The Best Of The WebThe Best Of The Web
Awards time is here. No, it's not the "Oscar" , "Grammy" or the "Emmy" awards. It's the awards for the World Wide Web where they choose the 'best of the best' of the Internet. It's the "Webby Awards". And here are the nominees and winners which are catogarized into 15 categories.
POLITICS/LAW |
WINNER |
This channel of the HotWired Network is a must-see for political news and commentary, with daily, high-quality essays that take the Internet seriously as a political force. John Heilemann, former Washington correspondent for The Economist, files dispatches from the campaign trail; gonzo-wannabe Brock N. Meeks reports on the latest cyber-rights developments from the nation's capital; and John Katz, former New York Magazine media critic, inveighs against the East Coast media establishment with overwrought but usually provocative culture-crit diatribes. You also get a daily poll and quote, RealAudio interviews, and more. |
| California Voter Foundation | This cutting-edge organization seeks to shape a more informed electorate through the use of new technologies. In 1995 CVF produced the San Francisco Online Voter Guide-the first Web-accessible database ohttp://www.calvoter.org f campaign contributions available prior to an election. Another pioneer project this election year was CVF's third annual California Online Voter Guide, featuring hard-to-find information on judicial contests, state ballot measures, and legislative races. CVF's growing network of Web sites demonstrates how the Web is reinvigorating participation in public life. |
| Channel A | This colorful and busy site, which debuted in September, aims to be the "gateway to the Asian world." We'll see, but it's certainly off to an impressive start. While not overtly political, Channel A serves up plenty of saucy opinionmaking-especially on the politics of representation. Comedian-cum-columnist Margaret Cho, for instance, laments the U.S. film industry, where an Asian must be a "computer expert or Kung Fu master." Other pieces ponder business, community, the arts, food, and health. Keep your eye on this one. |
| Stalker's Home Page | What would it be like to live in a database-driven society? This is the question the Stalker's Home Page forces us to consider. To stimulate debate, the site provides to a vast array of resources on the Net for tracking down information on individuals. Options abound: Look up someone by phone number, get a copy of an FBI file, search a national telephone directory, and more. Paranoids should avoid this creepy reality check at all costs. |
| Disinformation | Infoseek for info-skeptics. Having faith in the power of information to save the world might seem a bit naive, but Disinformation suggests an interesting innovation: a search engine with a point-of-view. This slick site is divided into five subsections: Propaganda, Censorship, Counter-Intelligence, Revolutionaries and Counter-Culture. Special Report dossiers in each section compile reviews of Web sites on specific topics overlooked by "mainstream media." Hand-grenade icons rate the quality of each site. |