Construction Computing Awards 2009

Nominations for the Construction Computing Awards 2009 are now open (close 3 September). Sponsors include Causeway and MPS. Pretty much the same format as previous years, with online voting for two months from September to November with a ceremony on 19 November, this year at the Tower Hotel, London.

A couple of thoughts:

First, looking at the categories, there are none that are about use of social media –  pretty much confirming, perhaps, that Web 2.0 has yet to penetrate the psyche of many construction industry IT professionals.

Second, as organiser BTC has continued to rely on voting rather than judges, I think making the online voting public would be a powerful demonstration of the ‘wisdom of crowds’, but I doubt BTC will go down that route. For a start, I expect they will want to maintain the suspense on the night, perhaps ensure a good spread of awards among the companies attending the dinner, and maybe guard against people voting more than once (I had a heated online debate with BTC’s Stuart Leigh about this and related issues in 2007). Also knowing that their names might be listed could deter some people from voting (but equally it could encourage some, proud to be associated with the company/application/product they’ve just endorsed).

Displaying the polling figures up to, say, the last week, might get round some of the counter-arguments. The organisers could then reveal the figures during or immediately after the awards ceremony so that we all know how much the winners won by, or how narrowly a runner-up missed out. Publishing the numbers might also increase the credibility of the awards (and the winners) – highlighting that over X,000 votes were cast in Y category, or that the whole event garnered ZZ,000 votes.

What do you think? Comments please….