no one rips off jake dobkin and lives. i want them dead. i want their family dead. i want the people that owe them money dead. i want their pets dead. etc.

got to love the fact that a whore won though

Hello - Rob, one half of the BigSmoker here.

First off - let me say that Gothamist was undoubtedly our inspiration for setting up the BigSmoker.

The name itself is our little tribute to the site which we visit more than daily.

The similarites though, end there. We wanted a very british looking site - which is why we chose the Financial Times background colour - similarly, the Battersea Power Station logo is a great London landmark and fits in with the name of the site.

We chose black and white photography to give it a more newspapery feel and we have a 'features' and 'funnies' section which makes the site a bit more than a straightforward blog.

A lot of work went into the site and we were very happy and very proud that the Guardian chose to reward us for that.

Finally, the design of the site started off as a basic Movable Type template - and it takes a lot of work to carve out a totally unique site from those basic building blocks. Yes, we have posting with headlines and pictures in them. This does not make us whores.

Jake - I'll tell my Grandma and Grandad and my pets to be on the lookout for anyone lurking around the flat.

I was actually referring to belle de jour.

Yeah I just realised that! Sorry.

(I think the pressure's getting to me)

hi, are people saying that bigsmoker is a copy of gothamist? i have seen both, and i dont see any similarities. i like bigsmoke .. its very interactive, i like the humour , it is very easy to read, those boxes are an inspired move.. makes any article really easy to find and easy on the eye.
it avoids the bane of weblog, namely, many words all in the smallest of print size.
it well deserves the accolade.
what's more, it downloads real quick, even in my really slow computer using only a 56k modem.

that comment above, is, of course, a joke- i don't mind if people borrow the templates for gothamist or bluejake, as long as they link back to us somewhere on the site and change the colors. sharing is caring, folks!