Alright folks, buckle up because tracking this year’s ELF Awards was a wild ride. Honestly, I almost threw my laptop out the window twice.
The Starting Point: Total Chaos
Heard whispers about the ELF Awards 2024 shortlist floating around. Saw a few folks on my feeds buzzing about it. Me? I hadn’t gotten any official emails. Zilch. Zero. Figured I’d better start digging myself. Opened the damn event website first thing. Looked pretty, sure, but finding the actual nominees list felt like searching for a sock in a black hole. Clicked every tab they had.
My Garbage Research Method
Ended up scrolling through my email trash folder first. Yup. Deleted it with a bunch of newsletters last Tuesday. Big brain move. Went back to the website and found one tiny link buried in the footer saying “Updates Coming Soon.” Super helpful.
Decided social media was the only way. Started checking every official ELF Award account I could find. Twitter? Last tweet was from 2023. Instagram? Pretty pictures of last year’s party. Finally, saw someone tag the ELF handle in a Facebook comment asking about the shortlist. Scrolled down. Saw one reply hours later saying “List announced! Check our official announcement.” No link. Just vibes. Fantastic.
The “Big” Reveal
Gave up and googled “ELF Awards 2024 nominees”. Third link down was some obscure entertainment blog. Clicked it. Boom. There it was. Scanned that list like my life depended on it. Honestly? Half the names I didn’t even recognize. Not sure if it’s me getting old or the scene changing too fast. Used a super advanced technique called “opening a new tab for each unfamiliar name”. Took ages. Found out one person makes these insane clay sculptures. Another does underwater dance performances. Cool. But also… how did they even get nominated?
Why This Process Sucks Rocks
Got thinking. Why is finding out about an arts award harder than assembling flat-pack furniture? Whole system feels busted. Feels like they expect everyone to live inside their specific social media bubble. Newsflash: we don’t. Found myself explaining what the ELFs even are to my neighbour while chasing the list. Not ideal. Also, that shortlist blog? Probably scraped the data. Doubt they got permission. Whole thing feels messy.
Here’s the funny part. Just as I finished writing down notes about the nominees I did recognize, guess what landed in my inbox? Yep. The official ELF Awards announcement email. Timed perfectly for after I’d done all the legwork myself. Classic. The email looked slick, though. Had little bios for each nominee. Nice touch. Too bad it arrived late. Would’ve saved me that deep dive into the underwater dancer’s YouTube channel. Don’t get me wrong, it was cool, just… unexpected.
My Main Takeaways
- Official websites need better navigation. Put the nominee list right on the dang homepage! Don’t make me hunt.
- Email faster. If bloggers have the list, your mailing list should too.
- Context matters. Give me more than just names. Who are these people?
- Feels disconnected. Finding out through a random blog post shouldn’t be the easiest way.
Wrapped up my notes feeling half satisfied, half annoyed. Saw some truly amazing artists made the cut, saw some head-scratchers too. But the real story for me? How bloody hard it is to get basic info out of these big awards sometimes. Need to send them some feedback. Or maybe just a link to “HTML Navigation For Dummies”.
