'The Week' to Present Opinion
Daniel Radosh'The Week' to Present Opinion Awards. Considering that this Editor & Publisher story had to have been written from a press release, it gets a lot of stuff wrong -- but fortunately in a way that exaggerates my importance.
The 2004 award season will kick off next Wednesday at the New York City apartment of Harold Evans, who will host the first annual The Week magazine Opinion Awards, at a noontime luncheon. Evans has hosted several The Week panels during the past year but this time he is opening his home to an event.
And I'm invited, for reasons that will be clear below. Anyone know where I can buy a suit?
Winners will remain secret until then. The four categories are Columnist, Single-Issue Advocacy Columnist, Blogger of the Year and Local Columnist.... In the blog category, a panel of experts -- Jeff Jarvis, Daniel Radosh and Glenn Reynolds -- screened candidates and presented them to the judges, who included Harold Evans, Robert Caro, Susan Cheever, Edward J. Rollins, Mario Cuomo, James F. Hoge, Jr., Lauren Hutton, Walter Isaacson and Alex S. Jones.
While it sounds like I got to chat up Lauren Hutton, this bit of misinformation completely obscures the point. In fact, it was all the other categories that were presented to the judges -- by editors at The Week not including me. The rowdy blogs were made to sit at the kid's table, with Glenn, Jeff and me nominating candidates and selecting the winner entirely without adult supervision.
Who won? Tell you in a week, but know that because this was for The Week, our emphasis was on news and opinion blogs and our chief criteria were contributions to the national debate, influence in the real world, and effective use of the medium. Not most goofy patois.