The Nigerian Blog Award 2010

June 19, 2010 by Albert Njoku

In my search for good online resources, I stumbled upon this repository of Nigerian blogs: www.nigerianblogawards.com. They have a massive compilation of Nigerian blogs and have been running an award programme for Nigerian bloggers since 2009. Blogs are nominated and voted for by the public. They have already conducted one round of voting in 2009. The 2010 session is still on. If you are looking for a directory of Nigerian blogs and authors, this is the place.

I was surprised to find more than half of the listed blogs are hosted on the Blogger platform. Granted, the cost of running a private hosting may be a bit high (from Nigeria) but any serious blogger should be thinking about independence right from the beginning. The singular most terrifying reason why I dont like using these blog hosting platforms is that you never really own your blog 100%. What about cencorship? These hosting companies are quick to shut down a blog without notice. Anything can be "jeopardising the corporate image" of the host and you will loose your blog archives.

On TV, the other day, a video blogger claimed youtube shut down his account over copyright breach claims. He was not warned before they clamped down on the account. He lost all his previous footages - including the offending one. He was now engaged in a long running process to retrieve his contents.

Back to nigerianblogawards.com. In order to be nominated successfully, blogs have to meet the following criteria:
1.) blog must be by a Nigerian or have a strong focus on Nigeria.
2.) blog must have been updated in the last six months.
3.) blog must be publicly accessible

Nominations are grouped into Group A and B.

Group "A" Blogs: This nomination group is considered the more serious group of awards. Nominations and voting has been concluded for 2010. Results are here

Group "B" Blogs: nominations here focus more on the personality of the bloggers. At the moment, Group B nominations are being accepted. Voting results will be announced on July 12, 2010.