Interview with Petties Winner: Sparkle

DogTime interviews Sparkle of SparkleCat.com, winner of the 2011 Petties Award for Best Blog Post. Congratulations, Sparkle!

DogTime: Who or what is the inspiration for your blog?

Sparkle: My human has been online since 1993 and building websites since 1997. So when I came along in late 2002, she already knew she was going to put me on the internet. It built from there, from a monthly journal to an advice column to book reviews to kitty commentary and calendars. I actually had no say in the matter. Have I been exploited? You decide.

DT: How did your blog begin?

S: It began from the beginning, when I came to live with my human. As I said, it was a monthly journal of my adventures and activities for the better part of a year. The advice column (which eventually developed into two books) began in September 2003, and the rest of it developed from there.

DT: Has your life changed since you started blogging? If so, how?

S: I can't tell you if my life has changed since I began blogging - I was only four months old when I started! The past couple of years have gotten a lot more interesting since I've begun blogging almost every day. I've met a lot of great cats from all over the world and had the opportunity to help a lot of rescue groups. That is really awesome.

DT: What does winning a Petties Award mean to you?

S: It means that I have the chance to help out two worthy rescues! Although I work hard on my blog and try to make it the best it can be, I know it wouldn't count for much without my readership, so I let them choose who got the donation money (this year it was Animal Advocates and Forever Home Feline Ranch). I like the recognition, but the donation money makes me happiest.

DT: What do you hope to accomplish with your blog?

S: I want to keep being a voice for felines all over the world, and to expand my reach so that eventually humans will have to publicly admit that we cats have already achieved world domination. I also want to help more homeless kitties and sell bunches of my books - but recognition of our world domination is definitely at the top of the list. Humans are always the last to know these things.

DT: How did you decide which organization would receive the Petties donation money?

S: It was completely done through social networking. First, I went to my Facebook fans and asked them to give me suggestions for rescues that helped feral cats (since I was nominated for Best Blog Post for a story I wrote about Feral Cat Day, I wanted ferals to benefit). I took their suggestions, created a poll on my blog and had my readers vote. The two rescues with the most votes got to split the donation money. I also added a bonus: the group that came in third got to have a donation widget on my blog for the month of August. The winner of that was A Call 4 Paws, and if I had not won the Pettie, they would have gotten money anyway! It turned out that A Call 4 Paws got $150 in donations from my readers - in addition to the money the other two groups got from the Petties.

Check outall the Petties winners' interviews...