'Irish Times' voted best website

IRISHTIMES.COM HAS been named Ireland’s Best Website at the 2010 Realex Irish Web Awards.

The award was presented to online editor Hugh Linehan at a ceremony at the Mansion House in Dublin on Saturday night. It is the first time the website has won the overall prize, which was selected by a panel of 140 judges.

Irishtimes.com was also named Best Online Publication, beating competition from the Day&Night, Irish Examiner, Irish Independent and Cork Independent sites. This is the third year in a row that the site has won in this category.

"These awards are really heartening for all the people who've worked so hard on irishtimes.com over the past year," said Mr Linehan. "Winning Best Online Publication for the third time is welcome recognition for the fact that The Irish Timesputs more effort and more resources into digital content than any other publication in Ireland. And being named Ireland's best website shows how important our quality journalism is for online audiences. We look forward to continuing to build and improve on our digital content."

Irish Web Awards organiser Damien Mulley congratulated irishtimes.com on its success.

"As well as being a consistent winner in the news category each year, The Irish Timeswebsite was chosen as Grand Prix winner for a well-designed, open website which provides valuable information to Ireland and beyond," he said. "Importantly, the blogging and Twitter interactions by Irish Times staff means it is a strong member of the Irish web community."

Other winners include State.ie, which was named Best Web Only Publication, and 98FM, which took the Best Radio Website award. Ragged Words won the Best Music Site prize and irishprocycling.com took the top award in the sports category. Movies.ie was named Best Entertainment Website and the Abbey Theatre took the Best Arts Website prize.