Nominees Announced April 2nd

The Webby Awards 2000 Reveal Nominees for the Best Web Sites of the Year

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact:

Judie Mulligan, mulligaj@fleishman.com
Fleishman-Hillard Public Relations, 415.356.1086

THE WEBBY AWARDS® 2000 REVEAL NOMINEES FOR THE BEST WEB SITES OF THE YEAR

The Webby Awards to be Webcast live from San Francisco May 11th; David Bowie, Patrick Stewart, Matt Groening, Laurie Anderson Lead List of Judges

http://www.webbyawards.com

SAN FRANCISCO, CA (March 14, 2000) – Crowning an extraordinary year in which the Internet set off seismic shifts everywhere from Hollywood to Wall Street to Main Street, the International Academy of Digital Arts & Sciences today unveiled the nominees for the 4th Annual Webby Awards.

Shining a spotlight on the very best of the Internet’s 800 million-plus Web sites, the Academy announced five nominees in 27 categories ranging from: Activism to Arts, Commerce to Film, and Music to Weird. A complete list of nominees follows this announcement.

The Webby Awards are the leading international honors for Web sites. The awards are presented by the Academy, a 350-member organization dedicated to the creative, professional, and technical advancement of new media.

More than 3,000 digerati and celebrities from around the globe will attend the awards, which have quickly become the Internet’s biggest night of the year thanks to its irreverent attitude, outrageous fashions, and five-words-or-less speech limit.

“This year’s nominations reflect the incredible breadth of the Internet – from wildly popular Web sites to wonderful, unheard of gems,” said Tiffany Shlain, the founder and director of The Webby Awards. “What links them, however, is that they represent the best of the best in a medium that grows at an increasingly dizzying pace everyday.”

Shlain attributed the diversity of this year’s nominees to the Webbys’ first ever call for entries, which she said resulted in thousands of submissions from more than 27 countries.

The Webby Awards are judged by The Academy, whose members include David Bowie judging in Music; actor Patrick Stewart in Travel; cyber-guru Esther Dyson in Activism; Simpsons creator Matt Groening in Humor; BCBG designer Max Azria in Fashion; Performance Artist Laurie Anderson in Arts; and Arianna Huffington in Politics & Law.

A four year tradition, the public can also vote for their favorite Web sites in The People’s Voice Awards. Beginning today, online fans can cast their ballots at the official Webby Awards site.

The Webby Awards and People’s Voice Awards voting process is audited by PricewaterhouseCoopers.
Winners will be announced at The Webby Awards 2000 on May 11, 2000 at San Francisco’s historic Nob Hill Masonic Center. The entire event will be webcast at http://www.webbyawards.com beginning at 8:00 PM PST. The winners of The People’s Voice Awards will also be announced during the live Webcast.

About the International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences
The International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences is dedicated to the creative, technicaland professional progress of new media. The goal of the IADAS is to assemble a unique and brilliant panel of leading new media experts, Web visionaries, journalists and luminaries to propel the new medium through the new millennium. IADAS currently boasts over 200 members, including such diverse experts as film director Francis Ford Coppola, musician David Bowie, Chair of Miramax Talk Media Tina Brown, cyberguru Esther Dyson, Simpsons creator Matt Groening, Infoseek Chairman Steve Kirsch and computer scientist Jaron Lanier, as well as writers and editors from such publications as Wired, Details, Fast Company, Elle, ARTBYTE, The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, Rolling Stone, Vibe, Forbes, Premier, PC World and Jane. For more information, visit www.iadas.net.

About the Webby Awards
The Webby Awards are the leading creative honors for digital media. Nominees and winners are chosen by The International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences. The Webby Awards are an IDG event. Sponsors for the 2000 Webby Awards include Intel, Hewlett-Packard, PricewaterhouseCoopers, Adobe, vivid studios, Visa, Warburg Dillon Read, BeSeen, Xpedior, AboveNet, Audi, commission junction, worldlyinvestor.com, PlanetClick, adauction.com, Fleishman Hillard, The Creative Group,Entertainment Weekly, Business 2.0, Access Magazine, NewCity.com, Metropolis Editorial, ArtByte, MacWorld, San Francisco Bay Guardian, MacWorld Expo, MSN bCentral, Internet World, We Also Walk Dogs. Balloting is audited by PriceWaterhouseCoopers. For more information, visit www.webbyawards.com.

About IDG
IDG publishes more than 290 computer magazines and newspapers and 700 books and offers online users the largest network of technology-specific sites around the world through IDG.net, which comprises more than 240 targeted Web sites in 55 countries. IDG is also a leading producer of 168
computer-related expositions worldwide and provides IT market analysis through 49 offices in 41 countries worldwide. Company information is available at http://www.idg.com.

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