Tonight, the Irish Blog Awards travelled north to Belfast and the Europa Hotel. At the same time as Rev Jesse Jackson was addressing victims and survivors of the troubles up in the twelfth floor suite, bloggers filled the ground floor conference hall.
Rick O’Shea guided the gathered crowd through the umpteen categories, handing out the glass trophies and polystyrene objects. Unfortunately, many of the category winners weren’t in the room to receive their awards.
Cedar Lounge Revolution beat Slugger to the Best Political Blog award.
Dylan Haskins triumphed over shortlisted local Minister of Culture, Arts & Leisure Nelson McCausland to win Best Blog of a Politician.
June Caldwell picked up a very well deserved Best Blog Post award for her piece on depression – Being depressed just means you’re not a moron – dedicating the win to the other writers at the excellent group blog The Anti-Room.
Manuel the Waiter got huge cheers as he picked up the Best Humour Blog award for Well Done Fillet.
Damien Mulley, the driving force behind the six years of awards, explained at the close of the ceremony that this would be the last IBAs he’d be organising.
Alan Meban. Tweets as @alaninbelfast. Blogs about cinema and theatre over at Alan in Belfast. A freelancer who writes about, reports from, live-tweets and live-streams civic, academic and political events and conferences. He delivers social media training/coaching; produces podcasts and radio programmes; is a FactCheckNI director; a member of Ofcom’s Advisory Committee for Northern Ireland; and a member of the Corrymeela Community.