Brian over at Cathartidae posted some comments concerning Flying Chair’s Asia Blog Awards, and I felt that perhaps I should make some of my own. As you can see, I’m no longer at the top of the ranking, nor is it likely - barring an endorsement from God, Instapundit or someone else along those lines - that I will ever see the top of the rankings ever again. The blog that has shot to the top of the rankings is The Greatest Aspirin - it’s not particularly my kind of blog, but it seems pretty cool nevertheless with a comments section the activity of which I can only dream of. Now, Brian objects to the way in which Blue Moon, the administrator of the blog, introduced his participation in the awards. OK, I’ll admit that Blue Moon’s choice of words was perhaps not the best (but then again, a number of expats - including myself - have been guilty of making statements that were not the most culturally sensitive), but truth be told, he was just joking around and there was no offense intended; I’ve left a couple of comments on his blog (for those wanting to see how shitty my written Korean is, here’s your chance) and both Blue Moon and most of his commenters seem to be having a grand old time over there. If there is anything I dislike about the way in which Blue Moon is conducting himself, it’s that he seems to view this whole Asia Blogs Awards thing as one great big game, which is fine with me, but I’m not sure if that’s what Phil had in mind when he came up with this idea. His current quest to knock off the top Japanese blog as the top vote getting blog is probably not the coolest thing, either, but then again, it’s all being done in a relatively light-hearted fashion. In the end, he’s having a good time, which was an underlying principle to this whole thing in the first place, and while I might not necessarily agree with the way in which Blue Moon is going about his business with this, he hasn’t been nasty about it, either, and if he and his readers can get a chance to sample a number of the other blogs in the Asia Blogosphere (just as I have been introduced to his blog through this contest), then it’s all good as far as I am concerned.
I should also point out that if some of the more serious Korean-language blogs (Gatorlog, Hochan.net, etc.) were more involved, this issue wouldn’t be an issue.
UPDATE: Blue Moon responds.
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15 Comments
I guess there should be categories for each language. I was surprised to see that guy on top but given how easy it is to cheat and multi-vote, I don’t know how accurate it is anyway. For example, my vote count shot up 30 votes today, which was unusual. I think someone was trying to catch me up to the new blog leader. Anyway, I’m just glad I got some extra exposure.
Shawn - personally, I don’t think the blogs should be broken down by language. If the blogs are about Korea, they should be grouped together regardless of language. And yeah, the guy was able to get to the top rather quickly, but truth be told, I don’t really think that was because of cheating and multi-voting - his blog’s popular. The only reason I put this post up was because there’s at least one person who feels that the blog in question was using some racist campaigning techniques, and I felt it wasn’t. The best thing about this contest is that it’s given many of us some terrific exposure - I know that has been the case here, and it has to be the case over at your blog, too - and it has introduced us to many a great blog that we were perhaps unfamiliar with before. What I’d hate to see are misunderstandings ruin what has been up to this point nothing but a boon for the Asian blogging community.
Robert,
I stand by my comments. I’ve been following the actions of Korean netizens for a few years now, and I know if there is anything that will get them really fired up, it’s a chance to outshine foreigners. To them… it’s a show of strength and solidarity; it’s a chance to put the stamp of Korea on the world around them.
Part of being a great blog is accessability. I know it’s a tough break if you can’t write in English, but English is the lingua franca of the web. You can have the best frickin blog in the world, but if it’s written in classical Arabic, it’s not going to do anyone outside of an elite few any good.
I think you’re blog is the best because of your ability to cross the language barrier. Your translation work gives your readers access to Korean thoughts that don’t always see the light of day outside of Korea. This is incredibly valuable in my mind, and a big part of why I voted for your blog (of course, credit where credit is due, some other bloggers do the same).
And even if they were being just “playful,” I’d still argue that their votes be ignored on grounds that they weren’t taking the process seriously. But his constant begging and pleading (he put up another “please vote for me” post this afternoon) indicate to me that he is very serious about this.
I agree with Shawn… they should have made seperate categories for different languages.
Once again, a serious survey on something Korean has been ruined by the almighty Korean netizens, Korea’s badwill ambassadors to the online community. JOb well done…
Here’s another Korean-language blog groveling for votes:
http://blog.naver.com/chkfile......0000497086
One of his supporters says he’ll have to use a different computer because he already voted.
I feel very smart right now. I made the call (Korean blog taking the top spot) back in my December 22 post. One problem for the Anglo-phone blogs is that there is only one Korean language blog in the running. If all the Kojang would have stuck together, we could have put one of our on on top.
BTW, There is no hope for the Greatest Aspirin to get the most votes. The top Iraqi blog is going to finish this thing with over 2,000 votes. Right now the top pro-coalition blog (by a dude in Basra) has 1,935 votes and the top anti-coalition blog (by a chick in Baghdad) has 1,843 votes. So, that poll at least has some geo-political aspect to it.
So, I how all my fellow right-wingers go vote for “Iraq THE MODEL”.
BTW2: I happend to start the Iraqi blog category. I nominated “Healing Iraq” but had to do it in the “best non-Asian blog” section because their wasn’t a section for Iraqi blogs. The Iraqi section was made later.
“I don’t think the blogs should be broken down by language. If the blogs are about Korea, they should be grouped together regardless of language.”
Not surprisingly, Blue Tylenol disagrees with you: “??? ?????짹??흹 ??◈??짯??쨍??쑣??쨈 [...]“. Although this guy and others are most obviously Korean, their blogs don’t special bring much to the reader… And a site like Hochan is a rehash of things happening in the English-language blogosphere…
This little “??? ?????짹??흹 ??◈??짯??쨍??쑣??쨈” remark says it all, Robert: we will never belong.
Eh, if I would go for a blog from an actual Korean speaker (even though he posts in English) it would be baekdu.org. But of course I can’t read Korean so this puts my judgement at a disadvantage.
And Yangban certainly did call it (all hail the wise Yangban!
) so that’s a major hat tip to him. I guess you have to expect this sort of raction among a tight-nit population that is the most internet active on earth. I’m surprised more votes haven’t been flying around.
What do most Korean language blogs consist of anyways?
What I drunk. What I ate. What I shat.
Like the girlies blogs in Singapore.
“One of his supporters says he’ll have to use a different computer because he already voted.”
just clean up your cookies. Dummy…
Christopher: I haven’t the faintest clue what’s going on with the vote.
Brian: I have no desire to turn this into a war. While I personally do not see how he can’t understand that some foreigners might be a bit upset about how he introduced himself to this Awards list (especially given that if I wrote something similar, I’d have certainly earned the wrath of more than one Netizen), Blue Moon does have a point when he says that none of us directly told him about it on his blog or through e-mail. I had left comments on his blog, but since I didn’t take what he said seriously, I didn’t complain. He seems to be pissed that we’re over here bitching among ourselves about him. Seems like a good point to me, although this is not to say that there have not been some rather critical comments left by readers on his blog - one in particular stands out - concerning the foreigner blogs. Anyway, this issue is going nowhere, and to be frank, I’m not sure if it should have even been as issue in the first place - the only reason I posted what I did above is because I didn’t want this to become a big thing. This is not to say that you’re not right, Brian - Blue Moon and I discussed the situation by e-mail, and while I generally accept his explanation for the “possibly” derogatory statement concerning us big nosers (I don’t buy some of his explanations for some of the comments on his blog clearly indicating cases of rather open illegal voting, however) - I still understand why you’re upset, and perhaps you have a right to be.
Bottom line: I have zero tolerance for Korean netizens and their online shenanigans. Time and time again I’ve seen them manipulate polls and surveys at various websites, totally destroying whatever value they might have had had Koreans not swarmed the site. If they didn’t have such a history, then I might have let this little episode of ballot box-stuffing slide… but they do, so I won’t.
It’s their own damn fault for being such online troublemakers. I feel entirely justified in assuming the worst no matter what they’re doing.
Have they gone ahead and stopped voting or are they restarting for a quick vote till January 3rd?
Yeah, he’s been ranting about our “?짠???짢??쩌???”, whereas so far them fellas have demonstrated a far greater propention to circle the bandwagons and call the good guys at the rescue…
I’m not even going to touch that - it’s not like I’ve been over here saying “Vote for the White Guy.” Shit, I didn’t even vote for me, and if anything, I thought I was trying to defend him in my post above.
Hell of a way to end things, ain’t it?
Robert,
Your Korean is much better than mine so I haven’t been able to keep good tabs on the the comments over at his site.
You say he is complaining about that fact that noone told him about the awards. I don’t see why we would be obligated to inform him about the blog awards… it’s right there on the flying chair website for the world to see. If it’s in English and thus out of his usual sphere, well… that’s his problem. I would never think to complain if freechal ran a best Korean blog award and noone notified me.
Look, I have no problem with Korean-language entries on the list of nominees. If one of his readers thinks his site his the best, then he or she should go right ahead and vote for him. I do have a problem with 1) the race card being played (perhaps my translation was off the mark, but race was brought up), 2) the begging and groveling for votes, 3) and the ballot stuffing that goes on whenever Koreans get involve in such a survey. He’s guilty of the first two, and I’m betting that many of his “voters” are guilty of the third.
Yea, I’m upset… I’m upset because I was dumb enough to think that such a survey could be done without KOrean netizens catching wind of it and ruining the entire thing… just like they always do. I thought that maybe we could have a reasonably fair-and-square voting system, where the winner, whoever it is, would be deserving of the title.
Instead, the whole thing was turned into a joke.
And that’s my last word on the subject…
PING:
TITLE: AsiaBlog Awards쩔징쩌짯 쨍쨍쨀짯 쩔??횠쩔? 횈?째횩…
BLOG NAME: 째징?? 째?쨈??? 쩐횈쩍쨘??쨍째
쨀짧?? 쩌?쩍??? ???횠 ??쨍째쨈?째? ?횩쩍?쨈?쨈?. ??째징 쩐?쩌??? ??쩐?쩌짯 ??쨀?쩔징 횈첨쩍쨘횈짰쨍? ??쩌쨘 쨍첩?? 째? 째째쩐횈 ??짹? 쩐짼쨌?째? ??쨈?쨈?. 쨀짧쨈? ?? 횈첨쩍쨘횈짰쨍? ??쩌쨘??쨍? 쨍?쨔첩??쨀짧
PING:
TITLE: On-line Voting..
BLOG NAME: Gossips about Everything in Korea
Maybe some(maybe most of) foreigners are condemning one korean blogger’s post asking his readers to vote for his blog site at Asia Blog Awards. You can smell a tense atmosphere in Marmot’s post and Cathartidae’s post. In this case, It…