Bruno Giussani is a writer, the European Director of the 
The Eugen Swiss Media Award 2007, which recognizes every year the best Swiss technology journalism, has been given tonight in Bern to writer Cornelia Schmid and photographer Daniel Boschung for a report on "The Future Makers" ("Die Zukunftsmacher" in the original German version) published in September 2006 in the ETH Globe magazine. This is a science-popularization mag published by the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich.
As I said in the commendation tonight ('m a member of the jury, I was awarded the prize a few years ago), the work is a good example of a very complex topic (the story deals with ubiquitous computing, virtual reality, weather models, quantum crypto, synthetic biology, etc) explained in understandable terms, and accompanied by pictures that help relate these technologies to daily life.
The Eugen prize for radio broadcast has been awarded to Reto Widmer, Guido Berger and Lucius Müller of Swiss Public Radio DRS (the German-language station). They produce a weekly tech show and podcast called "Digital Plus", and we picked a particular report, on the release of Windows Vista. It's always very difficult to discuss technology on radio. So they wrote a fictional job interview, where Mr Vista meets an HR director seeking a replacement for Mr XP -- and then added all the useful context.
The prize for television broadcast went to Peter Berni an François Cesalli, of the French-language channel TSR of Swiss Television, for a report on synthetic world Second Life produced for the weekly magazine "Mise au point".
The award ceremony also featured a keynote speech by writer Esther Girsberger, who mused brilliantly on political blogging, including that of the Swiss Minister of Telecommunications Moritz Leuenberger -- who, she said (and I agree), "understands the spirit of blogging quite well".
The Eugen jury is chaired by prof. Louis Bosshart of the Department of Sociology and Media of the University of Fribourg. The annual (since 1992) prize, which is sponsored by IT firm Bedag, is meant to encourage technology journalists to produce works that "further the understanding of technology and of its social and business impacts for the broader public".
A parallel series of Eugen prizes, for the best websites from Swiss public administrations, went to the town of Weggis (small towns) and Köniz (cities), to the canton of Appenzell Innerrhoden (the smallest Swiss canton) and to the Swiss Federal Aviation Administration.
Talking about Weggis: the picture above is the homepage of the region's portal. Or when a picture says more than many menus, links and icons.
It's fantastic that Weggis won this prize. Weggis/Rigi Kulm/Lake Luzern are incredible beautiful. Congratulations!
Posted by: Robert Stengård-Olliges | November 16, 2007 at 01:27 AM