MTV Goes Viral With O Award Nominees

By Michael Lopez

Get ready for an entirely new type of awards show. Capitalizing on all of the latest viral and social media trends, MTV announced the nominees for its very first O Awards this week. Fan favorites like Lady Gaga and Justin Bieber did score nods, but not in traditional categories. This time you’ll see them competing for Must Follow Artist on Twitter and Best Fan Forum.

Set to take place via webcast on April 28, the O Awards is nixing red carpets and Academy voters, and putting the entire event in the hands of the fans. Winners will be decided via social media votes and the results will be shown in real-time on MTV.com, VH1.com, and through mobile phone apps.

“Some elements of this will be experimental,” MTV’s head of digital media, Dermot McCormack said. “If there’s such a thing as a beta award show, this is it.”

Even the nominees are pretty unconventional. It’s hard to imagine “Friday” sensation Rebecca Black getting honored for her work, but she did score an O nod for Favorite Animated GIF. And that’s only the beginning. Artists ranging from Michael Jackson, to The Beatles, to Andre 3000 were also recognized for their online popularity.

Some of the more interesting categories include Best Animal Performance (I got my money on Sax Playing Walrus), Best Music Hashtag Meme, and Best Independent Music Blog.

Must Follow Artist on Twitter is definitely going to be one of the fiercest battles with artists like Kanye West, Lady Gaga, and Nicki Minaj competing.

And all of you Latino fans don’t worry. O showed some cultural love too, nominating YouTube sensations Jorge and Alexa Narvaez for their heartwarming duet clip. The entire list of nominees is now available for viewing on the O Awards website and obviously since it is a social media based event, you can expect plenty of daily updates if you follow them on Twitter.

Are you excited about this month’s O Awards? Sound off in the comments or @MTV3.

Tags Alexa Narvaez, Award Shows, Celebrities, Hot Stuff, Jorge Narvaez, MTV, O Awards, Rebecca Black, Technology, twitter, Videos, YouTube