Status: 06/24/2022 07:24 a.m
The “Grimme Online Award” is one of the most important awards in the German-speaking online world. Outstanding offers are awarded – also from private individuals. The award was presented on Thursday evening as part of a celebratory gala in Cologne’s Flora. WDR digital expert Jörg Schieb was there – and introduces the winners.
The Grimme Online Award honors the best German-language online offerings: websites, YouTube content, online reports, research projects. A total of eight offers received the prize, which is extremely coveted in the industry and which many insiders regard as the “Oscar of the German-speaking web”, in the Flora in Cologne. Back in attendance for the first time in three years.
Grimme Online Award ceremony on June 23rd in Cologne’s Flora
Image: WDR/Jörg Schieb
The nomination committee had to select the best offers from hundreds of submissions – the jury was spoiled for choice to select the most worthy of the award. Offers that deal with a wide variety of topics – sometimes on different platforms.
Many of the award-winning offers tell stories in videos, on websites, in podcasts and on social media at the same time: the makers use all the means of play – and also the strength of the respective media. A strength of the podcasts, for example, is that people take their time here – and can be told in detail. This works particularly well in the excellent offers.
Guantanamo and Environment in the East
A classic podcast and honored in the “Information” category is “Slahi: 14 Years Guantánamo”. In this twelve-part NDR podcast, the authors tell the extraordinary life story in the context of Islamist terror. How does he see his actions? What did imprisonment and torture do to him? In addition to Slahi, former companions also have their say – and there is a conversation between Mohamedou Slahi and his torturer. This creates closeness and gives an important topic the necessary space.
The 12-part podcast documentary “Slahi” impressively documents the conditions in the Guantanamo prison camp
Image: WDR/Schieb
MDR’s interactive documentary “Environment in East Germany” was also awarded in the “Information” category. For decades, the planned economy of the GDR with its environmental sins brought nature to the edge of its resilience. In the interactive documentary, users scroll from the air through the biosphere to the ground – and thus learn a lot about the nature of nature and the damage that environmental sins can cause that still have an impact today.
Story telling: reports and stories
A particular strength of some excellent online offers is how intensively they deal with topics that play little or no role in everyday life and in the current media. An example of this is Kandvala: the two young photojournalists Sitara Thalia Ambrosio and Iván Furlan Cano, 19 and 20 years old, have put together a close-up, interactive documentation on their own.
The makers spoke intensively with people fleeing the Bosnian border, in the ruined building “Kandvala” – hence the name of the project. The two have sensitively portrayed the young people, recording their fears, longings and hopes in photos, videos, audios and texts. An offer that makes you think.
Making history tangible
Some of the award-winning offers also try to make history understandable. This applies in particular to the “Nuclear Games” offer, which was awarded in the “Knowledge & Education” category – which is currently regaining importance due to the Ukraine conflict and the energy crisis. In a mix of interactive animation and documentation, the creators tell of the threat to humanity posed by eight decades of nuclear technology.
The interactive documentary “Nuclear Games” vividly describes 80 years of nuclear research – and the use of nuclear weapons
Image: WDR/Schieb
Uranium mining in the Sahara is just as important as the expulsions due to the nuclear tests in the Bikini Atoll or “rocket man” Kim Jong-Un. The elaborately designed graphic novels, which users can scroll through, are supplemented by knowledge libraries with videos and texts.
TV producer “Scobel” receives audience award
3Sat presenter Gert Scobel received the audience award
Image: WDR/Schieb
The YouTube channel of 3Sat presenter Gert Scobel, who describes himself there as a “Youtube philosopher”, was awarded the audience prize. Every Thursday on Scobel’s channel there is a new video on the “big issues in life”: everyday, new and amazing things from science, philosophy, society, ethics or culture. With an interdisciplinary and philosophical view of what is important. Scobel-style: One hour long – with fun and understanding graphic elements. This is how Scobel skillfully gets people interested in sophisticated content.
About the author
Jörg Schieb, WDR digital expert.
Image: WDR
Jörg Schieb, born in 1964, is WDR digital expert and author of 130 specialist books and guides. He has been dealing with digitization and its effects on our everyday life for many years.
Source: wdr.de