Recognizing achievement in heritage Web site design

Each year, Museums and the Web sponsors the “Best of the Web” competition. Museum Web sites from around the world were nominated in a variety of categories and judged by an independent panel of judges.

See if your favorite site was nominated.

This year's categories include:

Best On-line Exhibition

Best E-Services Site

Best Museum Web Site Supporting Educational Use

Best Innovative or Experimental Application

Best Museum Professional's Site

Best Museum Research Site

Best Overall Museum Web site

As well as choosing the best in each category, the judges chose the "Best of the Web" from all the sites nominated. This award recognized the outstanding nature of a site and its overall contribution to the institution, museum profession and cultural informatics community. Prior winners were:

1997: The Exploratorium
1998: MoMA The Museum of Modern Art
1999: Walker Art Center
2000: State Hermitage Museum
2001: Bhutan - Fortress of the Gods

Overall Chair of the Best of the Web Contest

Jim Angus, Website Project Manager
National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke
Bethesda, MD, USA

2002 Best of the Web Judges

Categories judged in Parenthesis

Thimoty Barbieri ITECH Engineering Milano, Italy http://users.iol.it/thimoty Angela Brayham (research, online exhibit, e-services) Director of the Canadian Craft & Design Museum Vancouver, BC, Canada John Chadwick (professional, education) Arizona K-12 Center Northern Arizona University Phoenix, AZ, USA http://azk12.nau.edu Susan Chun The Metropolitan Museum of Art New York, NY, USA http://www.metmuseum.org Dale Clark San Diego Natural History Museum San Diego, CA, USA http://www.sdnhm.org Jim Devine (education, e-services) University of Glasgow Glasgow, Scotland http://www.hunterian.gla.ac.uk/ Herminia Din (online exhibit) The Children's Museum of Indianapolis Indianapolis, IN, USA http://childrensmuseum.org/ Karen Elinich (education, innovative) Franklin Institute Philadelphia, PA, USA http://www.fi.edu Dr. Patricia Gillard (e-services) User Insite Pty Ltd Braddon, Australia David Green National Initiative for a Networked Cultural Heritage Washington DC, USA http://www.ninch.org David Greenfield (education, innovative) Skirball Cultural Center Los Angeles, CA , USA http://www.skirball.com

Katherine Burton Jones (professional, online exhibit, e-services) Harvard Divinity School Cambridge, MA, USA http://www.hds.harvard.edu/ Lawrence Monda (online exhibit) National Museums of Kenya Nairobi, Kenya http://www.museums.or.ke Joan C. Nordbotten (professional, innovative) University of Bergen, Norway Bergen, Norway http://www.ifi.uib.no/staff/joan Dr Jim O'Donnell (online exhibit) Royal Observatory Greenwich Greenwich, United Kingdom http://www.rog.nmm.ac.uk/ Virginia Pifko (research, online exhibit) The Art Museum Princeton University Princeton, NJ, USA http://princetonartmuseum.org Angelina Russo University of Queensland Queensland, Australia http://www.unisa.edu.au Kevin Sumption (education) Powerhouse Museum Haymarket, Australia http://www.phm.gov.au Kathy Talley-Jones (education) Pasadena, CA, USA http://www.talleyjones.com Isabelle Vinson UNESCO Sector for culture Paris, France http://www.unesco.org/culture Ned Zimmerman-Bence Minnesota Historical Society St. Paul, MN, USA http://www.mnhs.org