The Spot won CSotY, taking home the Webby for first; David Siegel's Home Page took home the Webby for second. As there were no awards for third, fourth, and fifth place, the rest of the runners-up got to take home...nothing. I will point out that according to Glenn, The Spot was way out in front and the others were close but in order (although he wouldn't say what the order actually was for third, fourth, and fifth). He also asked me not to say how many people voted, so (cracking my knuckles a few times and mumbling to myself) I guess I won't. To make sure the election was on the up-and-up, Glenn had asked people to leave their email addresses for verification. Apparently this caused a little heartburn in potential voters, because when Glenn went back online during the last few days of the election and promised not to use the addresses for evil, the voting picked up considerably. So much so, in fact, that one of the sites moved up and passed another one, leaving us to wonder what the results would have been if Glenn had made his announcement closer to the beginning of the election. Next year, I guess.
Before the ceremony, David Siegel was giving all the other nominees T-shirts with his logo and site address on the back. There were so many people there from The Spot that he handed me a shirt, apparently thinking I was with them. When I reluctantly admitted that I wasn't a Spotster, he snatched the shirt from my hands. Well, I almost had one. Later, he began his acceptance speech by saying, "I didn't think I would come in second." The crowd sat for a moment in stunned silence before he apologetically pointed out that what he meant was that he thought he would be fifth. Everyone laughed. The Spot's acceptance, by comparison, was unremarkable; they pretty much just got up there and did the thank-you thing. Of course, they did bring all their Beautiful People...
Among the "losers" was Mr. Showbiz, represented by Susan Mulcahy, editor-in-chief; this was the only site not from California, so...oh well! Rocktropolis' Nick Turner (a one-man show much like David Siegel as far as site production is concerned) talked a little about the future of the site with fellow loser, Ian Rogers of Crash Site. Nick had the Hollywood look down pat: dark, oval sunglasses, windblown hair frozen in place at just the right moment, and cowboy boots with the proper amount of Southwestern turquoise woven into them. Plus, of course, the oh-so-nonchalant sports-jacket-with-jeans look. Ian wore shorts, a plain-but-appropriate T-shirt, and short hair--your basic, currently in, "up-yours-if-you-don't-like-it" look. The conversation between these two colorful nominees got far enough out there that they started discussing the possibility of combining their two sites. Nick told Ian, "Your site has some gross things on it," to which Ian replied, "Oh, we've found worse. There's a site out there that compares different kinds of feces." (But he didn't say "feces.") The two went off on teaming the sites until they had virtually produced the Feces of the Rock Stars Site (FRSS? Might be a bad idea...), but I don't think it'll happen. Ah...creativity at work. Still, I guess whatever it takes to be first next year...
Glenn proudly announced to anyone who would listen that CSotD is so big that he has to actually warn the winners weeks in advance so the sudden onslaught of curious visitors doesn't instantly crash the winners' servers. In this month's WWWiz, Maximized Online told me that true to his word, Glenn did call them ahead of time with the dire-but-beautiful warning that they had been named CSotD on Valentine's Day this year. However, Maximized was quick to point out that although they did have more visitors than they could handle, their server didn't crash.
Another small note: Glenn said the folks at InfiNet are planning to start a magazine this year. I hope that
doesn't dilute his efforts. CSotD is what it is because Glenn devotes what must be a very large amount of
time to making the picks good. So let someone else do the mag, Glenn. Okay?
Glenn meets WWWiz: "Oh, I like this magazine!"
Incidentally, the room we occupied at the Hollywood Roosevelt was the scene for the very first Academy Awards about 70 years ago. A good omen for the CSotY Awards, I say. And are you surprised that most of the nominees were from California? I'm not! We will spend a little more time with the losers as they are actually all winners. They were nominated, after all. Personally I would have ranked them out to the fifth place. All the chosen sites were wonderful examples of what can be done on the Web with some talent and a lot of hard work. Thanks to Glenn and everyone else involved for promoting the image and the usefulness of the World Wide Web!