Indibloggies - The Indian Weblog Awards | Indian Blog Awards

And the nominees are …

Debashish — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 17:40:59 +0000

After an unmentionable wait we are here with the final list of nominated blogs for the 2008 Indibloggies. Thanks again to all of you for suggesting all these wonderful blogs and to the Indibloggies Jury for carefully going through thousands of blogs and rating them. Watch out for the announcement of the final polls.

Best Indiblog of the Year

Best New Indiblog

Best IndiMicroblog

Most Humorous Indiblog

Best Humanities Indiblog

Best Group Indiblog

Best Food Indiblog

Best Entertainment Indiblog

Best Travel Indiblog

Best Sports Indiblog

Best Science Technology Indiblog

Best IndiPodcast

Best Business Indiblog

Best Designed Indiblog

Best Indi Photo blog

Best Personal Indiblog

Note: The “Best IndiBlog directory/service/clique/network” category was dropped due to insufficient number of nominations received.

The Indibloggies Hall of Fame

Debashish — Sun, 16 Aug 2009 15:28:47 +0000

Having woken up from my kumbhakarni sleep I realized that I didn’t tell you guys about a new room we added at the Indibloggies. Well, it’s a Hall really (the H of the HK, you know) and we named it the “Indibloggies Hall of Fame”. Its meant to accommodate the growing tribe of people who have caused a “naak mein dum” by winning again and again at the Indbloggies (pssst…if you want to know how to win multiple times at the Indibloggies write to me in confidence with your “quote”, not the byte walla quote you silly.). So we decided finally to lock them up in this decorated “Hall of fame” (and thus ensure that they never win again, hehehe).

On a serious note, the “Indibloggies Hall of Fame” is to recognize fellow bloggers and communities who won 3 or more times at the Indibloggies. It’s not a mean fete to pull this out. It’s sad that this also means that they have to stay away from the competition in future but hey Indibloggies is about showcasing new talent. Join me in saluting the present occupants of the HOF (Guru Subramanian, Desipundit.com and Amit Varma) for their talent and gusto. By participating at Indibloggies they added gaiety and glitz to the platform. We are proud to have them as part of the prestigious “Indibloggies Hall of Fame”.

Meet the Indibloggies 2008 Jury

Debashish — Sun, 16 Aug 2009 14:53:30 +0000

Aditya Kuber, a Pune based photographer,
writer & geek. After working for various media houses he set up Media Sphere
Communications in 2007 that deals in custom publishing, content delivery
and design.

Akhil Tandulwadikar from Hyderabad is an MBA and makes living as the Editor of a Healthcare magazine. Interests include writing, reading books, Photography and Cricket.

Aparna Ray, a qualitative research consultant based in Kolkata. Passionate about limericks. Blogs in Bangla a Khola Janala and helps bridge the world of Bangla blogs onGlobal Voices and Desipundit.

Arzan Sam Wadia. Architect and Urban Designer, currently based in New York, but very much from Mumbai. He also publishes a popular blog Parsi Khabar.

Avinash Raghav, Regional Manager (North) at NASSCOM. He blogs at and manages the NASSCOM Emerge Forum, a 1400+ member community for the mid-sized.

Balendu Dadhich, heading leading Hindi news portal Prabhasakshi.com. He is a MVP and developer of a Hindi Word Processor ‘Madhyam’ among several other softwares.

Deepak Kumar Majhi, a first year student at IIT, Kharagpur. Also a blogger and reviewer.

Indra Awasthi, Oregon based, originally from UP and a Calcuttan by birth, He is an Engineering
graduate from Allahabad and infrequently blogs in Hindi.

Kaushik Narasimhan, an MTech from IIT-Bombay and a PhD student at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Kaushik is an avid reader and movie-watcher.

Kinshuk Sunil, an open source enthusiast, has been developing games since 2005, writing literature and organizing technology unconferences. He is an alumnus of Sri Ram College of Commerce, Delhi.

Lavanya Raj, a stay at home mom owning a
food related blog since the past 1 and half year.

Laxman Koushik Krishnan, Graphic Designer based at Chennai. Working with web since 2002.

Mayank Chandak, an engineering student at JUIT, Waknaghat majoring in computer science. But he calls that a side job as he is a tech enthusiast concerned about new web technologies and services.

Megha Meshram, Software consultant, eye for all things nature and ear for all things music,
food-wine freak, highly opinionated, all that and more or less

Mohan K, a media studies, psychology & English literature student from Christ University,
Bangalore. He has been a blogger for the past 5 years and is associated with the Centre for Social Action.

Ninad Gujar, an engineer by training and a neuroscientist by profession; has a passion for
photography and travel. Also a budding entrepreneur and a citizen who wants
to create a social impact for the greater good.

Paras Sharma, 21 year old blogger from Mumbai, blogging since 2005, writer with Youth
magazine JAM since December 2007. Paras specializes in humor, poetry, music
and movie reviews.

Patrix, the founder of DesiPundit and author of popular blog Nerve Endings Firing Away. In the offline world, he is a doctoral student at Texas A&M majoring in Urban Planning.

Pradeep Chopra is a co-founder of OMLogic Consulting and Whizlabs Software, an IT education
company. Whizlabs won NASSCOM’s Most Innovative Indian IT Company award in 2004.

Priya Venkateshan, just out of college and currently one of the millions of software engineers in Bangalore. As wanderlust she blogs about anything and everything that catches her fancy.

Ram Prasad Narsimhan, is experimenting with “early retirement” after working for over 12 years in corporate America. He wants to travel and plans to volunteer at NGO’s and organizations that could use his skills.

Rezwan, an Indonesia based blogger from Bangladesh; started blogging in April 2003. He blogs at The third world view and is an author/editor at Global Voices.

Rohit Sane, a second year IT student from Mumbai, blogging since 2006 on Blogs of different niches.

Shanti Mangala, is a long time blogger, known for starting the Bharteeya Blog Mela clique. A software engineer by profession she currently lives in Dallas.

Shweta L Khare, founder and president of Career bright – Career Coaching Services. Shweta is also the co-chair at the Career Resource Center at the India Community Center in Milpitas, California.

T V Srinivas, 48 years old Assistant General Manager with RBI, actively involved in writing
poems, stories and articles on social problems in Kannada.

Nominations begin for the Indibloggies 2008 edition

Debashish — Mon, 16 Feb 2009 05:55:01 +0000

The nomination phase for the Indibloggies 2008 edition has been flagged off. Here is your chance to showcase your blog to the whole world and win laurels from your peers and readers alike

Nominations for 17 award categories would be open from 16 Feb 2009 to 28 Feb 6 March 2009. Do take a look at the sponsors page to know about the prizes at stake.

The nomination form is located at http://nom2008.indibloggies.org
Update [6 Mar 2009]: Nominations are now closed.

Rules, etc:

You may also apply to be a part of the Jury through the same form. (The primary function of the Indibloggies Jury is to do a peer-review or screening of nominated blogs. The final voting takes place from the top blogs chosen by the Jurors in each award category. Jurors are required to stay away from the Indibloggies 2008 contest.)
Please don’t ask your friends or readers to nominate your blog multiple times, simply because Jurors don’t consider the count of nominations as any criteria for rating. Moreover, self-nomination is perfectly OK. Please beware that repeated nominations for the same blog may be treated as spamming and may lead to disqualification.
Please only enter the web-address (URL) for the main-page. NO Blog title or permalinks to posts please.
Twitter and suchlike URLs are acceptable only for the Microblog category.
Indibloggies contest is limited to blogs written in English language only. We are considering holding Indibloggies for Indian language blogs in latter part of the year.

Happy nominating!

The Indibloggies 2008 Sponsors

Debashish — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 03:30:31 +0000

Do take a look at the award categories for the upcoming 2008 event. We would only be too happy if you could lend your support to this movement.

Would you like to be a part of the Indibloggies 2008 event? Please write to us with your proposal.

INDIBLOGGIES 2008 SPONSORS LINE-UP

PLATINUM SPONSORS

Interested?

GOLD SPONSORS

Interested?

SILVER SPONSORS

Books & Goodies from Hachette India
Hachette India would award:

Books worth Rs 3000 to the “Indiblog of the Year 2008″

Book Hampers worth Rs 1000 to the winner in each award category.

A copy of award-winning blogger Amit Varma’s upcoming book “My Friend Sancho” to the winner in each award category. Amit’s book will be published by Hachette India in April this year.

BRONZE SPONSORS

Scrapture Trophy from Arun VermaA special “Indiblogger of the year” scrapture trophy, worth Rs 15,000, designed by Arun Verma Design Studios.

Problogger BookCopies of the book “Problogger: Secrets for Blogging Your Way to a Six-Figure Income” authored by well known professional bloggers Darren Rowse and Chris Garrett. For further details on the book please visit its official website.

Cash Awards from ZohoZoho would award Rs 2,000 each for the “Best Science/Technology Indiblog” & “Indiblog of the Year” categories. Zoho is a comprehensive suite of online applications (services) that you can easily access from Zoho.com.

Blog Hosting packages from Web1Web1 would award a Blog-hosting package (1 domain name + 1 GB webspace + Latest Wordpress + 1 Professional theme worth max $25) worth Rs 6500 to the winner of the “Best Personal Indiblog” and a Blog-hosting package (1 domain name + 1 GB webspace + Latest Wordpress) worth Rs 5500/- each to winners of the “Best Designed Indiblog” and “Best Travel Indiblog”.

AWARDS FROM THE BLOGGER COMMUNITY

Indian Social Aggregator India Sphere would award $30 to the winner in “Indiblog of the Year” category.

A copy of Complete Digital Photography, Fourth Edition (Graphics Series) by Ben Long, worth $26, for the Best Photo Blog from the food-blogger duo Jay & Bee of Jugalbandi.

Chetan Bhawani’s thewwwblog would award $15 in cash and a copy of the book Blog Blazers worth $17 to the “Indiblog of the Year”.

Cash Awards of $50 for the “Best Science/Technology Indiblog” and $50 for the “Best Designed Indiblog” from techblissonline.

Cash Awards of $20 for the “Best Business Indiblog” from Learn QTP.

Windows Vista Ultimate x64 licensed DVD worth Rs 12,000, by Anand Khanse, Microsoft MVP for the “Best Science/Technology IndiBlog”.

Our heartfelt thanks to all the Sponsors!

The Indibloggies 2008 award categories

Debashish — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 03:30:19 +0000

The upcoming 2008 event of the Indibloggies would award outstanding blogs in the following award-categories:

IndiBlog of the year
Best Humanities IndiBlog (IndiBlogs covering Art/Craft/Painting, Hobby, Literature, Poetry/Fiction)
Best Entertainment Indiblog (blogs on Music, TV, Movies, theater & fashion)
Best Sports IndiBlog
Best Science/Technology IndiBlog
Best IndiBlog directory/service/clique/network
Best Designed IndiBlog (Blogs with original designs or with major visible customizations to existing themes)
Best Food/Beverages Indiblog
Most Humorous Indiblog
Best Indi Podcast/Vidcast
Best Travel Indiblog
Best New Indiblog (IndiBloggers who began blogging on/after July 1, 2008)
Best Photo Indiblog
Best Personal Indiblog
Best Group/Community Indiblog
Best Business Indiblog
Best Indi Microblog

To know about the prizes being distributed in these award categories please click here.

Nominations for the 2008 Indibloggies haven’t started yet. We would make an announcement about nominations shortly. Meanwhile, please don’t send nominations via contact form or comment form.

Blogging and mainstream media

Debashish — Mon, 31 Mar 2008 08:54:14 +0000

In his 2006 piece for Hum Blogistani, titled “Blogs will make MSM honest”, Peter Griffin had predicted that blogs would complement the big media, instead of competing with it. Continuing the 2007 Hum Blogistani essay series we present the second essay by Rohit Pradhan that dwells on Indian mainstream media’s perception of blogging. The mainstream media, he blames, remains unapologetically hostile to blogging, dismissing it as a passing fad and as a giant talking shop by people who seem perpetually on the offensive. He wishes that with the maturing Indian blogosphere the MSM chooses the path of cooperation rather than confrontation.

Rohit aka Confused lives in Florida and is a doctoral student in Health Services Research. He discovered blogging through online debating forums and now blogs with the passion of a neo-convert. He is interested in Indian politics, current affairs and of course in news which can be best characterized as just plain weird. He blogs at Retributions and Life is a street car named Desire and is a contributing editor for Pragati. Rohit was also part of the Jury at Indibloggies 2006 event.

he Indian media’s reaction to blogging has been marked by two divergent trends. On one hand, almost all major Indian media houses, especially television channels, have embraced blogging by hosting blogs on their site while many top journalists utilize popular blogging platform like Blogspot and Wordpress. No doubt, some of the blogs are merely a placeholder for columns; nevertheless, a few of them, at least, carry genuinely interesting articles.

Despite this reluctant embrace, the mainstream media remains unapologetically hostile to blogging as an independent concept. Columnists in the Times of India and Outlook have dismissed blogging as a passing fad; a giant talking shop by people who have little knowledge about real India and who seem perpetually on the offensive. Leading media luminaries like Barkha Dutt have made sweeping generalizations about bloggers as if they are a monolithic voice with no disagreements or divergence of views. While bloggers would be the first to accept the importance and relevance of mainstream media (MSM), it would be hard to find an Indian journalist who would praise bloggers, even in the passing.

The number of serious Indian bloggers can be counted in thousands, yet, it appears as if the MSM thinks that blogging is a serious threat to its future.

Prima facie, the MSM’s unwarranted hostility to blogging is surprising. The number of serious Indian bloggers can be counted in thousands and those who comment on current affairs, MSM’s bread and butter, constitute a miniscule minority. Bloggers remain dependent on MSM for hard news and no serious blogger talks about replacing the MSM, rather, they see blogging as complementary to newspapers and television channels. Yet, it appears as if the MSM thinks that blogging is a serious threat to its future especially by a certain class of bloggers who have the temerity to comment on current affairs. MSM has many times featured personal bloggers or technology specialists, but I am yet to come across an instance when a blogger was quoted on politics, strategic affairs or economic development. An entire one hour episode of “We the People” on NDTV featured only bloggers who write about personal experiences, mainly sex, as if that is what the blogosphere is restricted to! Why?

India has been a proud democracy since its independence in 1947. Yet, it is only in the last two decades that true democratization of Indian society has taken place. Economic reforms have increased the number of Indians able to live above subsistence levels. Old power structures have crumbled, in politics, sports, and business, replaced by those whose achievements are a nod to their hard work and ambition and not family names. Knowledge in this globalizing, modernizing India, more than at any point in her history, is power. The rapidly increasing reach of internet has challenged the traditional limits and controls placed on acquisition of knowledge. Future generations may remember Wikipedia, despite its flaws, as the largest and most successful democratic experiment in the history of humankind. Information is no longer the monopoly of the privileged or solely a function of geographic location.

The MSM however has retained its monopoly in influencing and shaping opinions, the real source of its power and privilege. It may or may not influence electoral performance but it definitely affects public mood. Bloggers have challenged this intellectual hegemony by relentlessly questioning, probing, and critiquing journalists and columnists. In many cases, they have offered alternative stories and policy formulations. The intellectual dinosaurs who continue to cling to a set of archaic beliefs find it extremely unpalatable to be challenged by a group of passionate upstarts.

In the high stake medium of MSM, it would be rare to find a columnist who directly challenges the ideas of a fellow journalist…Bloggers have no such inhibitions.

In the high stake medium of MSM, it would be rare to find a columnist who directly challenges the ideas of a fellow journalist. In this cosy world, The Hindu can sell it self a liberal voice while furiously editorializing in support of the brutal and repressive Chinese regime. It is hard to imagine a Barkha Dutt or Rajdeep Sardesai or even the self-proclaimed classical liberal newspaper calling its bluff; they have plenty of skeletons of their own. Bloggers have no such inhibitions; N. Ram is not likely to be too pleased with Nitin Pai’s brilliant exposure of his intellectual dishonesty. That many such bloggers might be specialists in their own field as opposed to journalists who, at least in India, tend to be generalists simply adds to the discomfiture. It is hard to pretend to be all knowing when arguing with someone who may have years of experience in a particular field. Granted that many such critiques are over the top and the language employed may be too colorful, a fact which the MSM has cleverly exploited to dismiss the dissenters as dysfunctional ranters. Yet, the stridency of the tone cannot subtract from the message. Bloggers may not have won this battle of ideas, that has never anyway been the intention, but there is little doubt that they have mounted a serious challenge.

As the blogosphere continues to grow and develop, the MSM faces two stark choices: It can either continue in its present state of denial or it can accept that bloggers have managed to carve their own niche and are unlikely to disappear. It is a choice between confrontation and cooperation. We can only hope that, for once, MSM would display wisdom and humility.

On Jalebis, Jhangris and JPG files

Debashish — Sun, 23 Mar 2008 06:12:21 +0000

Dear Readers, we flag off the Hum Blogistani Essay series 2007 with an encouraging essay from an expressive Indian expat couple based in US who plead the case of Indian food blogs, equipped for specialized writing on the culinary delights. In their essay they dwell on the variety that Indi food blogs put on show, emphasize on making a distinction between food blogs and recipe sites and eloquently discuss their POV on the much talked about plagiarism issue in food blogdom.

Bee and Jai (nicknames) live in the northwestern U.S. She has a background in media, he in strategy development in the technology field. They’re amateur photographers and have serious fitness goals. “We seek to foster a more conscious approach to the food we consume, the thoughts we harbour, and the environment that sustains us. Jugalbandi is our means of reasserting our commitment to a natural, healthier lifestyle, and to a less toxic world.”, the couple clarifies.

n her article in the Hum Blogistani series 2005, Charu Ramdurai made an interesting observation about the limited impact by Indian blogs in the global arena because of the lack of specialisaton “in terms of content or focus”. Fortunately, in the food blogosphere, Indians have made a noticeable impact. (We use the term ‘Indian’ in terms of ethnicity rather than citizenship status, as a good number of popular Indian food blogs come from expats in the U.S. and Europe.)

This validates the importance of ’specialisation’. Almost all these blogs have a narrow, but deep focus on Indian cuisine/s – traditional and modern. Indian food bloggers start out with three distinct advantages:

The language of food is universal, and lends itself to a global audience. Besides, there is a lot of interest in and curiosity about Indian cuisine(s) – recognized and enjoyed as one of world’s “mother cuisines”. If nothing else, everyone has heard of “curry”.
Indian regional and micro- cuisines have depth and variety. There is plenty of space for each blogger to express his/her uniqueness by showcasing family heirloom recipes, regional specialties or personal creations.
We Indians have the advantage of being able to communicate easily in English, helping us reach a global audience.

Most Indian food bloggers are multilingual, and some have regional language blogs in addition to their English ones. Indian food bloggers have, in a short time span of three or four years, changed perceptions about what Indians eat – drastically and for the better.

Indian food bloggers have, in a short time span of three or four years, changed perceptions about what Indians eat – drastically and for the better.

Those who equated Indian cuisine with Mutter Butter Paneer Splutter at Bombay Garden can now see and try out quotidian fare from a Kashmiri, Telugu, Marathi, or Bengali home kitchen.

Blogs acquaint us with the culinary and cultural artifacts of India that are uniquely regional and outside the “mainstream” – with a side of mongrel fusion fare from Indian-Born Confused Americans. Indian food blogs have a global readership. In terms of the quality of content, they stand shoulder-to-shoulder with the best. They host blogging events on a regular basis highlighting south Asian ingredients, regions and a variety of themes. Our blogs have helped us bridge oceans, nationalities and linguistic barriers to form friendships with fellow foodies who have a deep curiosity about our customs and culture. They have yielded insights on cross-cultural culinary influences and similarities – like the Bihari influence on Caribbean cuisine.

Over the past three years, a host of independently published culinary histories have fared exceptionally well. They owe this, in large part, to the visibility and positive reviews generated in Indian food blogs. Some celebrity authors like Suvir Saran and Ammini Ramachandran are bloggers too. See this article describing the symbiosis between Indian food blogging and publishing. In the past, one area where we seemed to lag behind our global counterparts was in the quality of our photographs. They don’t call it ‘food porn’ for nothing. The draw of a food blog often (but not always) depends on how narcissistically it stages and struts its ’stuff’. Of late, the standard of food photography in the Indian foodie universe is to be reckoned with. We, at Jugalbandi, host a monthly theme-based food photography event with participants from across the globe. In the January edition, the first four spots went to Indians.

How many desi food blogs exist? We can state, without exaggeration, that there’s a new food blog by an Indian every day. We tried to list them all on our blog roll, then gave up after a while, ‘cos it’s exhausting. There must be a large number of Indian food blogs in regional languages too.

How important is the role of writing or presentation style in food blogging? How does the description of one ‘dal tadka’ differ from the other?

Writing and presentation are everything in food blogging, precisely because recipes give not much scope for ‘literary expression’.

To us, writing and presentation are everything in food blogging, precisely because recipes give not much scope for ‘literary expression’. What sets one space apart from the other is the blogger’s personal narrative, unique take on the dish, and how it came about. Dal tadka can be simply be a recipe (as here), or can be accompanied by a glimpse – not so flattering – of how desi bachelors live.

Is blog a suitable format for a recipe-site? It may sound bitter but only non-food bloggers tend to look at food blogs as “recipe sites”. While the latter (like Bawarchi-com) have their value, food blogs are much more. Many of our posts do not have recipes at all. They are photo essays, discuss how food is grown, or its history. Blogging gives a forum for culinary, literary and photographic creativity that a ‘recipe site’ doesn’t.

When roti is glamorous, can plagiarism be far behind? It is an occupational hazard with all types of blogging, but particularly rampant in the Indian food blogosphere. With individuals, a lot of it boils down to lack of awareness. While copyrights laws do exist in India, they are not strictly enforced. Many folks do not understand the distinction between “plagiarism” and a “copyright” violation, and that a picture can be “open to the public” and have “all rights reserved” at once, or that “hotlinking” is a cardinal sin. With corporate thieves, it’s a different story. As a lot of English and regional Indian newspapers go online, they add on a food section. What better place to quickly populate these spaces from, than blogs? Any attempt to contact them is met either by stony silence, or by explanations of how their staff is not conversant with copyright laws. We’d learnt to shrug and move on. Until last year. Yahoo’s new language portals in India were brimming with content from Indian blogs. Some voiced their displeasure. Yahoo’s response: “Not our problem. Talk to our Indian subcontractor.” On March 5, 2007, more than 100 Indian blogs ran an anti-Yahoo campaign. They apologized and accepted responsibility for the stolen content. Shakespeare’s work is too old to be copyrighted, but quoting Shakespeare without giving credit to him is plagiarism. Yahoo was guilty of both. They stole pictures, reproduced verbatim whole chunks of posts, monetized work that was not theirs, while asking bloggers to “negotiate” with their subcontractor. If you buy something from Walmart that ends up being defective, they don’t give you the number of the guy in China who made it and say, “Talk to him.”

Now, some Indian food bloggers send out invoices if their pics show up elsewhere. They contact advertisers to report content theft. They flag service providers. What they don’t do is put up with being asked to stop whining and get back to the kitchen, already.

Invitation for the Hum Blogistani essay series – 2007 edition

Debashish — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 18:14:04 +0000

Blogs have become a force to reckon with, they are the new paradigm of online communication. It’s fascinating to see how common online journals with candid & irreverent personal opinions, observations and links became a formidable force when blended with reader reactions. Since their advent, blogs have graduated from mere online diaries to vehicles for marketing, thought leadership, knowledge management and crisis communication, among others.

Indibloggies is pleased to announce the 2007 edition of its annual essay series “Hum Blogistani”, where various Indian bloggers share their thoughts about the Indi-blogosphere, evoking its journey so far, probably doing a SWOT analysis and predicting the road-ahead.

Fellow Indibloggers, I am sure you will like to share your wisdom on the subject of blogging and would like to share your thoughts on the nuances of Indian blogging. I am honored to invite you to this year’s essay series and request you to pen a short essay on the subject (or any other subject that revolves around the India blogging scenario).

We will also have some modest reward for the best of the submitted essays, chosen by known names of the Indiblogdom. I thank you in earnest for sharing your insights with the world and look forward to receiving your contribution.

Rules etc:

Essays should be written in English and are acceptable only through email at indibloggies at gmail dot com. Please mark the subject as “Essay Submission: 2007” and try to avoid attachments.
Word-limit: We suggest a world limit of about 800 words.
Last date for submission is tentatively 25 March 2008.
Prizes: The best essay chosen by a panel of known bloggers would receive a copy of Biz Stones’ book Who Let the Blogs Out?: A Hyper connected Peek at the World of Weblogs, watch this space for more announcements.
Accepted essays would become the property of Indibloggies.org. The essay could not be published on any other website or print publication. However author of the essay could publish it on his own blog/website with a link to the appropriate Indibloggies website page. (Please note that this does not apply to submitted essays not accepted for inclusion in the series).
Indibloggies reserves the right to accept/reject submissions. All efforts would be made to inform the author about the results of submission.
Decision about the best essay and prize distribution would be binding on participants and no objections would be entertained.

Suggested topics (feel free to suggest more in the comment area):

Rise and Growth of Indic Blogging (aka blogging in Indian languages)
Blogs’ anti-establishment nature have ruffled many a feather in the corporate world. Brands fear them; companies treat their posts with caution. How are companies, corporations and governments dealing with this new menace? How are the Business & Corporate blogs faring (remember Mazda’s “Kid Halloween” debacle?) in using blogs to their advantage?
Is blogging really meaningful? Have blogs made any difference to a society like ours? How is blogging relevant to the third-world and developing nations where internet penetration itself is an elite phenomenon?
MoBlogs, VLogs, Photo blogs, Microblogs so many formats, but which one works the best, which are the most popular formats in India? What are the trends, which blog platforms are most popular? What kind of blogs are widely read? What’s the ASL of Indibloggers?
Celebrity bloggers are here, from Shekhar Kapoor to Aamir Khan, so many have jumped into the blogging bandwagon, but how many of them are taking it seriously? Why are they blogging? And why are the politicians shying away? What’s the story here?
Banning is a popular deterrent in India, just raise a hue and cry about anything on religious and caste grounds and it would be banned. India has seen a stupid blanket ban on Blogger.com on the behest of national security. In our neighboring countries situation is worse. Trace the path of democratic tyranny in your essay, how do we deal with such bans? Is pure slander free-speech? Self-censorship, regulation, blogging laws etc.
Is there is any differences between blogging techniques, usages, foci, etc, depending on the different cultural landscapes ie, how is Indiblogging different than the rest of the world? (suggested by John Saddington)
Your suggestion comes here…

DesiPundit Indibloggies Prizes Auction

Debashish — Tue, 03 Apr 2007 06:37:56 +0000

Like the previous year, the good people at Desipundit, who won in the “Best Designed Indiblog” and “Best Directory/ Clique/ Service” categories, are auctioning their awards. The proceeds will be donated in entirety to Magic Bus, a nonprofit charitable organization that conducts developmental activities for children and young adults through the outdoors and sports. This is an excellent gesture on the part of the Desipundit team and we laud their effort. For further details and to participate in the auction please click here. The auction ends on Thursday, April 5 2007 at 11:59pm CST.