A grand total of 1,222,174 votes were cast this month during for the Webby Awards voting period which ended last night at midnight. I voted for all sections available in the websites, online film & video, interactive advertising, and mobile & apps categories. Out of these four categories, I’ve shared my picks only from the websites category here since it’s the most interesting category. And this should kindly spare you from reading scanning a never-ending list as this one is a whopping 67 items long (though a few are repeat links).
Results will be announced on May 3. I am not holding my breath for most of my picks to win. As I voted, the leader boards became visible and many of my selections showed up in 3rd to 5th place at the time. This led me to believe that some people simply voted based on brand recognition rather than based on the strength of the website itself. But I knew that was likely to happen going into this. What can you do?
My top web picks for the Webby Award Nominees for the websites category are below!
connections (6 items)
celebrity/fan: Wonderwall
community: Tumblr – Yay! A site I actually use.
guides/rating/reviews: Yelp – Yay! Another site I actually use.
personal blog website: the3six5 – I’ve been selected to submit a post for this site to be posted by the end of the day, 10/21/11. Can’t wait!
social media: Behance Network – I should visit this site more often.
weird: The Daily What – Who hasn’t been to a site on this network (Icanhascheezburger, anyone)?
entertainment (7 items)
art: YouTube Play – A nice video of an event I would have loved to attend
fashion: Vogue.com – A well-done website overall.
games: Cityville – Don’t play this game myself but it seems like people really enjoy this one.
games-related: Joystiq – A great gamer destination
humor: The Onion
netart: Welcome to Pine Point – An interesting digital scrapbook.
sports: espn.com
features (9 items)
best copy/writing: The Onion
best home/welcome page: YoungArts.org – Nice integrating motion graphics
best navigation structure: Zappos.com – I’ve used this site and was happy with the ease of my purchases.
best practices: Hulu.com – I’ve been a member since it was in beta. Cool story, huh?
best use of animation or motion gfx: Immersive-Garden – A personal site of a Paris-based art director.
best use of photography: The Tiziano Project| 360 Kurdistan
best use of video or moving image: The Wizarding World of HP
best visual design – aesthetic: Life.com
best visual design – function: Vimeo.com
living (6 items)
events: Vimeo festival + Awards
family/parenting: Making Sense of Baby – Type in a name and age to really see the site go.
health: Attraction – French anime cartoon for youth, discouraging smoking.
lifestyle: NOWNESS – I’ll have to visit this site again.
religion and spirituality: Interfaith Youth Core
youth: A Thin Line – A good interactive role play for wise decision making for middle grade kids
marketplace (12 items)
automotive: Mercedes-Benz What Drives Us
beauty and cosmetics: COTY: Beyonce Heat
blog-business: Mashable
consumer electronics: LG Kitchen Experience
corporate communications: The GE Show
food and beverage: Epicurious – I should visit this site more often.
IT/Hardware/software: Google Demo Slam – It was interesting and cool to see what people can do with Google apps. Slam.
professional services: Vaughan Hannigan – Photographer with an amazing portfolio
restaurant: Chipotle – Home of the 1,000 calorie burrito. mmm…
retail: Zappos.com
self-promo/portfolio: Twitter Knitter – Too cute and valuable as a service to others to not get my vote.
media (7 items)
blog-cultural: Speakeasy, wsj.com blog – I’ll definitely visit again.
magazine: Vogue
movie and film: Disney.com’s torn: legacy
music: Soundcloud – Nice site to host music from what I’ve seen
news: NPR
radio/podcasts: BBC World Service podcasts – I enjoy listening to the live stream (not the podcast) at night before bed (when the UK business day is starting).
television: Hulu
services (9 items)
banking/ bill paying: Lending Club
employment: Glassdoor.com – I have mixed feelings about this site but it’s a good business idea.
financial services: Yahoo! Finance
insurance: University of Farmers
real estate: RE – The NY Times
telecommunications: Brightstar Studio
tourism: Oregon Food and Drink – If my home state didn’t offer the exactly same things (+ more) I’d want to visit Oregon based on this website alone. The pacific coast is quite delicious in many ways.
travel: LonelyPlanet.com – Yeah, I need to get out more.
webservices/apps: Tumblr
society (11 items)
activism: DIY Fundraising- International Rescue Committee
associations: Art Alliance for Contemporary Glass
blog political: TruthDig
cultural institutions: Sundance Institute
education: Exploratorium – fun+ learning!
government: NASA home page
green: shft.com
law: Guardian.co.uk/law – Interesting site on current issues and the law. I’ll visit again.
politics: PoliPulse – Usually politics and easy aren’t used in the same sentence, but this site is an easy way to gauge interest on a variety of topics in politics.
school/university: The Anything Project Microsite – A University of Victoria project created to gauge community ambition. This is a great idea that could be spread to other places of learning, perhaps at the secondary school level.
science: Discovery News
There you have it; the best of the web.
This weekend I’ll be volunteering downtown and stopping by BarCampLA 8. Enjoy your last weekend in April/first weekend in May!
A Mad Notepad 
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