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: Infamy or Praise

Blawg Review Nominations

By Colin Samuels

Offered in response to the anonymous Editor's call for nominations, the following five posts are, in my humble opinion, the best of the best in what was an outstanding year of Blawg Reviews:

• #89 (Blawg Review) and #127 (Deliberations) -- What do these posts have in common? Each, in addition to collecting examples of excellent legal blogging, taught me something about arcane and somewhat quaint traditions -- mummering and voir dire, respectively.

  When the anonymous Blawg Review Editor produced #89 on January 1, 2007, I wrote, "It's never happened that the Blawg Review of the Year was the first one of the year, but (assuming the Anonymous Editor is willing to accept the award him/herself) this year's award may just go to the first of 2007"; it's held up over the course of the year. At the time, in keeping with the mummering tradition, Ed. invited his audience to attempt to guess his identity. Since then, I've had the pleasure of getting to know Ed. more personally. A year after #89, I'm pleased to say that I know who Ed. is even though I still don't know his name.

  When #127 was posted in September, I wrote, "[W]hen a particular Blawg Review is a destination in itself, a post which educates and rewards time spent reading and considering, what a treat that is!" I was treated not only to a bit of enlightenment about the voir dire process but also introduced to an outstanding blog written by an outstanding blogger. Anne Reed's Deliberations has since become a favorite.



• #116 (Corporate Blawg UK) and #122 (Preaching to the Perverted) -- Nos. 116 and 122, posted in July and August respectively, are the best examples this year of how creatively a collection of legal blog posts can be presented. Corporate Blawg UK and David Gulbransen's Preaching to the Perverted get two of my five nominations this year for remembering, in the course of hosting the carnival of legal blogging, that carnivals should be fun. Corporate Blawg UK presented an entire Blawg Review in rhyming couplets; Gulbransen produced one in the form of a course catalog.


• #134 (New York Personal Injury Law Blog) -- If this vote were a weighted one, Blawg Review #134 would receive my top vote. When Eric Turkewitz posted #134, publicly I wrote that it was "an instant classic. Turkewitz' theme -- the New York City Marathon -- is as well-integrated into the narrative of his Blawg Review as any I can recall seeing over the more than two years this carnival's been making its rounds." Privately I lamented that he couldn't have been scheduled to host just after rather than just before my next-scheduled Blawg Review. #134 was my favorite in 2007 and would be a very worthy Blawg Review of the Year winner.
  

I can't speak for any of you, but I'm more eager to see the final vote for Blawg Review of the Year than the final tally in the upcoming presidential election. Perhaps it's because we have better candidates from which to choose?

Full post as published by Infamy or Praise on January 04, 2008 (boomark / email).