Golden Spider Awards

Seth Brundle

Am I the only one here that thinks that the Golden Spider Awards are a load of shíte?
Firstly, to pay good money to be told your site is good or not is ridiculous and possibly only an option for the larger companies. Surely, with the high profile sponsors they have it could be a free competition?
Secondly, their own site is crap (IMO) and using the following three keywords (web awards ireland) on google does not result in a 1st page listing. They also fail on the W3C HTML validator.
Anyone with a different opinion?
Killian

the Guru

Hey killion

So which site was it they turned you down for

tomED

So which site was it they turned you down for

LOL


No seriuosly - It depends on what way you look at it. Is the way in which they choice the best sites a lod of S**te... I would say yesish.... Sometimes they get it right, others are just blatant advertisements (MY OPINION!!! before anyone jumps in giving out!).

If you want to promote your website and your website is good enough to compete - that doesnt mean good design or a huge amount of visitors, it means quality content etc - well then yeah its probably worth the investment.

Seth Brundle

I haven't tried to enter firstly.
With regard to tomED's post - "If you want to promote your website and your website is good enough to compete" - if theirs is not up to standard then how can they judge others?

tomED

if theirs is not up to standard then how can they judge others?

fair point... how could I ever come up with a comeback to that!!!

manonthemoon

So how do you become a judge on this ****!

the Guru

http://www.spiderawards.com/default.htm

It is a shocker !!! :eek:

tomED

HOLY SH**

You know I never wasted my time visiting that website - but that is a terrible looking website....

I think when a web development company (the ones that designed and developed it according to the note at the end of the site) has its own site "UNDER CONSTRUCTION" is a sign of unprofessionalism.

I think for any web development company to have their website under contruction is a joke. How can they honestly promote web design if they dont even know the basics!

manonthemoon

Somebody must be making money out of this. This is a bunch of corporate, coke snorting, backslapping bull****.

All the best websites are corporate.

There must be some way we can undermine this rubbish. We got to take the power back!

(Apologies, just watched 'Bowling for Columbine'. Very good)

mneylon

Every year we all take it in turns to slam the Golden Spiders - and rightly so!
Have any of you eagle eyes noticed that the readers' award is to be selected from among the other categories ie. you won't be able to select *your* favourite site, but will be restricted to choosing from amongst those submitted (on receipt of payment!) to the other categories.
A little crazy? No no, this is only the beginning... it gets worse.
The entire thing is sponsored heavily by corporates, but strangely enough:
1. Your are expected to pay to submit your site
2. The winners list does seem to be a rather lopsided view of the Irish internet

If you look at the past winners list you have to ask the question : Why?

PiE

Yea, I mean when boards.ie starts winning awards there must be something wrong.

Ph3n0m

hmmm eircom.net as a reader's choice?

which readers, have they been executed yet?

having attended spider awards "ceromonies" they are dull, and completely pointless

the day the spider awards mean something, is the day i get naked at a boards.ie drinking session

tomED

Yeah they judge websites - not html coding.

DeVore

Several things:

1. I was a judge on the panel years ago. I can vouch that is was reasonably fair that year but then it was also free to enter. Good websites won imho with the exception of the awards that are "cloaked" and backdoored (by this I mean there are awards which if you looked closely were NOT judged and were just awarded by the organisers). I strongly objected to Micheal O'Leary winning the Lifetime Contribution to the Internet award.

2. Boards won when it was a free and fair online poll and we swarmed it with the hordes that hang out here. They complained at us that we were just using the popularity of our website to win over less active websites. We pointed out that that was kinda the point of the whole "readers choice" thing and since then they havent made *that* mistake again.

I dont think they liked my acceptance speech either

DeV.

Seth Brundle

Originally posted by tomED & DeVore
Yeah they judge websites - not html coding.
Good websites won imho

My earlier point of them not being in a position to judge returns. Do they judge sites based solely on their visual appearance? If so then they are (for want of a better verb) excluding certain members of society (the blind) if they assume that it is not necessary to use ALT text with their image tags (18 recorded absences from their homepage IIRC).
Given that it is going to be illegal in the US to design a site that could possibly exclude a citizen, something that will catch on here in time, and that the judging criteria page on the site contains the following text:
For further clarification of criteria guidelines you can check out The National Disability Authority who have published IT Accessibility Guidelines (http://accessit.nda.ie/checklist_1.html). These are easy to understand and are based on the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (version 1.0) of the W3C Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI).
it just goes to show that they know Sweet Fúck All about the industry

mneylon

I think Dev's post sums up their general attitude.... it's a joke.
It could be a worthwhile award if it wasn't so obviously biased and blatantly aimed at the clueless.
That Eircon.net (sic) could win the readers' award is a reflection of the quality of its standards

fre

Thought I heard something about this years GS on the radio at the wkend so I did a search... their site is down and there is nothing out there about the awards except from those who have won. I was going to enter something but after reading these coments and learning a little... it seems a little pointless. and paying to enter is stupid, what SME has any budget to pay for kudos which should be based purely on merit??

jmcc

manonthemoon wrote:

So how do you become a judge on this ****!

Well knowing nothing about web development or little about internet is not a disadvantage. Indeed it can be a positive given the inclusion of that Weckler character from the Sunday Business Post's advertising supplement. Do the web design for the site - that gets you on the panel. You see it needs the oxygen of publicity so having a press release recycler operation gets you a place on the board - there goes ENN, Irish Computer and the PC Live mob. So is there anyone there who really has a clue? It doesn't matter. These heads are there because of their retail value and not because of their clue value. And of course, sponsoring an event gets you a place - how else would the IEDR ever get into an industry event?

Then there is the fact that the number of "awards" are nothing other than pimping for paid entries. It all boils down to the simple fact: The Golden Spiders is a discredited dot.bomb operation designed to provide an advertising platform that will make money for the organisers.

Regards...jmcc

irlhost

Well I can't look up the award site as its down :eek:

What is the cost?

I was thinking for entering this site
http://www.aed.ie

What you think?

FX Meister

kbannon wrote:

I haven't tried to enter firstly.
With regard to tomED's post - "If you want to promote your website and your website is good enough to compete" - if theirs is not up to standard then how can they judge others?

You slate them but your website is a state too. It may be coded properly but it's a horrible thing to look at and doesn't appeal at all, same goes for the BMW one you created, it looks like it was done by someone with no experience at all. But some of your other sites look much better

buddy

irlhost wrote:

Well I can't look up the award site as its down :eek:

What is the cost?

I was thinking for entering this site
http://www.aed.ie

What you think?

You asked before, it looks great but:

Why is the email address in red??

And on the downloads page the pictures for product spec & manuals - why do they have a white background - they look out of place.

irlhost

buddy wrote:

You asked before, it looks great but:

Why is the email address in red??

And on the downloads page the pictures for product spec & manuals - why do they have a white background - they look out of place.

Hi

You think the red email address is a bit mad?
I did it to make the address standout, but you know what it's like when you look at the same thing for a long time. What colour should it be? BLACK?

The white background again was to make the pixs standout? Should I make it clear?

pork99

DeVore wrote:

1. I was a judge on the panel years ago. I can vouch that is was reasonably fair that year but then it was also free to enter. Good websites won imho with the exception of the awards that are "cloaked" and backdoored (by this I mean there are awards which if you looked closely were NOT judged and were just awarded by the organisers).

Do you think likely that organisations which sponsored awards won awards for their own sites? Would that have come under the "cloaked" and "backdoored" end of things? I've had my suspicions.

jmcc

pork99 wrote:

Do you think likely that organisations which sponsored awards won awards for their own sites? Would that have come under the "cloaked" and "backdoored" end of things? I've had my suspicions.

To give the Golden Spiders credit where it is due, it has been largely exempt from this kind of thing. Apart from the obvious examples that Dev has mentioned, it has been ok.

The opposite pole would have beeen the utterly discredited "National Internet Business Awards" run by the defunct WebIreland magazine. There was a clear example there of Yahoo winning the WebIreland readers' award one year because it sponsored a category. (When there was accessible online voting the second year, Yahoo only got a staggering 11 votes.) Then the editor of ENN was given the tech journo of the year award even though she did not win it. Eircom/Indigo sites always got awards because they were the magazine's major advertisers. I don't think that the charities that were supposed to receive the donations raised even got all the money. So I guess the Golden Spiders , while not being the best awards scheme, is not the worst.

Best tip for an unexpected Golden Spiders win - Business And Finance (or whatever they call themselves nowadays for their business protal. )

Regards...jmcc

impr0v

Does anyone know what the closing date for entries to this fiasco is?

Their new web-address is www.goldenspiders.ie and despite it being obviously important and relevant information they seem to have forgotton to mention it....I also like their form for nominating entries , the description beside one multi line text field being:

"*Reason for <%=varDesc%>:"

Which I guess translates as "reason for nomination, but never mind that, give us the cash"

Seth Brundle

the reason for... works ok for me (*Reason for : (max 400 words))

The all new s(h)ite still isn't valid HTML (http://validator.w3.org/check?uri=http://www.goldenspiders.ie/) with a few sloppy errors.

What exactly is it? Is it a beauty contest (they have picked rotten looking designs before!)? It does not mention valid coding or consistency accross browsers or anything like that so thats a large part of design & development out the window.

impr0v

It strikes me as being a cross between a popularity contest and some sort of mutual back-slapping club. In a way, you have to congratulate them on turning a competition of questionable worth into a money making exercise and a brand with high recognition.

cgarvey

impr0v wrote:

Does anyone know what the closing date for entries to this fiasco is?

October 15th according to the URL you posted.. was that just updated recently, or something? Or have I completely missed something!!

.cg

cgarvey

kbannon wrote:

the reason for... works ok for me (*Reason for : (max 400 words))

IE hides those <% %> tags, FF shows them, for me.

.cg

Seth Brundle

So I see - idiots! (titter titter!)

jmcc

Here they go with the utterly unbiased promotion where they claim that the industry does give a damn:
http://www.enn.ie/frontpage/news-9554255.html

This is one of the best quotes:
"While the previous events have been a success, Business & Finance in association with the Department of Communications believe that a greater focus on the business community is essential to ensure value for sponsors and greater relevance for the awards itself."

Just who do these nobodies think that they are and why do they think that they are part of our industry? The Golden Spiders is just an advertising scam. It has the characteristics of a 419er scam where the 'winners' are left with a dodgy bit of kitsch and a depleted bank account. The suckers who don't pay enough (no award sponsorship) don't even get that tacky golden spider.

And the "judges" - they ruminate like some gang of deposed dot.bomb nobodies and relevancy wannabes wondering why it is not 1999. Would you seriously pay the entry fee for your site to be included in the Golden Spiders? Could you live down the embarrassment of having been associated with such a dodgy event? Maybe it is time for the Irish internet industry to relaunch its own awards.

Regards...jmcc

Gizzard

jmcc wrote:

Here they go with the utterly unbiased promotion where they claim that the industry does give a damn:
http://www.enn.ie/frontpage/news-9554255.html

This is one of the best quotes:
"While the previous events have been a success, Business & Finance in association with the Department of Communications believe that a greater focus on the business community is essential to ensure value for sponsors and greater relevance for the awards itself."

Just who do these nobodies think that they are and why do they think that they are part of our industry? The Golden Spiders is just an advertising scam. It has the characteristics of a 419er scam where the 'winners' are left with a dodgy bit of kitsch and a depleted bank account. The suckers who don't pay enough (no award sponsorship) don't even get that tacky golden spider.

And the "judges" - they ruminate like some gang of deposed dot.bomb nobodies and relevancy wannabes wondering why it is not 1999. Would you seriously pay the entry fee for your site to be included in the Golden Spiders? Could you live down the embarrassment of having been associated with such a dodgy event? Maybe it is time for the Irish internet industry to relaunch its own awards.

Regards...jmcc

If memory serves Devore was one of their judges

impr0v

cgarvey wrote:

October 15th according to the URL you posted.. was that just updated recently, or something? Or have I completely missed something!!

.cg

y'know i was kinda tired......

Unless they updated after I e-mailed them the query last night, cos I could have sworn the information wasn't on the site.

jmcc

Gizzard wrote:

If memory serves Devore was one of their judges

Was - past tense. Look at the current bunch and tell me why they should be there. Even the awards entry form is a very dodgy piece of work and yet one of the main players from the webdev agency that developed the site is on the panel because the webdev agency did the website. All the reasons I gave earlier for inclusion on the panel seem valid. Perhaps the Golden Spiders should be referred to as the Golden 419ers.

Regards...jmcc

buddy

irlhost wrote:

Hi

You think the red email address is a bit mad?
I did it to make the address standout, but you know what it's like when you look at the same thing for a long time. What colour should it be? BLACK?

The white background again was to make the pixs standout? Should I make it clear?

I think the red doesn't sit well on that background - I'd suggest white as with the contact number and address.

I'd make the pictures clear, maybe leaving the white in the circles there (that should make em stand out. Will just make the site look more integrated.

You've done a fantastic job, I'd love to make site like that.

Seth Brundle

I sent a mail to info@goldenspiders.ie asking the following:-
I am trying to find out whether valid HTML/CSS coding and cross browser compatibility is*included in the judging process for the Golden Spider Awards.

The reply I just recieved was:-
Thanks for expressing an interest in this years awards. These criteria are not specifically judged by our team of judges but are encompassed into all aspects of the criteria which you can find in more detail on the site.

Comments?

jmcc

kbannon wrote:

I sent a mail to info@goldenspiders.ie asking the following:-
I am trying to find out whether valid HTML/CSS coding and cross browser compatibility is*included in the judging process for the Golden Spider Awards.

The reply I just recieved was:-
Thanks for expressing an interest in this years awards. These criteria are not specifically judged by our team of judges but are encompassed into all aspects of the criteria which you can find in more detail on the site.

Comments?

Yeah. Apart from the obvious illiteracy, it is clear that the Golden Spiders is nothing less than a 419er operation. The 'judges' probably never heard of CSS. That "encompassed into" really grates. Perhaps these people should invest in a dictionary. Though it could just be a form e-mail reply by some office flunky who knows how to use e-mail.

Regards...jmcc

Seth Brundle

How does one get tickets to attend?
Wouldn't it be fun if all of us went and expressed our opinions on awards night - we could also get to rub shoulders with the "finalists and winners of the Golden Spider Awards [who in the last 7 years] have proven to be Internet leaders" :rolleyes:

jmcc

I was just trying to remember who the Internet Leaders that the Golden 419ers [1] refer to on the website. I think that local.ie (protal that seems to have disappeared when nobody was looking) and Gerry McGovern (The Nuan Thought Leader) won something. It would be interesting to do an analysis of the past "Internet Leaders" to see what happened to them and where they are now.

Regards...jmcc
[1] Golden Spiders is just like a 419er op - asking for money for nothing.

nahdoic

screw it - i'm going to enter StatCounter for the "Best International Web Site" Judges will look for design in an international context -- e.g. ability to attract business overseas by multi Lingual, multi cultural communication and/or foreign exchange facilities

Does over 1 billion hits a month get me anything

Or how about being a Google Pagerank 10 - I've got a feeling I might have to explain to some judges what pagerank means.

200,000 members from 180 countries worldwide.

800 new members joing each day.

over 1,000 upgraded members from 20 countries worldwide from Saudia Arabai to Japan to Austrlia to Brazil to United States to Europe

Think I have a shot? Anyone know how to enter? Or more to the point anyone know of a IIA member I can get to enter me? I can send them E100.

nahdoic

I'll try and make the site multi-lingual before the judges get at it as well

That should look good.

Anyone got translation skills let me know

http://my.statcounter.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=2122

And if anyone is a member of IIA and willing to nominate StatCounter please get in touch!

mneylon

Biggest load of rubbish I've seen in ages!

jmcc - you've summed it up very nicely