Well mai pals as the staff jet back to to the UK it is time for you to get your nomination in for the March #Pawpawty recipient. It is real easy all you have to do is make a comment on this blog post telling everyone who you are nominating and why you are nominating them.

As an extra special incentive this month we will be giving the anipal who nominates the lucky shelter or charity one of the exclusive shorty award pins that we got at the event this weekend, so what you all waiting for get nominating.

Nominations close on the 15th March, winner announced on the 16th and the monthly #Pawpawty is on the 20th and 21st.

I am just gonna have a little sleep while the staffs fly over the pond, tweet you all tomorrow mai pals.

Anipals, I am  Zack, (also known as Zack the Hack). I normally don't get to address you pawsonally, but I have decided that I need to rally the  troops to help mai pal Dougal get some more votes in this Shorty Award thing that he has been nominated for.

Now our Dougal is a very hard working doggie as any of you who have been to a #PawPawty will know, he keeps us awake on a regular basis tapping away on the computer thing. So we decided to ask him why he does all of this stuff and what it is all about. Here's what he said...Oh and he had to answer in 140 characters or less just to make it a bit more fun!

Zack: What is all this  #Pawpawty nonsense?
Dougal: Its a monthly 24hr virtual party to have fun, win pwizes, meet new people and to raise funds for animal charities all over the world

Zack: Sounds a bit crazy to me who comes along to such things?
Dougal: Well we have lots of animals, kittys, woofers, furries, as well as ppl who care about animals, we even had @GodzillaofJapan turn up at  one

Zack: Sounds interesting so how much moula you raised then?
Dougal So far in less than a year we have raised over $23000, for over 20 different shelters all over the world , thats a lot of bowls of cat food

Zack: So how does it all work?
Dougal  Anipals nominate charities, donate prizes , donate funds, win prizes and generally have fun at the same time, we love to pawty on down

Zack: So what's a DJ, CJ, or FJ?
Dougal Every pawty needs music so we have Dog Jockeys, Cat Jockeys, Furry or Feathered Jockeys, we have Bunnies as well but don't call them BJ's!

Zack: How do they play music?
Dougal Simple when you know how they use Blip.fm to create a playlist and then tweet the tunes, sorry am I getting to teckinal fur ya mai pal?

Zack: I heard that you have drinkies and noms as well?
Dougal: Of Course we have a great team who create tasty morsels to tempt our taste buds, as well as gallons of drinkies to make the pawty rock



Zack: Does it not get a bit mad at times?
Dougal: It is hard to keep up but we use apps like tweetdeck and tweetgrid to make sure that everyone can join in and see who is at the #PawPawty

Zack: Ever get any gatecrashers?
Dougal: Well we have a great sekutiry team who report all those nougty ppl who turn up half dressed or worse and pretend to be B R I T N E Y

Zack: So why do you want to win this Shorty Awards thing?
Dougal: Simple mai pal if more people join in it means more creative ideas, more amazing connections , more donations, and more animals saved

Zack: What will you do if you do not win?
Dougal: I will carry on my mission of saving and helping more animals one paw at a time, after I have dunked my head in a bucket of bacon beer BOL

Zack: is it true that being a finalist means you got an invite to New York
Yep , but I will be sending the staff to New York, as I really hate airplane food and I've heard it's kinda hard to go wee wee mid atlantic

Zack: Ok so what do we need to ask everyone to do?
Dougal: We need new votes from pals who have not voted before so pls ask everyone you know to vote, if they care about animals we need their vote

Ok Dougal thanks so much for that Shorty Guide to the #Pawpawty, just so everyone knows the timeline for the final vote here are the details from the Shorty Awards Site


Congratulations to all the Second Annual Shorty Awards Finalists!
From Monday, February 1 at noon EST until Friday, February 5 at noon EST, you'll be able to vote among finalists. You can also keep voting in any of the community categories.
All nominations will count as votes for the final round. If you've already voted for a finalist, there's no need to vote again unless you want to update your reason.
The Real-Time Academy of Short Form Arts & Sciences will use a combination of criteria to select the winners, including the number of votes, the reasons given in nominations, answers to the Shorty Interview (which you can still take here) and the content of the finalists' tweets.
If you are a finalist, please fill out this form so we can get in touch with you.
Get your tickets now for the ceremony on March 3 in NYC.


So mai pals thanks for reading this little interview I did with the CDO of #PawPawty Mr Frugal Dougal himself. Round here he is just a little dog, but now we know he has a big heart. So why not take a few minutes to vote for him, Oh and we hear he has a few pals who are also in the running so go on while you are there please show BZTAT , ZackRabbit and VAstateparks some support as well.

More Soon
Zack The Hack

Speechless
Mai pals ,  I am almost speechless, but I have to say a huge thanks to all of you for getting me to the finals of the Shorty Awards. This means so so much because less than a year ago no one had ever heard of a PawPawty and I did not know much about this thing called Twitter.

But how a year has changed all of that, now because of all of your help and support the PawPawty events on twitter have grown into the only regular event that uses the power of twitter to mobilise people all over the world to help animals in need.

We have raised over $23,000 for 20 shelters from all over the world
Animal Lovers worldwide have donated over 500 prizes for us to use in competitions
We even appeared as a trending topic on twitter on a number of occasions

We have created a strong community who care not only about animals but also about each other, and now we have the opportunity to share all of this with even more people.



Some great nominations that made me smile
@runrosierun I nominate @frugaldougal for a Shorty Award in #nonprofit because...touches the lives of homeless animals in a big way! 
@Doug Jumper I nominate @frugaldougal for a Shorty Award in #nonprofit because of his relentless efforts to improve the world! 
@Lou I nominate @frugaldougal for a Shorty Award in #nonprofit because he works so hard as CDO of pawpawty helping animals
@Indy the cat I nominate @frugaldougal for a Shorty Award in #nonprofit because... He found a way to do good and have fun too.
@Dave Baker I nominate @frugaldougal for a Shorty Award in #nonprofit because... his paws r so furry and he's a right wooofa!
@Sunny Harbour Cat Re I nominate @frugaldougal for a Shorty Award in #nonprofit because their tireless work for 'us' rescue's is amazing xx 
@Prof Cattus_Trophic I nominate @frugaldougal for a Shorty Award in #nonprofit because...he cares so much, raised money and awareness 
@Mr. Rusty Monkey I nominate @frugaldougal for a Shorty Award in #nonprofit because...he shows us all how to be more charitable tweets. 
@Melinda I nominate @frugaldougal for a Shorty Award in #nonprofit because there's no love like love from man's best friend! 
@Drive Industries I nominate @frugaldougal for a Shorty Award in #nonprofit because he helps animals around the globe!
@Louie Shiloh Beagle I nominate @frugaldougal for a Shorty Award in #nonprofit because he throws the awesomest pawpawties for good causes. 


If you want to see all of the nominations so far then here is the huge list!!


What's Next
The next stage in the awards opens on Monday 1st Feb at Noon EST and runs through to Friday 5th Noon EST. During this time more nominations will be allowed, at this stage I am not sure if only new nominations will be counted or if those of you who have already nominated  will be able to nominate again. Needless to say anything you can do to spread the word next week to ask your pals and all animal lovers to nominate me will help.

At the moment we are looking at the possibility of having another #shortypawpawty on Thursday 4th , which of course will be a chance to have some fun, spread awareness and  raise some money for anipals. As soon as all of the details are finalised we will be back in touch.

Now go off and rest those little paws, wings, and what ever else you type with because you are gonna need them next week.

Thanks so much for showing everyone the power that exists when a few like minded people get behind a purpose and make things happen, together we can do this one paw at a time.

My little doggie heart is bursting with joy!

More Soon
Frugal Dougal

PS Huge Congratulations to @bztat who is 3rd in #art,  VAStateParks who is 4th in #government , @zackrabbit who is 1st in awesome.

"The Shorty Awards honor the best people and organizations on Twitter. These unique awards are for the Twitter community, by the Twitter community. Online voting is public and democratic, culminating in an awards ceremony that recognizes the winners in 27 official categories as well as those in brand new crowd-sourced ones."

They are not like some of the contests where people who were clever with a PC could set bots up to vote 24 hours a day. These guys are actively watching out for any dubious activity, they are legit and the winners get invited to an awards event in New York.

I was so pleased for the whole of the animal community on twitter when you guys got me to be one of the five finalists, but the contest is not over yet!

In order to stay in the game we need to be in the Top 5 on Friday, January 29, 2010 at 11:59:59 pm Pacific time so please please continue to ask your friends to nominate me.

You can vote for as many people as you like in as many different categories, but your vote only counts once ( as far as I can tell by the rules) so to keep me in with a chance of winning, you guys need to get your pals who have not already voted to vote for me.

Of course I would be thrilled to win, but even to stay in the top 5 until the closing date would help highlight the wonderful work that we do every month for animal charities all over the world. Something which is only possible because of your tremendous support, caring and love that you have all given right from the start almost a year ago.

So while it is not cool to beg, I do it with all of the best intentions, help me get there so that we can continue this great challenge to change the world for animals one paw at a time.

Here is the link to take you straight to the page to vote for me @frugaldougal

While you are there why not show your support for two other great pals of the PawPawty events, @bztat and @zackrabbit

Thank You all so so much from the bottom of my doggie heart.

More Soon

Frugal Dougal


HOT NEWS HOT NEWS
watch out if we stay in the Top 5 through to Friday we will have a special thank you mini #PawPawty for all you crazy Pawty anipals