Bogus National Magazine Awards nominees list goes live
Ah, what a tease. Many mag writers were surprised and delighted (and in some cases, disappointed) when a nominee list went up on the National Magazine Awards website Wednesday — way ahead of the previously-announced May 2 release date. But, alas, just as congratulatory tweets started flying, the NMA Foundation said the list wasn’t right.
Ah, what a tease. Many mag writers were surprised and delighted (and in some cases, disappointed) when a nominee list went up on the National Magazine Awards website Wednesday — way ahead of the previously-announced May 2 release date.
But, alas, just as congratulatory tweets started flying, the NMA Foundation said the list wasn’t right. At first, the NMAF posted a note to its site saying the list was “counterfeit.” It later posted a longer explanation, saying the list was pulled from “unverified, unchecked data.”
The explanation continues:
“Today, as everyone knows, a ‘live link was uncovered and featured a list of 2011 NMA nominees.
So how did this happen? Our web provider informed us that the “off” toggle malfunctioned (it has since been fixed). It appears that someone who had bookmarked last year’s report clicked on the report link, and that triggered the system to automatically update the report, pulling from unverified, unchecked data elsewhere in the system. The list generated by the system has — until today — not been seen or vetted by NMAF staff and is very much incomplete and subject to change.
To reiterate what we said earlier, the judging is not final and the NMAF has not yet created its own nominees’ lists for ANY of the categories for this year’s awards. We sincerely regret the excitement and confusion this may have caused among members of the magazine community.”
And in case you’re still holding out hope, (or hope that the list was fake and that lo-and-behold you are nominated) read what NMAF president Arjun Basu told The National Post:
“I was surprised as anyone else when I heard the ‘nominations’ floating around. I can tell you it wasn’t leaked because there is nothing to leak. The vast majority of the judging isn’t final yet, so there are no official nominee lists in our computer systems.”
Crummy words to hear if (like me) you appeared on the bogus list.
The NMA gala takes place this year on June 10. The bona fied list will be posted to the NMA site next month — but if you really want to see what generated yesterday’s twitter tsunami among the mag crowd visit torontoist.com for the full screen-shot. Note: some categories, such as magazine of the year, didn’t appear on the “unverified” and “unchecked” list.
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