Well, we didn't win an ONYA this year...

...but that doesn't mean we can't continue our great work and win one next year!

During his introductory comments at the ONYAs Che quoted someone-or-other who had said that you should never enter your work for an award because you'll get discouraged if you don't win, and you'll stop doing the good work you're already doing because you'll think it's not good enough. Che disagreed with this sentiment, and so do we.

At WebWeaver Productions we love doing what we do - we love designing and building beautiful accessible websites - and we know we're doing it pretty well - both because our clients love our work, and also because we were nominated four times in three categories for three different ONYAs.

Our Environmental Protection Authority website was nominated for Best Accessibility and Best Use of HTML/CSS, our Optimation website was also nominated for Best Use of HTML/CSS, and my website The Gathering archives was nominated for Best Content (Personal).

We were disappointed not to win - but completely honoured to be there in the first place, in such illustrious company.

Radio New Zealand won both the Best Accessibility category and the Best Use of HTML/CSS category - and it couldn't have gone to a nicer group of people. They've been under siege from National this week, and a huge cheer went up when they won their awards. It's great to see such a large organisation striving to keep their website as accessible as possible, creating the best quality code they can create, and working hard to maintain their high standards over time. Well done guys!

If you want to express your support for keeping Radio NZ commercial-free and out from under the thumb of political or commercial influence, you might like to join the Save Radio New Zealand Facebook group. As I write this I see it's almost at the 10,000 fans mark - not bad for a group that's only been in existence for four days. I think National might have a fight on their hands if they pursue this...

My dear friend Zef Fugaz ended up winning the Best Content (Personal) category for his fantastic blog, zef[a]media - which he's been writing for years and years. It's completely brilliant - and shows very clearly just why he's one of New Zealand's most experienced and most well-respected user experience web professionals. Great job, Zef!

Being nominated for an ONYA (or four!) is especially thrilling because the judges are pretty much like superstars in our universe. It's rather awesome knowing that Alex Wright (New York Times), Amy Hoy (Slash7), Bek Hodgson (Etsy), Brian Fling (pinch/zoom), Donna Spencer (Maadmob), Jason Ryan (State Services Commission), Rachel McAlpine (Contented Enterprises), Russ Weakley (Max Design), and Thomas Fuchs (script.aculo.us) might have taken a look at our work...

It inspires all of us to keep working, keep learning, keep on striving for perfection, and keep on doing the best job we can possibly do. Our websites are made with love, just as Webstock and the ONYAs are made with love.



projection mapping + visuals: thedarkroom.tv audio + sound design: jeramiah ross aka module wellington town hall new zealand / 19.02.10 (larger version here)

Thank you everyone involved in both Webstock and the ONYAs for an absolutely wonderful week. You really do rock! WE LOVE YOU!


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