Maman Poulet

It’s still a bit surreal and sinking in what happened in Cork on Saturday. I’m very happy and still very humbled by the results.

I blog for fun, for anger, for stress relief from my day job, as a source of pain relief (you wouldn’t believe the nerve endings that can be numbed by a bit of digging and thinking) and simply I blog becuase I can. I’ve also made many friends through blogging and met people outside my usual circles and learnt lots about things I never thought I would know or want to know anything about.

I’m also very happy to be in the company of bloggers like the brethern in Cedar Lounge Revolution, a win I was delighted with!

It was great to be in Cork with so many friends and to meet so many new bloggers and feel the energy there is in Irish blogging. There are so many topics being blogged about in Ireland and the genre continues to grow. I’ll repeat what I said on Saturday about the need for more news and current affairs blogging in Ireland, I’ve been delighted regarding the growth in economics and financial affairs blogging and hope we can see more commentary on social justice issues and news reflection and creation sites in 2009.

A word of thanks to the sponsors, IGO People for the Best News and Current Affairs category and McConnells for the Grand Prix and to all the other sponsors also – the night was hugely successful thanks to their generosity and support.

I didn’t thank my sources in my speech and am very glad to have this opportunity to do so – to those people who send me things, who call or think ‘this is something Maman Poulet might be interested in’ – Thank you so much! Thanks for your trust in me, thanks for also taking calls or emails when I ask questions about something because I’m onto something and need to double check on it. Many of these sources also act as sounding boards as I ask myself questions about an issue and need to convince myself that I’m not losing it completely and that xy or z is worth writing about.

In the top right hand corner of the page you’ll find ways to contact me if you want to get in touch with anything or talk about how to get something to me whilst protecting yourselves.

Thanks also to my many non-blogging mates who put up with me wittering on about blogs, twitter and the like and who support me as I use them as sounding boards also.

To Karen, the blog widow, thanks for the weekend and every week and weekend and putting up with the hours online and non-responsiveness from time to time as I get lost digging and thinking.

And now for a return to normality. I’ll be back later in week when my broadband gets fixed (yup I came home to broken NTL – complete the sentence a blogger without broadband is like…..!) Meanwhile I’ll be figuring out the finer points of Irish ‘pork’ and the ways you might find politicians helping out benefactors and the like even when the walls of the economy are tumbling in.

6 Comments »

I’ll have a more substantial (and less hung over) post later but thank you for all the emails, twitters, facebook msgs and texts.

It was really great to win the Best News and Current Affairs category again this year. I am completely blown away however to win the Grand Prix as it’s being called (very apt we’re all going french with things!) To be selected as Best Blog in Ireland is truely humbling and brilliant at same time. I hear there are videos of speeches somewhere – which i’m sure someone will link to.

Congrats to all the winners – I can’t find a winners list to link yet and after 3 years of live blogging the winners and posting them last night I didn’t get a chance to and I’m not in any condition to do it now.

It was a wonderful night!

PS – Had all 4 of those golden circle names in the Sunday Times from 3 different readers – unfortunately I don’t have the lawyers fees of the ST to cover me! But it’s only the start of it

28 Comments »

Good Afternoon from Cork where despite the best efforts of some still slightly mysterious illness that has me out of work and going slowly doolally, I’ve made it to Cork International Airport Hotel – the most original, coolest, kitchest hotel in Cork Ireland.

I’ve also heard that I’ve joined 19 others in a feature in this mornings Irish Times on the 20 essential blogs in Ireland.  Many thanks to Shane for this inclusion – its all getting very oscar like 

If you are at the blog awards tonight please come up and say hello – please don’t take offence if I don’t recognise you or remember you – brain fog moments aplenty at moment.

Thanks to Damien for the whole shebang – it’s the highlight of the  year for many of us and  I’m delighted I was able to make it.

Best of luck to my co-nominees in News and Current Affairs (Sponsored by IGO People)

• newswire99.blogspot.com
• bocktherobber.com
• limerickblogger.ie
• splinteredsunrise.wordpress.com
• youghalonline.com

And in Best Blog Post (Sponsored by KRO Solutions)

• Annie Rhiannon: “Ten Days in May”
• Bock The Robber: “Leonard Cohen in Dublin – Concert Review”
• Darragh Doyle: “The first time”
• Hangar Queen: “The Big Lop Offski 2″
• K8 the GR8: “The Secret Fire”
• Tuppenceworth.ie: “Waiting for Obama”

And no I don’t know who’s in the Golden Circle and I don’t really care It’s that non hysterical anger don’t you know

6 Comments »

After an awful lot of judging the list of finalists for this weekends Irish Blog Awards is out.

I’ve made the lists for Best News and Current Affairs Blog and Best Blog Post. Many thanks to readers, commenters and judges. Amazing list of finalists throughout and roll on the weekend’s festivities!

No Comments »

The first round of judging in the Irish Blog Awards has taken place in the past week and this blog has reached the long lists of the Best Politics Blog (Sponsored by Digital Revolutionaries) and Best News and Current Affairs Blog (Sponsored by IGO people). The long lists for all the categories were announced last night and I’m delighted to see new blood all over the place! (I sound like Dracula when I read that…shudder)

This year a blog can only be in one category as judging proceeds to shortlisting so I’ve chosen to remain in the Best News and Current Affairs Category from here on in and leave the pure Politics to the lads experts to fight out

I am delighted to have reached this stage in both categories. There are a few nominations also knocking around for me in the Best Blog post category and the long list for these will be out by the weekend. Best wishes to all the nominees!

Only 18 days to go to the booked out awards in Cork! Really looking forward to the night/weekend/Irish Blog Week – more of the latter anon!

No Comments »

Nominations for this year’s Irish Blog Awards have been open over a week and there is a week left and I’m only now getting round to thinking about who I’m going to nominate in some if not all of the 20 categories on offer this year. The awards this year are being held in the Peoples Republic of Cork – in the Cork International Airport Hotel on February 21.

Cork and the hotel in particular looks like it’s going to be the base for a Bloggers holiday camp for the weekend judging by the numbers who have booked in to stay and the hundreds who are going to attend the awards and are registered already. (Fleeting thoughts of Damien/Gladys doing ‘Hi-de-Hi Campers’ announcements just passed by brain) I’m really looking forward to it!

Back to nominations – one important thing to remember is that you don’t have to be a blogger to nominate – and this is not a case of getting lots of votes in as there is a two stage judging process after nominations where the wheat is sorted from the chaff or something by lots of judges. I think it’s so important that blog readers (who don’t blog themselves) are able to take the most important seat in getting their spake in at the start.

There are a few changes in categories reflecting trends and the ever widening diversity that is blogging in Ireland. There are no nominations for Best Blog with all the category winners going into the Grand Prix for judging/selection at the end. To be nominated the Irish Blog or Blogger has to have been actively blogging between July 15th and December 15th 2008.

So go on off to the nominations page and have a look and nominate some blogs! Nominations close on January 14th.

No Comments »

Do you remember the days in the Irish Blogosphere when people wondered why there weren’t more women blogging in Ireland or if there was even a need to encourage more women to blog. We had the discussions about women and why they blog or don’t blog. And there were also the times when the men wondered about the differences with womens’ brains/discussion styles/self confidence/comedy stand up routines etc. etc.

Then along came the Irish Blog Awards and the recognition of some great women bloggers in the first and second years apportioning of the gongs.

This year however there was a significant shift! The awards were well and truely feminised.

And it continues, each month someone else brings to our attention another great blog written by a woman. And there seems to be a lot of genuine support out there for new voices and to encourage women to write about whatever it is that interests them.

In Saturday’s Irish Times, Aisling (One of the Beaut’s) McDermott profiled some of the many women involved in blogging in Ireland in a feature in the magazine. There were lovely photos also. (Yup I missed the photoshoot )

It’s a great article capturing some of the wonderful talent out there and remembering the times when being involved in blogging in Ireland seemed daunting or not so female friendly. Thanks to Aisling for the kind words about this particular speck on the map. I’d encourage you to have a look at the other blogs mentioned and go have a read. If you are thinking about starting your own blog you might get some inspiration from some of the women profiled.

*(I have an image in my head that the day of the photoshoot for the article being a bit like that Boots ad with makeup and stuff going on..lol)

2 Comments »

Oh I’m one of the special ones to get spammed. I got an email today targeted at bloggers from ammado about themselves and World Refugee Day and the UNCHR and taking a picture of me or someone else with my hands over me head in a pose to protect refugees and posting it on their site – not even my own site!?

Now I have a thing (or twenty) about human rights so contacting me might have been a good idea – pitching to me about a forthcoming event or campaign and saying have a look at this and we’d welcome your comments. Starting the email with Dear Suzy/Maman Poulet would have been even better!!

Oxfam and others have asked bloggers before about different campaigns – they’ve done it with a bit of nouse and understanding about how to pitch to bloggers. Even the Green Party knows about bloggers and getting a list together and asking if you’d be interested and then not patronising the hell out of you when doing so with ‘charidee/marketing’ speak. I bet if I tried to join this outfit they’d have me inviting all my friends to join too and spamming them in a ‘poking facebook’ kind of way.

ammado (with a small a – groan) – I hadn’t heard about them until today’s email – so I headed off to the website to find out more – and here’s the spiel…

‘the global online community of people who care. Providing a free interactive and unique environment, ammado connects nonprofits and engaged individuals to achieve their vision.’

It stinks of Chuggers on the net. Not buzzing in the blogosphere. Well the Irish blogosphere is certainly buzzing about the spam and the way in which the pitch was made.

If the UNCHR had emailed me themselves and said have a look at this I might have been along for a gander – if it were a news story even better – if you had picked one Irish blogger and asked them to blog about it and spread the word ye might of even got somewhere. There are loads of people in the Irish online communities who have advice on approaching bloggers and creating communities. I doubt they’d give ammado a hand now and the hands over the head thing well that’s crap. And ammado don’t want us to blog about the issues – they want us to go to their site and join up and build their community (aka target audience to tap for a few quid every month)

Now on the asylum seekers and refugees thing – when are we going to get angry about the trafficking of young people into Ireland who go missing and are not protected by the Irish State? Putting my hands over my head and taking a photo of myself won’t get them out of prostitution or slave labour – asking questions and getting angry and asking the HSE and Irish government and UNHCR to do something about it might. You see ammado, (aka Amadán to me for ever more) that’s what bloggers do well.

10 Comments »

I have a list of links that have been brewing, mentions and such – and I have found 5 minutes to mention them!

– Firstly Irish Left Review – go look – it’s new and very shiny –

We believe that the Left must contest conservatism on a broad front – whether it be on issues of governance, the economy, social reform, culture or history,…
…For we are adamant: the marginalisation of the Left is at an end; the half-status and quarter-status of our political parties will no longer persist, the sublimation of our ideas and our history is a thing of the past.

Bring it on lads – it’s looking mighty good design wise too!

– Did you see all those journalists blogging? Shane Hegarty won best blog by a journalist- well done! Harry McGee is back blogging today. The hotbed of blogging in Ireland is really in Tara Street not Cork. (sees PROC types declaring fatwa on MP.)

Will Harry get an Irish Times blog? Who else would you like to see blogging from the Irish Times (and no John Waters is not an original answer!)

– The man who sold Michael Lynn a baby grand piano reads this blog. I’m trying for photos… There might be a hippo!

- I’m going to Creative Camp on Saturday to watch something being grabbed by the balls and help look at the reasons why there are lots of women doing lots of exciting things but we don’t get to hear about them. And think about what we can do to help.

I’m going to play in a castle with 10 foot thick walls and a dungeon with lots of creative types! Now now get out of my boudoir and into Web 2.0 women! (ye know who ye are!)

– And finally for now – as the curtain may be drawning on the Democratic nomination tomorrow (ah go on Hilary keep Richard and others in suspense – hang on there woman!) Slate look at the West Wing and Obama and the similarities. Barack Obama/Jimmy Smits/Matt Santos/ Barack Obama – You will believe…

6 Comments »

Tis a lovely thing that’s sitting in a box in our livingroom at the moment. I don’t quite yet know where I’m putting her yet. It’ll remind me to keep doing what I enjoy doing and as I think I said last night I blog simply because I enjoy it and it can be done. Thanks to all the readers, commenters, nominators, judges, and of course to my sources of information and inspiration!

She’s a she of course. And indeed varieties of her were won by a whole load of lovely talented women last night – Sinead, Sabrina, Beaut.ie, Gingerpixel, Lorraine @ Italian Foodies, Grannymar, A Simple Yarn, The Family Voyage. We’re only brilliant! And I look forward to the continued increase of and respect for the voices of women in Irish blogging, because as last night proved we’re rather good at this – and I’ll also hope to see and support continued chances to introduce other women to the formats and possibilities in documenting whatever stories we have to tell. Lads yer all brilliant too!

Many thanks to Irish Broadband for sponsoring the category, to Hosting365 for sponsoring the Champagne from Bubble Brothers, and to Moviestar.ie for the DVD player!

I don’t think enough thanks and praise can be given to Damien Mulley for the making the (completely non profit/NGO supporting/non business generating/headwrecking) thing that is Irish Blog Awards and the community spirit, the nights craic, the profile given to social media, interest, support, friendly rivalry that goes with it. Rick cried last night when he won – what’s that say? (I snivelled later at home…not a qik in sight…)

Finally thanks to Karen, (who was referred to as Mrs Suzy, the wife, Maman Poulet’s other half and the Rooster last night.) Thanks for being there, loving me and helping me in lots of ways do what I enjoy doing. I’ll never be your wife though but I think you understand!! x

Update – Photos are beginning to appear – more links as I get them – Marcus has lots of photos here including some of me!

Ryan’s set of official photos are now available here.

14 Comments »