I really must figure out how to check my blog archives. Somewhere back there is one I recall posting about our entering this awards thingy. It was a fair amount of work, and all last minute dashing over a weekend, but we made deadline. Plus it was only (hah!) about £30 to enter.
As you'll gather from the way this is going, we did not make the shortlist. I only found this out because I just had an email saying who had.
I really thought we were in with a chance, otherwise I wouldn't have bothered. Awards can be a real distraction, and an expensive one. But like a gambling addict, you always wonder what would happen with that next roll.
It's the same with a funding application. It's great when you 'win', but when you don't you're just left wondering why. Not always for sour grapes reasons, but it can be hard not to go: 'what...them? But ours was...' At least with awards you do get to see who won, as I have often had my requests to get more information on even the names of successful funding applicants provided, let alone why ours did not make the cut.
More pragmatically, to avoid future wastes of time and money, you really wish you knew if it was it not 'on brief'? Did it fall down the back of the cabinet? Was it pushed? Sadly, the rules of entry usually preclude those unbestowed upon from posing such questions.
As no one is doing what we're doing, there's nobody 'better', so below is a link to the guys who made it. If you have an idle 5, see how you think to they stack up against our offering in the various categories. Feel free to say 'you wuz robbed' to make me feel better.
http://www.startupsawards.co.uk/finalists2005.html
And may the best .com... make the greatest impact, and positive difference via their online audience.
Winners are not always those who win awards.
And a blog is much better therapy than punching out the wastebin.
