The Webby Awards - run by the The International Academy of Digital Arts & Sciences - are the pinnacle of recognition that Internet sites receive from the industry for excellence in the online realm. And in its sixth edition, the Webbys saw quite a few media firms getting a pat on their backs for their Internet forays.

The BBC pocketed two awards - one for Best News and the second for Best Radio. The Osbournes a reality show focusing on rock star Ozzy Osbourne‘s family bagged one for best television. Search engine Google pocketed the best practices award for the second year in succession for serving as a model of excellence.

Several sites walked away with both a Webby Award and a People‘s Voice Award, which is decided by public vote. Dual winners included espn.com for Best Sports, Lonely Planet Online; Amazon.com for Best Commerce; The Onion for Best Humor; epicurious.com for Best Living; and evite.com for Best Services.

The sixth year of the Webbys witnessed a record number of entries - indicating that the disgruntlement by the business world with the Internet was easing off. Entries from 36 nations came in. Among these: AllAfrica.com (Mauritius-News), Debkafile (Israel-News), BBC News Online (United Kingdom-News), Freemuse (Denmark-Music), RTE Interactive Radio (Ireland-Radio), and The Vatican (Vatican City-Spirituality).

Three new awards- The Rising Star Award, the Top Global Site and the Top US site - were unfurled at the Webby Awards 2002. These recognise sites that excel at attracting visitors and were presented in partnership with Nielsen//NetRatings.

The winners of the three awards were the following in the order stated: self-assessment site Emode, Yahoo! and AOL.com.

The list of winners:
ACTIVISIM: tolerance.org
BEST PRACTICES: Google
BROADBAND: GUGGENHEIM.COM
COMMERCE: Amazon.com
COMMUNITY: Idealist.org
EDUCATION: Exploratorium
FASHION: ZOOZOOM.com Magazine
FILM: Donnie Darko
FINANCE: Yahoo! Finance
GAMES: Netbaby
GOVERNMENT and LAW: Library of Congress
HEALTH: teenwire.com
HUMOR: The Onion
KIDS: OLogy
LIVING: epicurious.com
MUSIC: LOOPLABS
NET ART: 360degrees
NEWS: BBC News
PERSONAL SITE: The Committee to Free Lori Berenson
POLITICS: Center for Responsive Politics
PRINT and ZINES: Salon.com
RADIO: BBC Radio 4 website
SCIENCE: Becoming Human
SERVICES: evite
SPIRITUALITY: BeliefNet
SPORTS: ESPN.com
TECHNICAL ACHIEVEMENT : David Rumsey Historical Map Collection
TRAVEL: Lonely Planet Online
TELEVISION: The Osbournes
WEIRD: Devices of Wonder
RISING STAR: Emode
TOP U.S. PROPERTY: AOL
TOP GLOBAL PROPERTY: Yahoo!

Business channel CNBC India in association with Sun Microsystems and Wipro Infotech today announced Managing India Brainstorm IV (MIB IV).

To be held on 28 June at The Grand Hyatt Hotel, New Delhi, the high-powered forum will focus on the theme - The New Economic Growth Drivers.

MIB IV would be aimed at determining where the next economic growth push could come from. It will dwell on issues such as how upcoming growth sectors can be nurtured better, evolving the right growth structure, what the key success factors for Indian industry will be and where the new challenges will originate, an official release states.

The Brainstorm is a confluence of the best minds from diverse streams of Industry and Business. It is envisaged as the top executive forum for the creation of a balanced and comprehensive view of the state of India‘s industry and economy and concomitant issues.

The forum will feature a keynote address from Azeem Premji. The panelists include Amit Burman (Dabur), Gautam Dalal (KPMG), Omkar Goswami (Economist), Sunil Munjal (Hero Group), RV Shahi (Union Power Secretary) and Promod Bhasin (GE Caps).

Managing India Brainstorm saw its birth in Mumbai and was followed by sessions in New Delhi & Bangalore. The Brainstorms held in Mumbai (July), Delhi (October) and Bangalore (December) were attended by over 200 corporate decision-makers from across industries, sectors and ideological affinities, the release states.

The list of MIB initiators at earlier sessions include GN Bajpai (Life Insurance Corporation), MS Banga (Hindustan Lever Ltd.), Scott Bayman (GE India), KV Kamath (ICICI Group), Dr Kiran Karnik (Nasscom), Dr K Kasturirangan (ISRO), Vivek Kulkarni (Secretary to the IT Dept.), Anand Mahindra (Mahindra & Mahindra Group), DR Mehta (Ex-Chairman SEBI), Nandan Nilekani (Infosys), Ranjit Pandit (McKinsey ), Bhaskar Pramanik (SUN Microsystems), S Ramadorai (Tata Consultancy), Dr Anji Reddy (Reddy Laboratories), Dr Pratap Reddy (Apollo Hospital), Analjit Singh (Max New York Life ) and Gautam Thapar (BILT).

It all seems to be happening on the news channel front. The latest on this is that global news channel CNN International, whose parent company is AOL Time Warner, is reported to be seriously looking at launching an India-specific channel in the not-too distant future.
This was revealed to indiantelevision.com this evening by a senior executive of CNN Asia Pacific. The channel executive said CNN may either go solo or in partnership.

CNN has in the recent past reportedly been in talks with the Prannoy Roy-led NDTV to start an Indian service, but apparently the two have decided not tie the nuptial knot and have decided to go their own ways. NDTV is currently going through its own pending divorce pangs with Star India, which has decided to set up its own infrastructure and news channel under Ravina Raj Kohli.

CNN had earlier been in serious talks with the leading Indian news network, the Living Media-run Aaj Tak. Industry sources say CNN and Aaj Tak had wooed each other for a while, and a pre-nuptial agreement had almost been signed, but differences on certain issues resulted in the arrangement falling flat.

With the two potential matches not turning out right and the woes of its own parent AOL Time Warner globally, the news was that CNN had put its India news channel marriage and conception plans on hold. But now with the CNN Asia Pacific exec saying that the US news network is still hungering after an India foray, the action in the news business is likely to hot up further.

Speculation that the broadcast of Formula 1 racing in Asia on Star Sports was in question can now be laid to rest with the sportscaster‘s assurance that coverage will continue till the end of the season.

The speculation had been fuelled due to reports of financial difficulties faced by the distributor of the programming in Asia.

ESPN STAR Sports Managing Director, Rik Dovey says there will be no break in telecast even in China and that the channel has secured rights to the event till 2005. One of the markets affected by the failed F1 broadcast deals is China, according to an ESPN Star Sports (ESS)commissioned survey, wherein F1 was ranked the fourth most popular television sport particularly with Beijing males. Overall, during the last season of the F1, viewership of the races on STAR Sports saw a 13 per cent rise in North and Southeast Asia over the previous season, says a company release.

F1 action will continue to be broadcast live each fortnight on STAR Sports Asia, STAR Sports India, STAR Sports Taiwan and STAR Sports Southeast Asia, the release says. Preview show RaceDay starts off STAR Sports‘ coverage with a look at the race ahead, predictions, scenarios and past performances and how those are likely to develop in the day‘s race. This is followed by live broadcast of the race before Chequered Flag gets airtime for a recap including highlights, analysis, rankings and results, the post-race press conference and the awarding ceremony.