Self-styled Internet Oscars make comeback

"I know it's a cliche, but we can honestly say there are no losers here tonight ... Because they weren't invited."

Rob Corddry, host of the Ninth Annual Webby Awards

Former US vice president Al Gore may have lost the White House, but at least he won a Webby.

Scant consolation, perhaps, for a failed presidential candidate, but a proud achievement for the other victors who took the stage at the Ninth Annual Webby Awards in New York City's Gotham Hall on Monday night.

It was comeback year for the self-proclaimed Oscars of the Internet -- or "gongs for geeks" as one humble winner put it -- which had been forced to roll up its red carpet after the global dot.com bust that relegated a host of past honorees to the cyber wilderness.

After online-only ceremonies in 2003 and last year, the Webby Awards for Internet excellence re-emerged from the virtual world to honor creative Web sites offering everything from employment opportunities for spies to surreal songs by guitar-playing kittens.

"It was like the Dark Ages back there for a while, but we've come out the other side," said Tiffany Shlain, the awards' founder and creative director.

"The past year has been one of outrageous growth for the Internet, and it's not only become bigger, but better ... more substantial and more mature," Shlain said.

Monday's ceremony offered awards in 65 categories -- more than double last year's number -- after receiving entries from more than 4,000 Web sites in 40 countries.

There were so many nominees that the organizers decided to announce the winners a month in advance of the awards event in an effort to restrict attendance.

"I know it's a cliche, but we can honestly say there are no losers here tonight," declared the host for the evening, comedian Rob Corddry. "Because they weren't invited."

While the Webbys may lack the glamor of the Oscars, they offer the quirky advantage of strictly limiting acceptance speeches to just five words, thus prohibiting gushingly tearful testimonials of gratitude to family and agents.

Results ranged from the strangely banal ("Look at my hair, man") to snippets of Yoda-like philosophy ("Politics good. Sex better ... much.")

The ceremony testified to the diversity of the Internet, with awards for social activism, religion and spirituality, sports, politics and consumer electronics.

And the categories threw up some surprises with the employment Webby going to the recruiting Web site of the Central Intelligence Agency.

Webby winners are chosen by the grandly titled International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences, which claims a membership that includes David Bowie, Francis Ford Coppola and The Simpsons creator Matt Groening.

Gore, who was pilloried during the 2000 presidential campaign for appearing to imply that he had created the Internet, won a lifetime achievement award for providing crucial political support to the technical development of the World Wide Web.

Clasping his Webby, even Gore adhered to the five-word limit.

"Please, don't recount this vote," he said.