Make an Impact: Do Oscar Buzzers Get the Job Done?

Internet has steadily changed Oscar buzzing over the last years. A few years ago, Sasha Stone’s Oscar Watch (Now, Awards Daily) emerged as the most important Academy Awards-related website on the net; an integral resource for all those interested on that little golden guy everyone wants but only a few actually get, and still remains as one of the most enjoyable websites within the clan. I like to believe Stone’s unprejudiced work as editor of the now gone OW contributed to the expansion of the Academy Awards online universe and the subsequent birth of other websites like And the Winner Is, Everything Oscar, Oscar Central and of course; our own.

When The Oscar Igloo was launched at the end of 2003, it was a work in progress that eventually found its place on the net and positioned right away. We are not the same website we were back then but throughout these years, we have kept a sole mission: to provide our readers with the most entertaining and most unbiased Academy Awards coverage on the net, all year long.

“It’s not about who we want to win, it’s about who will” has been our motto since the beginning and we have committed to it, just like many of our fellow Oscar-websites (and now, blogs), no matter how difficult it can get to stay away from our personal preferences on a subject as controversial and divisive as the Academy Awards.

It’s a hard task to be an unbiased website devoted to the Academy Awards 24/7 but I know our team of writers gives their best to follow the race, instead of trying to influence it. There is a reason why our biz is called Oscar Coverage, don’t you agree?

Oscar Coverage should be just that and Oscar Buzzers, known or not, should learn that it is not our job to force our personal opinions or agendas into our predictions or articles. We are not the stars of this show, remember that.

As a business-educated professional, I can understand the need of many of today’s top Oscar Buzzers with artistic backgrounds to make a brand out of their names. They are writers, they are artists in their own right and they need to capitalize on their prestige to make a living. In The Oscar Igloo, our website is our brand; we are a team of writers with different origins, personalities and tastes; joined by the full understanding of our common responsibility and the goal of keep expanding into new entertainment categories.

We have learned to track the buzz and follow the news, not trying to become the news. I fear many Oscar buzzers have detoured from this simple notion to nonsensical results: they have turned their web spaces into battlefields and they have contributed to the emergence of power struggles between websites that have no reason to compete with each other in the first place. If there is one resource people will always demand, that is information; even more if it is at everyone’s reach.

When the information becomes doubtful though, the writer-reader bond breaks and once this happens, there is no turning back.

Like Awards Daily, The Envelope also provides a substantial coverage of the Academy Awards (among other awards shows) by mixing original content with external buzz and news. Even Awards-expert and buzzer Tom O’Neil has apparently being positively influenced by his joint venture with the LA Times (although his championing for certain projects like this year’s Sweeney Todd could rival David Poland’s).

There are plenty Oscar-resources for you to choose and many are certainly plagued by personal agendas and bias. You know them, it’s not appropiate in my position to mention them but here’s the thing, only your valuable input can let them, us, know…

Hence, I'm asking you, Oscar-fan:

Do Oscar Buzzers get their job done? Do We get it done? Or Not?

Talk about it in our forum!

Leave your input!