I heard that voting for the Cybersocket awards was supposed to start on Nov. 3rd so today (Nov. 10th) I went to their main page to vote and there is absolutely nothing there that would direct surfers to a voting page.
Oh wait, I take that back… up in the right corner in a tiny font size is a link for “Web awards” but upon clicking it you are taken to a page with info about the awards but still no way to vote.
Anyone know what the deal is with the Cybersocket awards?
EDIT: Sorry, I took another look and found the small “Vote” tab at the top of the page. But could they make this any harder to find? And it sucks that none of my blogs got nominated.
Well… it’s an award that mainly benefits them, they get lots of incoming links from people who feel flattered that they got nominated. Nothing wrong with that and a great way of building links to their site. Every year I notice lots of sponsor sending out newsletters with “vote for me” to both sponsors and their members, which of course gives cybersocket a lot of free traffic.
Just as long as everyone are aware that it might not be a unbiased award. People have noticed over the years that there seems to be a correlation between who wins and who are paying advertisers on Cybersocket. It’s a yearly discussion on forums between people who love them or hate them (Cybersocket).
However to be fair, this forum won an award a couple of years ago, and I didn’t buy an advert. So who knows. They do also link back to all the nominated sites and the winners are mentioned on a page for several months. And you can’t blame them for awarding their sponsors really, everyone has to survive and make it worth their while.
Personally I won’t put up their banners or links, I don’t give away traffic for free. I would just end up sending them far more traffic than they would ever send to me. (People really should check their traffic logs).
On the other hand, there are many affiliates who send far more traffic to the different nominated sites than Cybersocket ever does, yet they never get mentioned on a sponsor site. So it’s a bit weird how people behave just as soon as someone mentions the word “award”… But it’s their traffic and as long as they keep those Cybersocket links off their Affiliate tours I’m happy.
Yawn! It’s long been known that most nominees are people that Cybersocket would like to sell advertising.
And I’ll say it once again, what the hell is Cybersocket? Is it a surfer magazine or a webmaster magazine. They’ve never resolved this identity crisis.
I think the whole conspiracy theory is nonsense. Obviously, Cybersocket is a popular advertising venue for most successful gay companies and its the very same successful gay companies that get nominated by the public because they deserve it. Just like the GayDemon forum, I also won a Cybersocket award for ChiliHost as the best hosting company 2006, and I never advertised with them.
This year, I am nominated for Business Person Of The Year as well as Affiliate Program (HunkMoney) and Community (GWW) still without advertising. I prefer to think that I was nominated because I did a lot this year, including taking over and paying off ALL outstanding affiliate payments and debts for BritishBucks, LatinoBucks (formerly AlexanderBucks) and GWW.
[QUOTE=HunkMoneyLuke;82350]I think the whole conspiracy theory is nonsense. Obviously, Cybersocket is a popular advertising venue for most successful gay companies and its the very same successful gay companies that get nominated by the public because they deserve it. Just like the GayDemon forum, I also won a Cybersocket award for ChiliHost as the best hosting company 2006, and I never advertised with them.
This year, I am nominated for Business Person Of The Year as well as Affiliate Program (HunkMoney) and Community (GWW) still without advertising. I prefer to think that I was nominated because I did a lot this year, including taking over and paying off ALL outstanding affiliate payments and debts for BritishBucks, LatinoBucks (formerly AlexanderBucks) and GWW.
Well to be brutally honest, I think I got the award for best forum because at the time no one else wanted to accept it at the time. I did need a new bookstand so suited me very well.
I’m just not sure Cybersocket is what it used to be. It’s a small site with few surfers and not exactly an authority on who’s who. I doubt that their voters are representative of gay adult surfers today. The real question is how many of the votes are actually the site owners themselves voting over and over again.
To put it in perspective, Alexa Ranks (yes I know they are not perfect but it gives you a rough idea):
BUT it’s still nice to get an award no matter what. It’s always nice to get a pat on the back and there really isn’t any other award around that’s gay specific.
PS I have a feeling I just ruined my chances of an award! I really could do with a matching bookstand
Damn my Alexa figures are better than Cybersocket But worse than all the rest you mentioned. LOL Oh hell I am tickled pink I got 2 noms (Best Gay Porn Blog) and yeah the knee slapper Best Porn Personalty UGH how did that happen?(I WRITE about and attend a few functions)
They say its based on your readers votes but hell I only blogged about Cybersocket once last summer and maybe a few times on Twitter.
Still after 3 years online nice to get some recognition.
BTW maybe its an advertising legend but I have heard the story repeated so many times that Corbin Fisher launched in late 2004 early 05 based on 6 months of back page ads in Cybersocket. I know I subbed to the site after seeing the Cybersocket ad.(then unknown Mason Wyler)
I do doubt anything like that would happen today in 2010
