Carnival Buzz

LOL.

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Here at Buzz, we spend a lot of time promoting new carnivals. So we thought it'd be refreshing to mosey through neurons less traveled and take a return trip to some good old blog carnivals we may have overlooked recently.

Who's You're Daddy?

Carnival of the Vanities is the daddy of carnivals, the carnival that started them all. It features links to the best recent blog posts (as determined by the bloggers who submit links). If you're a blogger looking to get exposure from a well-edited, high-traffic carnival, try submitting a recent post to CotV. The most recent edition, Edition 179 (yes, 179 editions!!), starts with some great Editor's Picks followed by links to blog posts in categories like Economy and Finance, Blogging, Culture, and How-to. Being the information sharers that we are, our fav link was to Wayne Hurlbert's post on Information sharing: Help others succeed.

Is There Doctor In The Blogosphere?

Like the most recent edition of the CotV, the most recent edition of Grand Rounds starts with 10 featured blog posts about medicine followed by links to blog posts in categories like Patient's Perspective and Commentary. Hmmm, is there a universal carnival format emerging? We like reading editor's picks at the top of a carnival, especially when we don't have time to click through every last link in a carnival (and who doesn't feel a little guilty about possibly missing a great nugget of information when they don't click on every link in a carnival?) (or are we the only obsessive-compulsives here in the blogosphere?).

Speaking of sharing information, the post on building centralized pharmaceutical histories for patients seems simultaneously wonderful and creepy. It's nice to know that any pharmacist could flag a bad drug interaction for any patient. However, given that Walmart and Office Max can't seem to hold on to mere credit information, imagine what would happen if the world were to find out what drugs we use to write these blogs?

Next Stop, New Jersey

In case you were concerned that a universal carnival format had emerged, take a gander at the most recent edition of the Carnival of the New Jersey Bloggers. Other geographies have carnivals (Wisconsin, Virginia, North Caroline, India, England, the Balkans, etc.) (if you're from a carnival-challenged geography, please register and start one!), but it's hard to beat the the Garden State bloggers for, well, being New Jersians.

In other words, this carnival is off the wall.

Not that we pretend to understand anything New Jersey. The post about Two Guys is about as parochial as we can imagine. We don't understand Two Guys like New Jersians don't understand Gemellos, the place to go for wine if you grew up near Stanford in California.

Speaking of which, it's time for a glass of Syrah and a little cheese while we digest a few more carnivals.

One of us lived in a house that was built by Joe Youngerman, an early president of the Directors Guild of America (you can read more about Youngerman and early Hollywood in the excellent book My Seventy Years at Paramount Studios and the Directors Guild of America). One perk of living there was that the studios hadn't figured out that the Youngermans had moved on to greener pastures, so the studios kept sending DVDs of all the films nominated for an Academy Award as part of their campaign to win more statues.

A DVD sent out for the purpose of garnering votes from Academy members always arrived with a notice saying that the DVD was for your consideration.

Even though none of us lives in Hollywod anymore and we no longer receive those free promotional DVDs, Blog Carnival is pleased to present, in the spirit of Joe Youngerman and for your consideration, Carnival of the Celebrities' Brokeback Mountain Extravaganza.

You'll want to check this before you attend your swank 78th Academy Award parties on March 5th. Otherwise, what will you have to talk about?

WhatsNextBlog has a concise article on information overload and the role of blog carnivals.

Information overloaded? You're certainly not alone. It's almost impossible to keep up with all there is to read and now, with podcasts, listen to. (That's why I'm still ignoring podcasts: I still like to sleep a few hours a night.)

(Click through for the Blog Carnival connection.)

That got us to wondering whether information overload on an iPod would be called information overloud.

And, speaking of information overload, we don't understand why all the great posts on WhatsNextBlog are repeated here. It sounds like an echo in the blogosphere.

After a nice afternoon walk in snowy Prospect Park looking at nearly indiscernable snowmen and listening to shrieks of young girls sledding down hills on flourescent pieces of plastic, we sat down for some web browsing and came across this oldie, but goodie article on blog carnivals by one of our fav bloggers, Bora Zivkovic. This post has one of the more concise definitions of a blog carnival we've read, as well as this swell section on how carnivals function for blogger communities.

Beyond the short-term enjoyment of discovering and reading cool blogs, or getting many hits and new readers, there are three major long-term functions that carnivals can potentially fulfill.

If you're sitting by the fire browsing blogs tonight, and looking for the meaning of life and blog carnivals, give this post a read.

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It wasn't so long ago that we celebrated the milestone of 150 blog carnivals.

This past week the Blog Carnival Index reached 200! Thanks to all the bloggers who have taken the initiative to start a carnival. We look forward to many more.

In our previous milestone post, we'd suggested that someone start a carnival about coffee. Well, that happened. We're still waiting for someone to start the photo scavenger hunt carnival.

If you've thought about starting a carnival, you'll find tons of good resources here and all over the blogosphere. Join in!

Welcome to the second edition of New Carnival Showcase. Since we're traveling, we won't have time to cover all the new carnivals out there. That would make this the short and sweet edition.

Quite by accident (honestly), this is the 2,500th edition added to the Blog Carnival Index. While this carnival focuses on the great new blog carnivals, remember to check out all the new editions of the old-time carnivals, too!

Zoom, Zoom, Zoom

In addition to submitting their carnivals, a few of new carnival organizers gave some background their new carnivals. Let's start with a retreaded carnival, Carnival of the Cars. This carnival started last year, then lapsed into obscurity. Luckily for all you car nuts out there, Mark Tapscott came along and revived it. Tapscott started his journalism career writing a weekly car column for the Washington Times. He emailed:

I started the Carnival of Cars as a way of helping encourage other auto bloggers to help each other grow everybody's audience. Plus, it is just plain fun writing the thing and keeping up with what everybody else is writing.

Our favorite article from the most recent Carnival of the Cars is on hacking your Prius, but there's lots, lots more car reading.

Enquiring Minds

Don Surber, a self-described columnist/writer from Poca, West Virginia, wrote us about the Carnival of the Celebrities:

The Carnival of the Celebrities is patterened after the Carnival of the Insanities in that it is not just what bloggers send in but what is going on in the Celebreality (as MTV calls it). The first one was a success not because of the hits I got (not many) but the fun I had writing it. People forget this is supposed to be fun and carnivals should reflect that.

The first and only (so far) edition is a fun read. Before the Academy Awards, you'll have to click through for the Brokeback to the Future link.

R, R, R

Last, but not least, on our whirlwind tour of new carnivals, is the Carnival of Homeschooling. Henry Cate writes that he was inspired by Carnival of Education to develop a carnival focused on the issues of schooling at home.

I read Hugh Hewitt's book "Blog." Hugh points out a number of different ways that blogs can be used, and opened my eyes as to some of the possibilities.

My wife and I have been very interested in writing a book about homeschooling, and creating a blog called "Why Homeschool" seemed a good way to play with some ideas and get feedback from people as to some of the reasons they homeschool.

So, careful, if your blog post is included in the Carnival of Homeschooling, it may end up in Cate's book! We're impressed about how quickly this carnival has enlisted a host of carnival hosts. The fourth edition was hosted at The Common Room and features quotes from the writer Charlotte Mason to introduce the links.

Coming to a Carnival Near You Soon

Thanks for checking out the second edition of New Carnival Showcase! Sorry we didn't have time to cover more of the great carnivals coming out. Below is information on the carnival if you'd like to participate in the future.

If you've started a new carnival in the past three months, please submit the permalink to your best edition to date to the New Carnival Showcase submission page. Of course, what the New Carnival Showcase really wants is the behind-the-scenes dirt! So, include a few words about what inspired the carnival, who's involved, and the vision of the carnival.

We're looking for hosts for future editions, too. If you're interested, go to the New Carnival Showcase page, click on "Steven" (next to "Maintained by:"), and leave your contact information there.

Submission Guidelines

• The new blog carnival should be no older than three months.
• Submit a permalink to one edition of the new blog carnival.
• Give the name of the new blog carnival.
• Include information about what inspired the carnival, who's participating, and the vision of the carnival.