This is a list of the winners of companies and websites that won the annual Webby Awards of the International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences.

[edit] 1997

1997 was the first year of the annual Webby Award event, which was the first-ever nationally televised awards ceremony devoted to the Internet. 700 people attended the event on March 6, 1997 at Bimbo's Night Club in San Francisco, California^[2] Whereas in later years the panelists were official members of International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences, in 1997 the awards were chosen and given by IDG's The Web Magazine, which appointed a panel to judge the competition.^[3]

[edit] 1998

The 1998 Webby Awards were held on March 6, 1998 at the San Francisco Palace of Fine Arts,^[4] and were the first event ever to be broadcast live via the Web in 3D.^[5] The "People's Voice" awards, chosen by online poll, received 100,000 cumulative votes that year.

The Web magazine, which was hosting the awards, was closed down by its parent company IDG shortly before the awards, and the ceremony continued thereafter under the management of Tiffany Shlain, who IDG had hired in 1996 to coordinate the awards.^[6] The International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences was constituted that year as the judging panel for the awards, continues to do so as of the 2007 awards.

[edit] 1999

The 1999 Webby Awards were held on March 18, 1999 at the Herbst Theater (War memorial Opera House) in San Francisco, with a post-award party at City Hall.^[7] That year, Mayor Rudy Giuliani lobbied to move the ceremony to New York City, but San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown convinced the organization to remain in San Francisco by promising city support. The event was noted for the famous incident in which a representative of Jodi.org, which had won in the arts category, called the event participants "Ugly corporate sons-of-bitches" in his acceptance speech and tossed his trophy to the audience.^[8] In 1999 the Webby Awards asked PricewaterhouseCoopers to help it tabulate and ensure security for the "People's Voice" winners, chosen by online voting.^[9]

[edit] 2000

[edit] 2001

[edit] 2002

[edit] 2003

[edit] 2004

[edit] 2005

Special achievement honorees at 9th Annual Webby Awards^[10] included:

• Webby Lifetime Achievement Award: Former Vice President Al Gore in recognition of the role he played in the development of the Internet over the past three decades^[11][12]
• Webby Person of the Year: Craig Newmark, the founder of Craigslist
• Webby Artist of the Year: The Kleptones
• Webby Breakout of the Year: Caterina Fake and Stewart Butterfield, the founders of Flickr

Webby Awards winners included Mercedes-Benz USA (Automotive), Google (Best Practices), Merck (Health), and Skype (Telecommunications).

[edit] 2006

Special Achievement honorees included:

• Webby Breakout of the Year: MySpace.com and its founders Tom Anderson and Chris DeWolfe
• Webby Artist of the Year: The Gorillaz
• Webby Entrepreneur of the Year: Mark Cuban, owner of the Dallas Mavericks and HDNet
• Webby Person of the Year: Thomas Friedman, New York Times columnist and Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The World is Flat: A Brief History of The 21st Century
• Webby Lifetime Achievement Award: Dr. Robert Kahn, co-inventor of the TCP/IP protocols, the technology used to transmit information on today's Internet
• Webby Lifetime Achievement Award: Prince, for "visionary" use of the internet, and being the first major artist to release an album over the internet, Crystal Ball

[edit] 2007

Nicolas Roope of London agency Poke London, receiving a Webby in 2007 for designing the Zopa site

• Webby Lifetime Achievement: David Bowie was honored for his career which has pushed the boundaries of art and technology – from Ziggy Stardust to BowieNet, the Internet service provider he launched in 1998, to BowieArt, a Web site that connects the new visual artists with art collectors worldwide.
• Webby Lifetime Achievement: eBay President and CEO Meg Whitman accepted the award on behalf of the 150 million registered eBay buyers and sellers
• Webby People of the Year: YouTube Co-Founders Steve Chen and Chad Hurley
• Webby Artist of the Year: Beastie Boys were recognized for their 2006 concert film, "Awesome, I F***ing Shot That", which was filmed entirely by dozens of audience members using hand-held cameras provided by the group.
• Two Special Achievement Awards for Acting were presented at the 1st Annual Webby Film and Video Awards:
• Best Actor: "Ninja", the star of the online comedy series "Ask a Ninja"
• Best Actress: Jessica Rose, star of the fictional video diary "lonelygirl15"

[edit] 2008

The 2008 Webby Awards took place on June 11, 2008 at the Citriani Restaurant event space on Wall Street in New York City.^[13][14][15]

Special Achievement honorees included:

• Webby Lifetime Achievement: David Byrne
• Webby Artist of the Year: will.i.am
• Webby Person of the Year: Stephen Colbert
• Webby Film & Video Lifetime Achievement: Lorne Michaels
• Webby Film & Video Awards Person of the Year: Michel Gondry
• Webby Film & Video Awards Best Actor: Tim and Eric

[edit] 2009

Winners will be honored at a star-studded ceremony hosted by Saturday Night Live's Seth Meyers in New York City on June 8th.^[16]

Special Achievement honorees included:

• Webby Artist of the Year: Trent Reznor
• Webby Person of the Year: Jimmy Fallon
• Webby Breakout of the Year: Twitter
• Best Actress: Sarah Silverman
• Outstanding Comedic Performance: Lisa Kudrow
• Film & Video Person of the Year: Seth MacFarlane

[edit] Notes

In keeping with the awards themselves, winners are designated according to the website winning the award, although the winner is, technically, the web design firm that created the winning site and in the case of corporate websites, the designer's client. Web links are provided for informational purposes where the winning website or a follow-on remains available and can be found; the text used for the hyperlink is as listed on the past winner pages at http://www.webbyawards.com/webbys/winners-1997.php and so on. Many older websites, however, no longer exist or are redirected to replacements and are so noted.

[edit] External links

• webbyawards.com - official awards website
• flash gallery of award winners