...hopefully.

For those of you who participated in last years award can attest, I'm doing things a little different this year. This year I've added judges.

Why, you ask? In order to give the smaller sites a chance. Popularity was a factor in several categories during the nomination process last year. Although I had no problem with that in the introductory year, I thought it best to allow quality to play a larger factor during the nomination period this year.

Which is why I had asked several people to give up the chance of their site winning an award this year, and volunteer to review every site nominated in every category. The hope is that amongst the five judges, we can acheive a level of consensus about the best of the best. I'll explain the process in a moment. But first, let me introduce the judges.

We have:

• Paul:Kiplog. He's the "Keeper of the Food Blog list"®.
• Owen:Tomatilla. He Published a book of the best food blog writing of 2004 called Digital Dish.
• Derrick:An Obsession with Food. Derrick has written in The Art of Eating and is one of the several food blog pioneers.
• Megan:I Heart Bacon. She's a Web Designer, a voracious food blog reader, and runs possibly the best named blog out there.
• li'l ol' me: Accidental Hedonist. I run the site you're currently reading.

These are the judges, and please vist their sites when you have a moment. All of them are working hard to make this a great and fair event for everyone participating.

To see what the judges are tasked with, click below the jump.

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During the time of open nominations, the judges will keep a running tally of their 5 favorite blogs nominated in each category. After the nominations have closed, they will submit each category lists to me with each category having their 5 choices.

I will then compile the lists into one huge e-mail with all the choices combined. Each Category may have up to 25 different pre-nominations.

The Judges will then rank the sites in each category from 1 (their favorite) through (at most) 25 (least favorite). They will then return these lists to me.

I will then run their rankings through the handy Xcl proper ranking generator, and arrive at the top five nominations for each category. Any ties that occur on the border ranksing (4-7) will be discussed and ranked again.

Then Tara and I will post the top five nominees in each category in a poll format, thus returning to the public for voting. At that point all hell will break loose and our databases will have to be watched carefully.

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I have also created 3 jurors awards that the judges can nominate people or sites that may or may not be included in the initial nomination process.

These awards are -

Juror's award - Best Photo
Juror's award - Best post
Juror's award - Best Site.

Instead of the people nominating for these categories, the judges will.

Each judge will provide three nominees, and then judging will proceed in a similar fashion as above, with the exception that there will be no list of five nominees provided to the public. The #1 ranked person or site will win each award with no influence by readers of the Food Blog Awards.

The purpose of the Juror's award is to give the judges a chance to have a bit of a say, as well as give some press and kudos to sites and people that others may have overlooked.

I hope this explains the rules and expectations a little better. I realize that no process is perfect and that some people will feel left out, regardless of how these awards operate. My apologies for that, because that is certainly not my intent.

But other than that, All I can say is visit as many of the nominees that are being listed in the comments of the categories, because there are many excellant food blogs out there.

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