Hello everyone! Welcome to the latest installment of The Blogger Awards v2.0, covering entries in February 2025! This continues a blogging community tradition that recognizes the best blogs of the month in different categories.

It's time to announce the results. All those who reach the podium can expect to see the results reflected in The Blogger Awards v2.0 Medal Table in short order.

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Gold: @PierreLuc for Your Elo is lying to you!
Silver: @JugadaBrillante for Squid Chess Game and @LeafySnack for ChessMatrix: LIGHTS! CAMERA! AUCTION!!!
Bronze: Not awarded due to tie for Silver.

Some comments from the judges:

JustGettingThisOffMyChess:

This month, the best title was "Your Elo is Lying to you" by @PierreLuc. This title created intrigue in its statement which made the reader want to read on.

Silver went to @ChocoCaramelPawn, because whether on purpose or not, I found it fitting that the person who wrote about getting many views on YouTube, titled their blog in the most clickbaity way, with "I became a youtuber for a year. Here's what happened".

My bronze went to @LeafySnack's "ChessMatrix: LIGHTS! CAMERA! AUCTION!!!". My reasoning? It was the third best title.⠀⠀⠀⠀

Orca:

@JugadaBrillante takes 1st place on titles for me. Most internet users are at least somewhat aware of Squid Game, so this title wins the readers' attention just on that. However, a bonus point is that this type of title can likely appear when one searches for “Squid Games”, which may well boost views.

As for @PierreLuc, the title isn’t difficult to decipher, but it’s still provocative enough. Anyone would find themselves curious even if they get the sense that they understand what the blog is about.

And last we’ve got @Alina_Bakhtina_24. She could’ve gotten 2nd place, but the tail end of the title was unappealing to me. However, the first part of the title reminded me of Forbes 30 Under 30, which would be a nice reference if intentional.

KevinSmithIdiot:

There were any number of excellent titles this month. I ended up with a list of candidates that alternated between screaming, "Hey! Read me! This could be you!!" and others that were soothing.

There was one that really jarred my funny bone, so, I'm plugging for the gold for @PierreLuc's "Your Elo is lying to you!"

But the competition was fierce. I'm not a Keanu fan (nor a critic), but @LeafySnack's "ChessMatrix: LIGHTS! CAMERA! AUCTION!!!" actively pierced any possible nonchalance regarding that bit of neon-garbed adverteasing (yes, it's a made-up word) and earned my vote for silver.

Finally, things settled down a bit and I was pleased to cast a vote for @PokeGirl93's "The Best Chess Stories I Have to Share" as the third and final spot on my podium.

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Gold: @PokeGirl93 for The Best Chess Stories I Have To Share
Silver: @JugadaBrillante for Squid Chess Game
Bronze: @DocSimooo for The mathematical and musical harmony of chess and @Nguyen-LongNhat for Ⅺ-The birth of the camera is a witness to the anecdotal history of chess!

Some comments from the judges:

JustGettingThisOffMyChess:

@PokeGirl93 won this hands down. It's one of those topics where I was wishing I thought of it first. Many people could be silver or bronze. I ended up choosing @JugadaBrillante for silver for Squid Chess Game, with @VOB96 snatching bronze because of how quirky I knew this topic was going to be, which she nailed.⠀⠀⠀⠀

Orca:

@JugadaBrillante takes the top spot again for me. I don’t really think there’s too much to say about why. It’s a strong topic pick.

@Nguyen-LongNhat comes in 2nd in my opinion. Initially the relationship of chess with the birth of cameras was not a topic that crossed my mind, but it became attractive once the words were planted into my head.

Finally, I chose @Chessy_Chess1 for 3rd place. The title does nothing for me, but the topic was interesting. The idea that there might be artifacts of chess in the world intrigued me.

KevinSmithIdiot:

imo, @PokeGirl93's "The Best Chess Stories I Have to Share" was ahead of the pack on this one. It's a timeless story, but this one was well-told. Top line: A nomination for gold! @DocSimooo delivered another orchestral triumph that welded chess, math, and music together in a way that earned my proposed placement of second on the podium. Rounding out the top three on my personal podium was @ChocoCaramelPawn's story of a YouTube Year, something I can appreciate from the perspective of an author who is always left wondering if there's an audience out there.

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Gold: @VOB96 for Duel Of Nations! Episode 4 - Russia vs. Marshall Islands 
Silver: @MaybeEvery for five eligible bot-chelors 
Bronze: @PokeGirl93 for The Best Chess Stories I Have To Share

Some comments from the judges:

JustGettingThisOffMyChess:

Following up from best topic, how could I not choose @VOB96 for gold here? She went for it, and it was stupid in all the right ways. @PokeGirl93 handily got silver, with humour shining through in all of their stories. Bronze was difficult to decide. I ended up going with @NMChessToImpress. While not belly-laugh inducing, it was light-hearted, while being educational, which isn't the easiest feat to achieve.⠀

Orca:

@MaybeEvery returns to stage with another bot roleplay blog. It may be my imagination, but I feel that the jokes were better this time around. At the very least, they were good enough for 1st place according to my (low) standard of humor.

For our 2nd runner up PokeGirl93 brings us a few chess stories in her life. There weren’t any notable jokes, but instead I found amusement at the young @PokeGirl93’s penchant for mischief.

Last, we have @VOB96’s parody of her own Duel of Nations series. The main joke came from the clear ridiculousness of the comparison, so VOB was for the most part writing as if she couldn’t understand why anyone would take issue with her scoring. Therefore, there weren’t any/many specific jokes to laugh at. However, the underlying joke still rings through, so I think 3rd place is suitable.

KevinSmithIdiot:

In the original version of this club, I managed to snag a few awards in this category because no one else bothered to compete! [Timing is everything!!😆] Now, even after we lured @JustGettingThisOffMyChess into the oh-so-lucrative world of judging, there is a circus of comedians (sheep come in flocks, cows in herds, so comics must come in circuses) tickling our sides and burying memes in our brains.

For my money's worth, @PierreLuc was at the top of the billboard. But @MaybeEvery kept me chuckling with the flirtations of Five-eligible-bot-chelors and so I placed that bot-batch in the hat for a date with a silver medal. We'll see what the other judges thought about that! Finally, @VOB96 certainly kept me amused with her "Vanessa ex machinations" and merited at least a bronze nomination, perhaps more in the eyes of her loyal followers.

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Gold: @SC0RP10NHUNTER for Albert Einstein - A Chess Genius?
Silver: @2000Knights for The Life of José Capablanca
Bronze: @imnotgoodatchess123456783 for The Faithful French Defense - A beginner's guide

Some comments from the judges:

JustGettingThisOffMyChess:

This is not my wheelhouse, but I'll do my best.

@SC0RP10NHUNTER gets gold,

@imnotgoodatchess123456783 gets silver, and

@NMChessToImpress gets bronze.⠀⠀⠀⠀

Orca:

I should mention that @MaybeEvery, who got my first place in this category the last time, did not “lose”. My high praise back then remains, but at the time it came more from the freshness of the idea than anything else. I chose not to add him this time, because I’m still not sure if he should be considered seriously for this category, when he’s not really analyzing anything.

All that said, I don’t have too much to say about my podium. They all do quite well with their analysis, and the edge is slight. @2000Knights is 1st, @SC0RP10NHUNTER places 2nd and @imnotgoodatchess123456783 comes last.

KevinSmithIdiot:

In a stark-raving-mad departure I'm changing from my usual sequence of gold, silver, bronze and will start with my nominee for bronze.

Why? Because I know @NMChessToImpress would have taken gold if he'd been focused on teaching his audience how to analyze a game. But he was focused on a more important topic. And that left room for the top two spots on the podium.

Since I started with bronze, let me just say, "Sorry, @SC0RP10NHUNTER, but you'll have to settle for my silver nomination this month." Not so bad, eh? You beat out a NM!

So, who did I think earned a shot at gold? None other than @2000Knights. I found your analyses of a number of Capa's games refreshing, and startlingly unencumbered by the slipshod use of chess.com analysis that spouts out nonsense in the openings and proposes brilliancies in the middle game and endgame that would confound Carlsen, Tal, or Spielmann.

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Gold: @VOB96 for Duel Of Nations! Episode 4 - Russia vs. Marshall Islands
Silver: @PokeGirl93 for The Best Chess Stories I Have To Share, @JugadaBrillante for Squid Chess Game, and @ChocoCaramelPawn for I became a chess youtuber for a year. Here's what happened
Bronze: Not awarded due to ties for Silver.

Some comments from the judges:

JustGettingThisOffMyChess:

Engaging to me is quite simple. It's which ones did I just want to keep reading and reading. The answers are @VOB96 in gold, @PierreLuc in silver and @PokeGirl93 in bronze.⠀⠀⠀⠀

Orca:

It seems we’re far from done with @JugadaBrillante. It’s not enough to come up with a good topic and matching title, execution matters. And the execution this time was excellent.

In listicon fashion, @Alina_Bakhtina_24 takes us through a brief summary of some of the best chess players under 20 years of age. It was an easy enough read, but I particularly liked the stat cards that she made. I think I’d like to see that idea further developed in the future.

While we wait on those cards, I think @PokeGirl93 for 3rd is good. I think this is her 2nd submission (possibly 2nd blogpost as well), but the quality remains high. In particular, there’s an unmatched ease I find when reading her writing. I don’t get it, I don’t seek to, but I think it’s enough to give her 3rd.

KevinSmithIdiot:

Twas February, and the slithy toves... Drat, my thoughts always get ambushed by that Lewis Carrol poem.

There were any number of entries that captivated me in this month's competition. But @ChocoCaramelPawn came the closest to eliciting that same Jabberwocky feeling with their sensational "I YouTube...do you" exploration of a year in their life, thus earning my gilded nomination for the top of the podium.

But I gotta say, @VOB96 and @PokeGirl93 were in the mix, gyring and gimbling in the wabe to earn silver and bronze-tinged nominations respectively.

The list of blogs one could sink into for a good chew goes on...but so must other comments.

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Gold: @PokeGirl93 for The Best Chess Stories I Have To Share
Silver: @VOB96 for Duel Of Nations! Episode 4 - Russia vs. Marshall Islands 
Bronze: @JugadaBrillante for Squid Chess Game

Some comments from the judges:

JustGettingThisOffMyChess:

@PokeGirl93 is a great storyteller who deserves gold here. @VOB96 did such a great job here that it had me believing it was serious (which it was). Bronze could have gone to nearly 10 people. I ended up leaning to @Nguyen-LongNhat. Great job.⠀⠀⠀⠀

Orca:

@JugadaBrillante once again takes my pick for 1st. The writing in his interactive game was great. I have more to say, but I’ll hold off for now.

@Nguyen-LongNhat’s writing was quite classy. I quite enjoyed it.

@2000Knights went in depth on Capablanca’s life this time. A small detail that’s more suitable for the editing category, I liked that the decision to add a Table of Contents link along the blog. It was a hefty blog, so allowing readers the ability to control their reading experience was considerate.

KevinSmithIdiot:

So many good writers, but there can be only three nominations by any one judge.

@PokeGirl93 stole my golden ticket, while @VOB96 added to her treasure chest by snaring a silver token for the losing team in her post, and @2000Knights snagged the brass ring for his story about Capablanca living life to its fullest.

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Gold: @JugadaBrillante for Squid Chess Game
Silver: @VOB96 for Duel Of Nations! Episode 4 - Russia vs. Marshall Islands
Bronze: @PokeGirl93 for The Best Chess Stories I Have To Share

Some comments from the judges:

JustGettingThisOffMyChess:

Gold for @JugadaBrillante, because of the way they put their unique blogs together so well. @VOB96 takes silver, always editing professionally, and @PokeGirl93 gets bronze.⠀⠀⠀⠀

Orca:

Surely for the last time, I pick @JugadaBrillante 1st in this month of submissions. As I said in the last category, I had a bit to say, but I felt it was more appropriate for the editing category. @JugadaBrillante managed to develop the CHYOA format that Vanessa brought to chess.com to an amazing level. The visuals were well done, the writing and formatting were too. Only thing I’d add, a button at the end of the story that would send the reader straight to the comment section similar to the one for when you picked the wrong answer. The scroll was long.

In 2nd place, it’s going to be @Nguyen-LongNhat for me. A lot of good pictures, and well-chosen paragraphing. It doesn’t make it a “shoe-in” per se, but the fundamentals do count for something, and @Ngueyen-LongNhat has them down. I wasn’t a huge fan of the header style, but it was still consistent and there were no negative areas to dock points from, if I had wanted to.

@Alina_Bakhtina_24 similarly has a formatting style that doesn’t suit me, but once again, you need to look at it reasonably. It’s consistent and the formatting rules make sense. My personal preference pushed well aside, it’s quite good, and the previously mentioned stat cards add a bit of flavor for me.

KevinSmithIdiot:

Great editing makes the writing look even better. Here I rearranged the deck chairs a bit from my Best Writing nominees.

It was a razor-thin margin in many ways, but I punched @VOB96's golden ticket in this case, offered a silver coin to @PokeGirl93 (no, not thirty pieces of silver. I'm not rich), and ponied up another brass ring to @2000Knights.

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Gold: @Alina_Bakhtina_24
Silver: @PierreLuc
Bronze: Not awarded this month. Many have shown improvement, but we are looking for breakthroughs.

Some comments from the judges:

Orca:

I'm not too good at keeping up with how our bloggers are improving, but I felt @Alina_Bakhtina_24 and @PierreLuc made sense. I couldn't think of anyone else for 3rd place.

KevinSmithIdiot:

@Alina_Bakhtina_24 just missed out on a medal in December. Now she came back even stronger! And @PierreLuc started out well and then stepped it up a notch. For your efforts, the two of you earned my head nod for gold and silver respectively.

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Gold: @DocSimooo for The mathematical and musical harmony of chess
Silver: @2000Knights for The Life of José Capablanca
Bronze: @Alina_Bakhtina_24 for Chess legends under 20 | TOP-5 

Some comments from the judges:⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀

JustGettingThisOffMyChess:

@DocSimooo takes gold and @JugadaBrilliante takes silver. I could give my reasoning for gold and silver, but I would rather you just go look at them.

Bronze does need one though. I initially had someone else in, before finding out that they didn't enter. I was then reading through my notes for when I judged BlogChamps and I'd written "Remember Alina's pictures for The Blogger Awards". If there were a category for pictures within blogs, Alina would get gold. I'm taking that into account and giving them at least something here.

Orca:

@2000Knights follows a somewhat classic style for the TBA and BC bloggers, but there’s a reason it’s popular. Where it loses in creativity and freshness (in my opinion), it wins in a crisp and appealing appearance.

@PierreLuc’s thumbnail on the other hand is far simpler but maintains appeal with a sharp (possibly high contrast) picture on white, as well as some not too crazy black and red text. I’m not able to place a name to the idea, but this reminds me of some YouTube video thumbnails that I’ve seen before.

Now, @Alina_Bakhtina_24’s thumbnail is the complete opposite of Pierre’s. Maybe calling it ‘busy’ would be unfair, but there’s a lot more going on, with 3 different text fonts and colors, and the lineup of boys that the blog covers.

KevinSmithIdiot:

My nomination for the top spot went to the thumbnail I felt best captured every element of the blog, @DocSimooo's The mathematical and musical harmony of chess. @2000Knights' entry would have been my favorite in most months, this time it got shunted to silver by the Doc.

@2000Knights managed to hold off the hard-charging @imnotgoodatchess123456783 who, imo, was also holding off a bevy of close pursuers who could easily have won silver or gold in another month.

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Gold: Capturing the ultimate recognition was @PokeGirl93 for The Best Chess Stories I Have To Share
Silver: @JugadaBrillante for Squid Chess Game and @VOB96 for Duel Of Nations! Episode 4 - Russia vs. Marshall Islands
Bronze: Not awarded due to tie for Silver.

Some comments from the judges:

JustGettingThisOffMyChess:

In the end, @PokeGirl93 earned this gold. I remember after their first blog, thinking that they should have saved it for BlogChamps. She proved that she didn't need to save anything, outdoing herself in every single way here.

For silver, I gave it to @VOB96. It might be a New Zealand / Australian humour thing here, but I enjoyed every moment of this. When I first read it, I actually felt that it would be very hard to beat.

@JugadaBrillante gets bronze. Their blogs are so fun, and this may have been their best.⠀⠀⠀⠀

Orca:

In 1st, I’ve got @JugadaBrillante, for my 2nd place, it’s going to be 2000Knights, and for my 3rd place I choose, @Alina_Bakhtina_24.

I don’t if there’s too much to say here. I feel that my picks are obvious if you’ve read the rest of my comments, but perhaps the order could be a bit more surprising. I think that overall, @2000Knights wrote the stronger blog, but I did enjoy Alina’s blog more. This is just a personal preference, so I ultimately gave @2000Knights the edge.

KevinSmithIdiot:

Okay, so you can add up my nominations as well as I can and get a sense of where I chose to cast my ballots for Best Blog.

All three folks I think belong on the podium wrote blogs that competed well in just about every category even if they finished off the podium in several. My choices were Gold- @PokeGirl93, Silver - @VOB96, and Bronze - @DocSimooo.

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This is it! Congratulations to all the award winners, all the podium finishers, and everyone who took part! Remember: the competition for March has already opened and we welcome your best blog as you try again to claim a spot on one or more podiums!

We'll see you soon with the March 2025 winners!

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MONTH SUMMARY