IN ASSOCIATION WITH

 About Us 

Twenty Major wins big at blog awards
03-03-2008
by Emmet Ryan

After taking his third straight Best Overall Blog title in a row at the Irish Blog Awards on Saturday night Twenty Major is set to step back from competition for a year.

The blogger, who also picked up the gong for Most Humourous Blog Post, announced in his blog that he will not enter the Best Overall Blog category in 2009. He will be joined by fellow three-in-a-row winner Sinead Gleeson. Her blog, entitled The Sigla Blog, won the Arts and Culture category for the third year in succession and Gleeson has indicated that she too will remove herself from contention in 2009.

Around 400 people attended the event, which is now in its third year, which took place in the Alexander Hotel in Dublin. Damien Mulley, organiser of the Irish Blog Awards, told ENN that one of the highlights of the night was in the category for Best Personal Blog.

"The nice surprise was the decision to give the Best Personal Blog award to joint winners. It was great to see a grandmother and a grandfather share the award," he said. The category was jointly won by the blogs Grannymar and Head Rambles. Mulley said the success of these blogs showed that the Irish blogging community was becoming more diverse.

The award for Best Irish Technology Blog went to Robin Blandford. As he was out of the country Blandford's mother Steph, who herself was nominated for Best Personal Blog, collected the award and gave an acceptance speech on his behalf. Other notable winners included Murphy's Ice Cream; their Ice Cream Ireland blog retained the title of Best Business Blog for the second year in a row.

Rick O'Shea, the event's MC, was given a bit of a surprise when he picked up the first award presented on the night for Best Pop Culture Blog. "He was a speechless for a few minutes afterwards," said Mulley. A full list of all the winners on the night is available here.

Following on from the success of the Irish Blog Awards, Mulley said he intends to hold a second awards ceremony in October called the Irish Web Awards achievements in websites and multimedia. ENN will have further details on this competition as they become available.