For four years the Irish Blog Awards have been a raucous, and often nude, celebration of the best of the Irish ‘blogosphere’.

From all corners of the country bloggers of all shapes and sizes converge on Dublin to drink pints, tell jokes about UNIX and swap Wordpress upgrade tips. Secondary to this is an elaborate awards ceremony, hosted by popular radio presenter and former TD for Dublin South-Central, Rick O’Shea.

Mullet has challenged Declan Ganley to a duel. As yet Ganley has not repsonded.

Already preparations are underway for the 2009 show with a change of venue and, indeed, a change of city. This years awards will take place in Cork, home of the founder and country music singer Damien Mullet. He told the Irish Sentinel “People have said it’s great that I’m bringing the show to Cork, the real capital of Ireland, and that I’m doing my bit for Corkonian rights, but it goes much deeper than that.

It’s all to do with handiness. After this year’s show I can just grab a taxi and go home. As you might imagine a taxi from Dublin each year costs a fortune”.

But with excitement building amongst the blog populi a dissenting voice has emerged. Hank Scorpio, Libertas spokesman, has called on people to vote against the Irish Blog Awards. He said “So what is in this ‘awards show’ that is so objectionable? It grants extensive powers to the Irish Blog Awards with no real means of holding accountable those taking over the power. The Irish Blog Awards will have extensive power over key areas Irish blog life. In some of these they are even granted exclusive control and in others they will have the ability to write Irish blog legislation.

In fact, it is hard to think of any major function of blogging in which the Irish Blog Awards cabal would not have power over if the Irish Blog Awards goes ahead. For the future of Irish blogging people should vote ‘no’.”

The move has been met with widespread condemnation across the Irish Blogging scene apart from the blogger who likes everything who said “I can see his point of view. Yes, the Irish Blog Awards is great, and yes, it’s my absolute ambition to win one but Libertas won’t follow me on Twitter if I go against them so I’m saying that we should acknowledge how great the awards are and give full props to Damien Mullet but at the same time we should vote ‘no’. It’s easy being me”.

It’s not the first controversial incident to emerge from the Irish Blog Awards. In 2006 blogger Twenty Major sent a henchman who, unbeknownst to many, released a pheromone into the audience which would ensure he won awards for the next two years. His evil plan was revealed in his 2008 autobiography ‘My life as a cunt’, before his enforced retirement due to old age.

And in 2007 fourteen audience members were gunned down in cold blood by a Limerick gang who took their fancy dress just that one step too far.