was canceled – it just wouldn’t be fun with negative feelings going around, that is for sure. i didn’t really see anything wrong with it though – and i have voted for and supported many bloggers in similar contests!
I think you’re pretty awesome Katy. I definitely admire your leadership skills. I don’t think I would have been so politically correct about it.
Either way we love #FBFF and we love you!
Smooches,
Ty
http://GorgeousInGrey.com
Ty/GorgeousInGrey.com recently posted..THE TREND- MENS VINTAGE BROWNS
I’ve told you several times that I though you did a great job! I think giving people who wanted it a platform to say who they liked was a great idea. Maybe people were just uncomfortable with having a final vote? I didn’t know that up front, so I just looked at it as an opportunity to point out bloggers I really love.
I hope your feelings didn’t get hurt in the process. I admire and respect all the hard work you do for FBFF.
Courtney recently posted..A Girl’s Guide to Quick Natural Makeup
Hi Katy, I am sad the awards were cancelled and I don’t think I even got one vote. I saw nothing wrong in what you did, but I can understand why you have cancelled them. I just think that if people did not want to participate then they didn’t have to the same as every week. The awards brought to light lots of new bloggers like you said and may help a few of them gain a bigger readership, how can that ever be a bad thing. I too am fed up of all the super-bloggers being the only ones to ever get coverage on a few sites and thought this idea was great for highlighting the high work of us little bloggers. In my choices I mentioned some much lesser know blogs that I personally thought deserved to be recognised, and it didn’t matter to me if they won or not as long as I showed my appreciation for them. Awards ceremonies are the same any were in life, the popular and more well known get the awards and the little fish lose out, the only difference here is the little fish got to the nominating so there was more chance of the little fish winning, pity.
I can understand all of the POV’s represented here. While I did nominate last Friday, I also started what I think may be a regular feature on my blog “Awesome Little Blogs You’re Not Reading (yet!)” where I link up some blogs with less than 100 followers. Sometimes blogging really hinges on a “big break” like getting linked by one of the larger blogs. I am not a “big blog” by any means but I hope that some of the blogs I mention can get an increase in readership from my links!
Andrea recently posted..Awesome Little Blogs You Arent Reading yet!
I’m really sorry to hear that there will no longer be FBFF awards. I can understand that throughout the process some people may have been singled out and that not everyone’s vote was genuine. It’s unfortunate because I thought that it would create a blogger community with a positive undertone. Anyways, I hope that eventually we will be able to celebrate one another through awards from a genuine place. Kudos, to you Katy for your valiant efforts.
So honored to be a part of FBFF. Excited for what we’re going to stir up
Mattie recently posted..SSDD- Lanvin Spring 2011 Harness & Brooch
Katy, I understand why you made your decision but I’m honestly super disappointed that they were cancelled! If I were you, I wouldn’t worry about the haters and continue with the awards, but that’s just me. I was excited to see who would win, whether or not it was me or anyone I knew. The most tragic part about this is that I don’t have time to go through all of the entries that include the nominees and I would’ve loved to be exposed to lots of new blogs, as you were. I think awards of any kind are a fun way to bring people together and I wholeheartedly believe that bloggers were brought up during this process, not cut down! Not to be insensitive, but I think the people who complained about the contest were probably just upset that they weren’t nominated and really, just need to grow up. It’s all in good fun!
Honestly, you can’t please everybody, so do what YOU think is right! Thank you for all the hard work you put into hosting this!!!
THE-LOUDMOUTH recently posted..If Im flying solo- at least Im flying free
hi katy!
i can completely understand your reasoning and i hope everyone else does too. though your intentions were pure and kind, i can see why you may have changed your mind about it. i hope no one is giving you crap for this! the very nature of awards requires the singling of people out. as much as people try and want to include everyone, it’s impossible. at the end of it all, decisions must be made. some people will get cut and it is unfortunate because maybe they don’t really deserve that.
but i think what counts more than awards is community interaction and the beauty of that. we all benefit from it and no one need feel excluded. =)
hugs to you! you are amazing and your dedication to community is inspiring.
Kristy Eléna – Full Time Fabulous
Vogue Gone Rogue
Twitter: @kristyelena
kristy recently posted..katy perry concert – vogue eyewear event
Thanks Kristy! You’re too sweet. And no worries, no one is giving me a hard time. Everyone has been really wonderful about the whole situation. They were just honest about their thoughts on the awards.
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