The National Media Awards Foundation (NMAF) is announcing the winners of the 5th annual Digital Publishing Awards. The Gold and Silver medallists were presented across the Digital Publishing Awards’ social and digital channels, including a Livestream on Twitter. All winners will receive an awards certificate, awards seal, and Gold winners in individual categories will each receive a cash prize of $500.
GENERAL EXCELLENCE IN DIGITAL PUBLISHING AWARDS
For the full list of winners, including honorable mentions, visit digitalpublishingawards.ca
The General Excellence awards recognize publications that maximize the possibilities of digital publishing by excelling in fulfilling their editorial mandate while representing the highest of journalistic standards. These awards are presented in three divisions: small, medium, and large.
In the small division, The Tyee took Gold. As an independent online news magazine for the past 17 years, The Tyee’s commitment to fact-driven stories, reporting and analysis that informs and enlivens our democratic conversation resonated strongly with our jury.
Hakai Magazine was the Gold winner in the medium division, its second time capturing this honour following their win in 2018. Exploring crucial areas to our understanding and appreciation of the environment, Hakai impressed our judges with its compelling journalism that highlights coastal life and phenomena along with its writers’ ability to translate complex ideas into authoritative, engaging stories that take us from past to present to the future.
After receiving honorable mentions in both 2018 and 2019, Le Devoir took the Gold Medal in the large publication division. The jury selected Le Devoir for their commitment to high-quality content across all platforms in a wide range of fields (politics, economics, environment and culture), as well as the depth of their analysis and the quality of their columnists and writers.
EMERGING EXCELLENCE AWARD
Jane Lytvynenko of BuzzFeed News is the recipient of the prestigious Emerging Excellence award, which honours an individual whose early work in Canadian digital publishing shows the highest degree of craft and promise. The jury was impressed with how she has established herself as a global leader in debunking disinformation. Additionally noteworthy is her impact on global media and ability to lead and train others in this important field. Receiving honourable mentions in this category were Jane Gerster (Global News) and Lakshine Sathiyanathan (CBC Radio).
LEADERSHIP AWARD
The NMAF was delighted to present Dmitry Beniaminov with the coveted Leadership Award. Beniaminov has worked with several notable publications, including Canadian Living, Elle Canada, The Walrus, and Toronto Life, among others. David Topping, Newsroom Director, Newsletters at Torstar said of Beniaminov: “In the two years I worked with him, I was consistently impressed at his ability to keep so much in his brain, and how generous he was with sharing it.” Learn more about Dmitry’s outstanding career and see his acceptance speech here.
WINNERS HIGHLIGHTS
The Globe and Mail is the top-winning publisher, receiving an outstanding six Gold medals and four Silver medals. Winning an impressive two golds is “Paving a new road for rap”, which took top honors in Best Arts & Culture Storytelling and Best Photo Storytelling, honours shared by Michelle Siu, Jeremy Agius, Melissa Tait, and Theresa Suzuki.
Following with an outstanding win total of three Gold and three Silver medals is Radio-Canada, with Gold wins in Innovation in Digital Storytelling (for “Voitures autonomes : qui sauver, qui sacrifier”), Best Digital Design (for “Formats numériques 2019”) and Best Feature Article: Long (for “Dénaturer la #nature sur Instagram”).
Among the top winners, CBC Podcasts notably swept the Best Podcast category with Gold and Silver wins (for “Hunting Warheads” and “Uncover: The Village”, respectively).
Along with its Gold win for General Excellence in Digital Publishing: Small, The Tyee earned an additional Gold in Best Editorial Newsletter (for “The Run”) and a Silver award in Best Column (for Dorothy Woodend, culture columnist, her second straight Silver win in this category).
Similarly, Le Devoir added to their Gold win for General Excellence in the large division with a Gold in Best Digital Design (for “Décryptage de l’affaire SNC-Lavalin”).
Also earning two Gold awards was Xtra, in Best News Coverage (Community) (for “Rainbow Votes”) and Best Editorial Newsletter (for “Xtra Weekly”).
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The National Media Awards Foundation is incredibly grateful for the support of: Government of Canada, the Ontario Arts Council, Ontario Creates and Reader’s Digest Foundation. We are also thankful for the support of our partners, Candescent and Cision.
Our sincerest thanks to this year’s judges, who graciously volunteered their time and expertise, evaluating the hundreds of entries submitted to this year’s competition.
THE DIGITAL PUBLISHING AWARDS
Produced by the National Media Awards Foundation, the Digital Publishing Awards promote and reward the achievements of those who create digital content in Canada—the writers and editors, designers and developers, video and podcast producers, photographers and illustrators, and many others. The DPA program recognizes, celebrates and promotes to a national audience the innovative publishing teams that produce digital content in Canadian media.
THE NATIONAL MEDIA AWARDS FOUNDATION
A charitable foundation, the NMAF’s mandate is to recognize, support and promote excellence in content creation of Canadian print and digital publications through an annual program of awards and national publicity efforts. The Foundation produces three distinct and bilingual award programs: the National Magazine Awards, the Digital Publishing Awards, and the National Magazine Awards: B2B.
SOURCE National Media Awards Foundation, Toronto, May 27, 2020 /CNW/