It's that time of year again

Here are the details for the (7th) ABRSM Platinum Blend Cafe Awards 2011:

Starting Date:
Sunday 31st July

Time Of First Category Launch:
21:30 BST

Rules & Regulations

1. To vote, you need to PM me (or whoever's in charge) your votes using the messaging tool in 'My Controls'. If you have my email address or are friends with me on Facebook, you can send me your votes in either of those methods instead if you prefer. You can vote for up to ten people. Please rank your nominees in order so I (or whoever's in charge) knows how many points to give them.
2. You are not allowed to vote for yourself, as it is not fair for everyone else. If you do vote for yourself, your vote will not count. [This rule also applies to the Best Couple category]
3. Please only vote for those people who have posted in the past year - the past year being from the 31st July 2010 onwards.
4. Please try not to announce who you are going to vote for in the public domain as it defeats the object of private messaging.
5. While the Best Signature and Best Profile Photo categories are running, please stick to your signature/profile photo (if you read this) during the week. If you decide to change it while the PMing votes week is still on, it would not be fair for everyone else if you suddenly win or come close to winning, plus you may even disadvantage your chances of winning in the process.
6. For the Most Sensible, Supportive, Cheerful and Humorous Poster categories, only vote for those users who are normally sensible, supportive, cheerful or humorous all the time, all year round, and not just clowning about frequently during or near voting time.
7. For the Best Newbie category, a 'newbie' is any new member whose member number is 115284 or above (based on last year's voting).
   For a list of those members who are eligible for this category:
   

   - Click on Members at the top of the page
   - Go to 'Toggle More Options'
   - Where it says 'Join date', you will need to search for those members who joined more than the 07-21-2010
   - At the bottom of the page, you will need to search for all members by total posts in descending order with 50 results per page. Click on 'Go'.

8. If you are planning to go away (e.g. on holiday) and want to send your votes for the category(/ies) you will miss, please let me know beforehand.

Categories
Here is the proposed running order of this year's categories:

| No. | Category | Dates of PM voting | Who to PM | Winner(s)|
1. Most Sensible Poster - 31st July-7th August - Car Expert - katyjay
2. Most Cheerful Poster - 7th-14th August - Car Expert - barry-clari
3. Best Signature - 14th-21st August - Car Expert - wendywoo
4. Most Useful Poster - 21st-28th August - Car Expert - Cyrilla
5. Best Profile Photo - 28th August-4th September - Car Expert - Car Expert / katica
6. Most Enjoyable Poster - 4th-11th September - Car Expert - Bagpuss
7. Best Username - 11th-18th September - Car Expert - PianissiMole
8. Best Newbie - 18th-25th September - Car Expert - ChristopherO
9. Best Couple - 25th September-2nd October - Car Expert - Bagpuss & Cyrilla
10.1. Best Looking Male - 2nd-9th October - Floss - stetenorve
10.2. Best Looking Female - 2nd-9th October - Car Expert - Bagpuss
11. Most Supportive Person - 9th-16th October - Car Expert - barry-clari
12. Most Humorous Poster (The Clavicembalo Award) - 16th-23rd October - Car Expert - carol*piano
13. Member Of The Year - 23rd-30th October - Car Expert - barry-clari

[Note: The list is subject to change]

Another award will be handed out to the member who receives the most PM points during the course of the fourteen categories.

For those who are new to the awards, and want to take part this year, this is how the awards process works:

• A thread will be published every week for each category in the Forums Cafe to inform people they are allowed to vote. All you need to do is to PM/email the person in charge with your votes (you can vote for up to ten people), and the votes will be recorded in a league table.
• The points system is: 1st = 10 points | 2nd = 9 points | 3rd = 8 points | 4th = 7 points | 5th = 6 points | 6th = 5 points | 7th = 4 points | 8th = 3 points | 9th = 2 points | 10th = 1 point
• If for example, you only vote for one person, they get 10 points. If you vote for two people, 1st will get 10 points and 2nd will get 9 points, and so on.
• The league table for each category will be published periodically throughout the week. However, the number of times this will occur will depend on the number of sets of PM votes received after each update.
• After a week, a final league table will be posted on the thread, with the winner(s) being announced usually at around 2130 BST on Sunday evening (unless stated otherwise).
• At the same time, voting for the next category is introduced. This process will be repeated until all the categories have been completed.
• In the event of a tie, the members at the top of the league table will share the award as joint winners.
• Once all categories have been done and a winner is announced for each, there will be an awards ceremony (date to be confirmed). This is where all the winners virtually collect their award(s).

Links from last year's awards

• Main Awards Thread, with links to separate awards threads
• Awards Ceremony preparation (from 2009)
• Awards Ceremony itself (from 2009)

If anyone has any suggestions for new categories or constructive suggestions for improvements, that would be very much appreciated too .

I will be monitoring most of the categories, but if I'm not here, someone else will monitor them in my absence.

Car Expert

***MUST*** get thinking for a decent signature .... as I don't think I could get any other award, !

Thanks for setting this all up again, Car Expert

I'll help you out if you want.... that's if you know who I am under my new guise.

Don't worry, I've kept up with recent proceedings

Car Expert

Let the fun begin. Thanks Car Expert.

Thank you for all your work with this, CE.

I can't wait to win Most Sensible Poster!

Oh, and are couples genuine or imaginary coz me and TDM and Violamum are all in an open relationship!

Yes.

Does the Morrocan House Boy count?

I had no idea there were couples on the forum. I shudder at the thought of OH reading my drivel!

Probably but that'a just dented your Most Sensible hopes...

As with Floss, I'm happy to cover you if you're away for any week, CE

Can I vote for any of the now departed forum members, as long as they posted within the timescale, CE?

How are we supposed to vote for couples if we don't know who is a couple ?
Is there a list of couples somewhere?

The couples are occasionally real couples in real life, but more often two forumites (or a forumite and something else) who have been linked in some way (duet partners and the like). It is not uncommon for the same forumite to appear in several different couples; I think barry-clari had five entries one year, including being coupled with the symbol.

Last year : the smiley, louise1712, aesir22, Babybird2, Clari-Netty, notmusimum, skylark.

The year before : not dissimilar...

...and in the absence of knowledge of actual couples, plenty have also invented combinations which really and truly never ought to be on the same planet as each other, never mind coupled (eg, anacrusis and the entire pushy parent subsection)

Yes, that's fine

Car Expert

Thanks, CE

jod and MatthewD anyone heard of the Oedipus complex!

Given how I've been behaving lately the best I'll do is 'most annoying poster!'

(usual 'Vote H_C' propaganda)

Looks who's back in time for the awards

Seriously though, it's good to see you posting again : you've been missed.

I seem to have lost the place where we can follow the voting score so far. Anyone know where it is?

They're in the individual threads. If you look at the list of "awards" above you'll see that the first one is a link - it's a link to the thread.

Most links are in blue to distinguish them from the underlined titles

Car Expert

Hmm, have been away and only just caught up with all the awards excitement. Looking down the list, I reckon my best bet is to get busy with Google images and Photoshop and (with a large amount of artistic licence) pitch for the 'Best Profile Picture'/'Best Looking Female' awards.

Or I could deregister (as it's all the rage) and burst back on the scene as 'Best Newbie' (would have to be much better than last time, though).

So, the winner of the best profile photo is Car Expert, is it?...

It appears so

Car Expert

The next two categories that will begin later this evening at 21:30 BST will be the Best Looking categories. Votes for Best Looking Female (category 10.2) need to be sent to me as usual, and votes for Best Looking Male (category 10.1) must be sent to Floss, who will be monitoring a category for the first time. There will be two separate threads for any updates and discussion for each category.

Feel free to change your profile photo with a picture of yourself if you so wish to

Car Expert

Are we having an award parteeeeeeeeeee this year, CE?

We can do

Car Expert

OK : let's see what the forum consensus is...