Online Oscars typify good and bad of Web

Every year for the past five years San Francisco has hosted the Webbys, the online world's version of the Oscars. Established by Ms Tiffany Schlain (yes, her real name, and could any nomenclature more perfectly epitomise the combined notions of Web, awards, and California?), the ceremonies are opulent and whimsical affairs with theme dress, expensive hors-d'oeuvres and far too many award categories (34 this year).

This year's batch of Webbys were handed out last week. The best thing about the ceremony is the acceptance speeches, because they are strictly limited to five words. Yes, words.

The tight limit means people give pithy "speeches" that are usually witty, surreal, and funny.

The overall speech winner has to be this bittersweet nugget from Tim Cavanaugh, former editor of recently dead and gone satire site Suck.com: "Bankruptcy never felt so good." He's now involved with e-zine (remember those?) Plastic.com, which won the "print and zine" category.

Other notables include, from VolunteerMatch.org: "Bush volunteers. It's that easy." From OpenSecrets.org: "Spy on Washington, it's fun." From surfer site Swell.com: "Sam Donaldson, dude, gnarly toupee" (famed US broadcaster Donaldson was hosting the show for ABC.com).

And finally, from the endlessly wonderful Onion.com, which has won the "humour" category every year it has existed: "To advertise, call Phil Meyer." You can get a full list of nominees and winners at www.webbyawards.com, as well as three years of speeches.

Perhaps the most unexpected element of the nominee lists is how many of the sites still exist. I did a trawl through all five years of shortlists, expecting to sarcastically note how many had joined the dotcom dead pool.

But that's not the case. Some sites have new URLs but the vast majority are alive and kicking. Amazingly, this was true even for arts sites and magazine sites. That says a lot about the dedication many Net innovators have for the medium, even - or maybe especially - among those who receive little or no financial award for their efforts.

I was also amused to see that the award's first year, 1997, included "sex" among its 15 categories. You'd think that's one category that would have been kept; none has done more to build the popularity of the Web, and sex remains the glowing success story of e-commerce.

The history of the awards, especially the way the Webby site describes that history, truly encapsulates the wonders, excesses, hubris and foolishness of Web culture. Begun as a feature of the magazine The Web, launched in 1996, the magazine's publisher actually trademarked the word "Webby" right away and, according to the site, brought it "to Tiffany as a blank canvas". Oh, please.

The publisher then closed down The Web in January 1998 (shades of crashes to come). But - hooray! - it decided to keep the Webbys going, and Tiffany lived on in a new context. The 1999 awards is notable for a new award category: "commerce" - that bit everyone forgot to include.

The tale gets ever more digerati. Ms Schlain and pals launch The International Academy of Digital Arts & Sciences. Founding members include all the usual groovy suspects: David Bowie, Francis Ford Coppola, Bjork, Geraldine Laybourne, Bob Metcalfe, and Esther Dyson.

The site then unfortunately reminds us of how the Web can, despite its pretensions to culture, out-shallow even TV. "The Webbys permeate pop culture when the quiz show Jeopardy! and board game Trivial Pursuit both include The Webby Awards in questions," it states breathlessly. Oh, kill me now. Then, a few sentences later, it proves its pretensions can be on the mark: "In conjunction with The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, The Webbys develop the $50,000 SFMOMA Webby Prize for online art."

Then, we're right back to the utterly ridiculous. The 2000 awards reap "thousands of rave reviews and articles", says the dizzy PR ghost that haunts this site's prose, then shoves the whole affair right over the self-hype cliff: "ABC selects Shlain to be their internet expert on Good Morning America," squeals the site. It finally demolishes all credibility with this screamer: "The Webbys achieve deeper resonance in pop culture as Vanity Fair names The Webbys the `It' Award."

And we wonder why the dotcoms crashed. That's the problem with so much on the Web - it's just too tempting to laugh, for all the wrong reasons. But do check out the nominee and winner sites. They provide an enjoyable journey through this still young medium, and show all its fresh promise.