In the Post announcing the 2003 Koufax Awards, I wrote:
Those are the eleven categories. If there is another one that you think should be added (or retained, a couple have been dropped from last year) please let us know and perhaps we will add one.
The purposes of the awards include 1) having fun hosting them, 2) you having fun participating in them, 3) providing the opportunity for lots of people to say lots of nice things about lots of other people, 4) recognizing people who, without compensation, have amused us, informed us or made us think and 5) helping build a feeling of community on the left.
All of those purposes seem to be promoted by adding some additional categories. This post will identify the new categories.
That said, it is not feasible to add twenty or more new categories. Mary Beth and I already have more than 250 comments, an uncounted number of emails and eleven categories to manage. If twenty more categories are added, we will not be announcing the winners until July. I would like to limit the number of additional categories to four. That will allow the recognition of some additional people without expanding the awards to unmanageable proportions.
After reviewing the comments and emails, and considering what I think is best, I have decided on the following four categories:
Best Commentor
One consistent suggestion has been that the contributions of those who post on the comment boards of other people’s blogs should be recognized. Last year the Awards included a Best Commentor category won by Digby, now of Hullabaloo. I removed that category this year because it is very had to locate and link to the commentors.
Nonetheless, the community wants the category of Best Commentor and it is hereby added. When making nominations, please let us know where the nominee posts. If you are nominated for “Best Commentor” please send a link to a comment or two you would like to see recognized.
Best Right Of Center Blog
Many comments suggested an award for our favorite conservatives. As Jeanne put it:
How about "Best conservative blog"? There are so many bad ones, I'd like to show a little appreciation to the rare few who demonstrate some style and grace in the ways they disagree with us.
Most Underappreciated Blog
Many comments suggested an award for people who do not normally receive a lot of recognition. One suggestion was for the best blog with less than a certain amount of traffic. Others made different suggestions trying to design an award for which Atrios, Kos, Hesiod, CalPundit and the other heavyweights would not be eligible.
One purpose of the awards is to show appreciation for those who have done good work in the last year. Thus, I decided to to make the award for the “Most Underappreciated Blog.” My nominee is Ross of The Bloviator from whom I learn more things of greater importance than almost any other blogger. Please leave a comment or send an email with your nomination.
Best Expert Blog
The fourth and final additional category was inspired by the comment of DavidNYC who runs The Swing State Project. David writes:
I want to suggest a new category: Best Specialist (or Specialty) Blog. This would be for someone who has a particular specialization (whether advanced degree, high-level job, or even auto-didact) and blogs primarily on that topic. This would be different from single-issue blog. Maybe another way to put it would be "Best Expert Blog". (For example, my blog, the currently on-hiatus Swing State Project, might be single issue, but it sure ain't expert.) My nominations for this category would be Prof. Juan Cole and Prof. Jack Balkin.
I think that is a great idea. Please provide us with your choices for Best Expert Blog.
Those are the new categories. We now have a total of fifteen categories. I will begin posting links to the nominees shortly. Please keep the nominations coming in.
Dwight,
I'm absolutely gobsmacked. Thank you so much for your nomination.
For Best Right of Center Blog: FuturePundit/Parapundit
Most Underappreciated Blog: tough category for me, as I almost feel obligated to give it to someone who has as few hits/day as I do or less (no small feat). I think he gets more daily hits than I do, but I really enjoy Chad Orzel's blog SteelyPips.
Posted by: Ross at December 13, 2003 01:25 PMBest Expert Blog goes to Trish Wilson for her commentary on father's rights groups andcorresponding women's issues. I know she has been published for her work and has been asked to testify in court for her expertise. If you are uninformed about what lengths father's rights groups will go to, she is the go-to woman.
Posted by: Lauren at December 13, 2003 05:07 PMBest Commentator: I find Kos, Cal Pundit et al's comments overwhelming. The comments section at DB's Medical Rants has the most active comments in the health blogs. Of the commentators at MedRants I nominate Stef for her comments in many sections including here
Best Specialty: Derek Lowe's In the Pipeline has real deep understanding of the pharma industry both in R&D and in the real world of health care.
AND
Tim Oren's Due Diligence, a sensible rational right-wing venture capitalist who REALLY understands technology and hates the RIAA!
Best Right of Center: VodkaPundit - Chill Before Serving
Most underappreciated and ignored by the mainstream to Democracy's detriment: Greg Palast
Posted by: Matthew Holt at December 13, 2003 05:41 PMbest expert blog: Brad DeLong
just because I haven't seen it nominated yet, most underappreciated: Road to Surfdom
Posted by: julia at December 13, 2003 08:22 PMBest Right of Center Blog: http://justoneminute.typepad.com/
Most Underappreciated Blog: http://www.seewhy.blogspot.com, of course.
Best Expert Blog: http://j-bradford-delong.net/movabletype (and if we're allowed two nominations, http://www.juancole.com)
Dan Drezner should definitely be in the best right of center contest.
AB
Cool that you adopted my suggestion, Dwight! I forgot about Prof. DeLong, definitely a worthy nomination for that category. And I'd almost nominate Billmon for this one (for his economic blogging), but I've nominated him for so many categories already, I think he'll be alright.
Best Commenter: Chris Bowers at DKos. (It's actually easy to link to DKos commenters because they all have user profiles.) Chris's diary series, the Empirical Cattle Call, is very cool.
Not to nitpick, but I think that in practice yer expert blog category is just going to be a more inclusive version of yer single issue blog category. Anyway, you got yer Delong, yer Maxspeak, yer d-squared, and yer Juan Cole, all of which (whom) are pretty obvious I guess.
I also have 1 nominee for best commentor: Jesurgislac, who can be seen fighting the good fight at Tacitus on any day.
1 more for best commentor: Baal Shem Ra, who says very smart things at Matt Yglesias.
Posted by: David at December 14, 2003 03:03 AMUnderappreciated (I prefer TDWR - Talent Deserving of Wider Recognition" like in Downbeat Magazine): Monkey Media Report
And I'd also give Monkey Media Report best design. OK. Finished.
Posted by: David at December 14, 2003 03:40 AMBest Expert Blog: Brad DeLong
Posted by: Kristjan Wager at December 14, 2003 08:27 AMMost underappreciated: Prometheus 6, hands down.
Best expert blog: MaxSpeak.
Posted by: Luis at December 14, 2003 11:55 AMA wonderful activity on a snowy day:
Best Blog: Daily Kos
Best Writing: Daily Kos
Best Post: The Rittenhouse Review
Best Single Issue Blog: Nathan Newman
Best Humorous Blog: Bartcop
Most Humorous Post: Bartcop
Best Design: Bartcop
Best Special Effects: Bartcop
Posted by: Sarah Reyes at December 14, 2003 12:50 PMOoops-- I said Derek Lowe's In The Pipeline should be "Best Specialist" in my comment above. I meant of course "BEST EXPERT"
Posted by: Matthew Holt at December 14, 2003 04:28 PMMost underappreciated:
Blogonaut
http://marcbrazeau.blogspot.com/
And since you encourage us to nominate ourselves, what the heck,
http://www.theartofpeace.blogspot.com/
I'll renew my nomination of Conrad Barwa and Danny Pinkus for Best Commenters - the best-kept secrets in the blogosphere, and they're mine, mine, mine! This thread is an example of what happens when they're on form.
As for Most Underappreciated Blog, I'll be a blatant whore for attention and nominate myself.
Best right of center - Light of Reason, Arthur Silber
Posted by: Tim at December 15, 2003 12:24 PMUnderappreciated: xymphora, Jerome Doolittle's Badattitudes
Posted by: skimble at December 15, 2003 01:41 PMI would second Just One Minute for best right of center blog, and would add John Isbell (seen at pandagon among other places) as best commentor.
Posted by: Sadly, No! at December 15, 2003 02:23 PMSince Road to Surfdom is apparently nominated a number of times for best blog and my thesis is completely wrong, I think I'm in safe company nominating Roy Edroso instead and no-one will bring up Torricelli.
Posted by: julia at December 15, 2003 03:01 PMDrysdale award for best righty blog: Volokh Conspiracy
Posted by: NohoMissives at December 15, 2003 03:30 PMCan I make another suggestion for a new category? From a cursory look, most of our progressive blogs have a pretty heavy domestic U.S. focus. I'd like to see a "Best International Blog" that either originated outside of the U.S. or whose focus was international affairs.
You didn't think I'd suggest a new category without having a nominee, did you? Mine is Jonathan Edelstein at Head Heeb. Jonathan has the broadest and deepest knowledge of Africa I've ever seen in a blog or anywhere. His posts are incisive and give us a picture of the continent we all know we should know more about, but don't.
Posted by: Richard Silverstein at December 15, 2003 04:04 PMBest Commentor: David Ehrenstein seems to ride herd pretty well in Atrios' comments sections -- no small achievement.
Best Right of Center Blog: Sasha Castel.
Best Expert Blog: Terry Teachout's About Last Night. When he's not on about the arts, he's pretty conservative, so that'd give a nice fairandbalanced vibe to the proceedings.
Best Underappreciated Blog: Little-mentioned but always eminently sane South Knox Bubba, or the indispensible Cursor.
I'd like to add a late nomination in the Single Issue Category for Like Father Like Sun, the scourge of the godawful craploid New York Sun. And hey, did anyone mention the Progressive Politics, Indian Issues, and Autism Advocacy blog... I've forgotten the name.
Two more nominations for best blog: Dohiyi Mir and Road to Surfdom
Dohiyi Mir started in June 2003 so it might qualify for best new blog too.
Posted by: Patrick Taylor at December 16, 2003 12:31 PMNomination for most underappreciated:
Best of the Blogs (www.bestoftheblogs.com)
Posted by: ana in DC at December 16, 2003 02:49 PMUnderappreciated = The "Boy Am I EVER Pissed!" Blog
http://www.geocities.com/vidiotcontact/pissed.htm
I like this blog. It's updated once a week and always has a few things I had missed in the previous news cycle. I appreciate the 'tude.
Posted by: bph at December 16, 2003 06:21 PMBest Commentor - T Chris on Talkleft, though I don't know if he still counts or Steve Plonk on SouthKnoxBubba and ClasslessWarfare/Jay Caruso
Best right-of-center - SayUncle or Jane Galt or Calblog
Best Expert Blog - TalkLeft
Posted by: Manish at December 17, 2003 06:25 AMBest Commentor - T Chris on Talkleft, though I don't know if he still counts or Steve Plonk on SouthKnoxBubba and ClasslessWarfare/Jay Caruso
Best right-of-center - SayUncle or Jane Galt or Calblog
Best Expert Blog - TalkLeft
Posted by: Manish at December 17, 2003 06:25 AMBest Commentor: hands down, John M. Ford; posting at Electrolite, Making Light, and Neil Gaiman's journal.
Use the MT search function on Making Light and Electrolite to get a list of his posts, and you'll see what I mean.
Posted by: Glenn Hauman at December 17, 2003 07:43 AMA second nomination for Best Expert Blog, which I unaccountably forgot before: MaxSpeak
Posted by: Al-Muhajabah at December 17, 2003 03:39 PMYou know, I'm a little bit worried about embarrassing the individuals whom I named as best commentors (as well as others whom I have in mind). I presume that you will email them before posting them as nominees.
Posted by: David at December 17, 2003 06:16 PMAnyway, Donald Johnson is yet another real good commentor (jeeze there's lots of them).
An easy way to find comments is by googling something like posted by donald johnson
Posted by: David at December 17, 2003 06:20 PMBest single post -- The Cogent Provacateur's "Operation Desert Snipe" -- http://cogenteur.blogspot.com/?/2003_04_01_cogenteur_archive.html#200191228
Best Single issue blog -- It's not really a blog, but I like http://www.oreilly-sucks.com
Posted by: pontificator at December 17, 2003 10:45 PMMost Underappreciated Blog: Suburban Guerrilla. Gets things just right for the non-blogging public (such as myself), which, considering the state of things, is what a lot more bloggers should be trying to facilitate.
Posted by: John at December 19, 2003 11:14 PMThere are a lots of great sites, blog campaigns and expert blogs out there. www.network-centricadvocacy.net should be compeditive with lots of left expert sites.
I would like to suggest www.npoblogs.org as a great site pulling together the rss from lots of nonprofit groups.
Posted by: Marty at December 20, 2003 01:30 AMMost under appreciated Blog: Bohemian Mama.
Posted by: Shelly at December 20, 2003 10:25 PM(a) Best commentor is Ikraam Saeed (of Path of the Paddle who comments frequently at Yglesias and Calpundit, among others). His comments are always well considered and well written, and frequently very funny too.
(b) For most unappreciated blog I nominate the The Head Heeb by Jonathan Edelstein. It's worldly and often pretty highbrow stuff, and I enjoy it immensely.
Funniest Post?
http://www.berrysworld.blogspot.com/2003_12_21_berrysworld_archive.html#107230711056185302
I got it from the Smirking Chimp.
Bill Ainsley
War in '04!
Best commenter: CJW , Donald Johnson, selise, cmdicely
Best conservative blog: Just One Minute - yikes, don't have URL to hand. (Tom Maguire)
Most underappreciated: I second others' nomination of Heed Heeb, Jonathan Edelstein