A night at the SA Blog Awards

So, my visit to the SA Blog awards proved to be quite strange, interesting, confusing and thought provoking. I knew I was kidding myself into thinking it wouldn’t run into a booze-up, that being the most frustrating part for me as the smell of alcohol in the air kept me outside on the Balcony for the short stay.

UCT Tennis Club – Good Venue

The Venue was great when I arrived, it’s a really nice place to have a meetup or event with a nice atmosphere, view of the City over the treetops with the mountain behind you.

Greening the blog awards

Having stodels as a sponsor would probably not been been so cool not too long ago, but I found it really great that part of the prizes were actually trees. Not sure how much Carbon emissions those trees would actually offset but it’s the thought that counts I suppose.

Met Some Interesting People

I bumped into a few people some I knew and hadn’t seen for years, some I had only seen online or on twitter, others who are regular show at events of this nature and a few interesting people I met on the night.

Chatting to Shane Dryden of ideate briefly was rather interesting and thought provoking, in fact the conversations I had, generally centred around how self glorifying the whole concepts of blogging and blog awards can be. I thought about this a bit and investigated my own intention for trying to build an online profile as a blogger.

Tim from Quirk was kind enough to bring me a glass of ice and a coke, knowing I don’t drink Alcohol, he’s an all round great guy and does a great job at making people feel at home.

So Why do we do this thing called Blogging?

Why do we blog? An ex colleague from Design School who I bumped into was speaking to me about having a personal blog which just focuses on personal matters, another guest spoke about only having started his blog that very day and wanting to engage with people as a financial planner by advising them through his new blog. I had conversation with Chris from iMod (a winner in one of the categories) a few months ago about the purpose of Blogging,do we do it for money, for fame, to blow our own trumpets? I think we can all agree we do it for different reasons, though we’re all looking to create value for ourselves in a different way.

I watched how a few people who were obviously just there to check if they or someone they supported had won or not scrambled out after their categories winner was announced, was quite funny. I never really expected to feature in my category as I know the other players in Design Blogging offer alot more value than I currently do, so no real disappointments for me other than the madness of the event.

The blogging gang who were at the Blog awards, including myself are definitely living in a world of their own creation, something completely cut off from the rest of society, something most people, including myself a few short months ago, didn’t know a thing about.

So Why do I blog?

I love how blogging has brought me into contact with some of the most interesting, intelligent and strange people I have met to date. I love the conversation created by blogging, but I have realised, like with real world conversation, there are genuines and there are those who fake it for the cameras. You can tell when you meet a genuine face to face, when he/she comments on your site, when you email each other or just say hi, and of course, the fakers.

What I hate about Blogging

Bloggers who love to comment but are never interested in a real human conversation. I Guess blogging is alot like real life, but with it’s own pros, cons and intricacies.

So Why do you blog?