The best thing about the SA Blog Awards..

is not the incestuous, self-congratulatory backslapping of the participants, which 'hell why not' I don't have a problem with at all. Congrats to all of them, especially Peas and her agent twa. The best thing is that it provides a central repository homepage of great links to good, proud ZA Blogs and in a sense creates a community out of all of them. What we have is unique and vibrant blog community who deal with serious issues (since our land is full of them) but also know how to have fun and generally take the piss.

When I revisit sites that started the whole blog thing in the 'States such as the great-grandaddy of bloggers, Glenn Reynolds at Instapundit I notice a lack of vibrancy as if he is just posting for the sake of posting. Many of my old favourites now simply return dead links. The passion and excitement of the early 2000's has left these blogs. Even legal bolgs of people like Stuart Buck at the Buck Stops Here used to provide an insight into themselves and their broader interests. Now it's pretty much focussed on the US legal system and administration, and much as I like the writing it does tend to lack personality. Let us hope the ZA blog community retains its vibrancy going forward.