Just 11 days left until we unveil the winners of the Media Innovation/Digital Edge Awards. (See the list of finalists here.)

The awards breakfast is at our Marketing Conference in Orlando Feb. 25, and the presentation is hosted by the NAA Digital Media Federation.

In addition to posting the list of winners here on the blog, we'll be releasing a report called "Behind the Winning Entries."  The report includes the original entries to the awards as written by the entrants themselves. You'll get to read about everything from motivation to execution for the 26 Digital Edge Award-winning projects.

As a preview, here's the introduction to "Behind the Winning Entries." (For the full report, head to www.naa.org/digitaledge on Feb. 25.)

Part of the Newspaper Association of America’s mission is to share the newspaper story with everyone: the employees of our member newspapers, industry analysts, local and national advertisers, and the valuable consumers who support our industry by reading the newspaper or visiting newspaper Web sites.

Our awards programs, which showcase the best of the best in our industry, is one way of sharing that story.

There’s little doubt the newspaper digital media story has changed dramatically since the first Digital Edge Awards in 1996. That year, there were less than 100 entries to “the Edgies” from forward-thinking newspapers that embraced a promising new medium with open arms. At the time, most newspaper Web sites were little more than the print newspaper contents, posted online with a few links.

Several times since then, the New Media Federation (now the Digital Media Federation, as the medium isn’t so “new” anymore) increased the number of categories to reflect major changes in newspaper digital media. One of those newer categories, for example, is “Most Innovative Visitor Participation.” We expect the categories will continue to change as newspaper digital media becomes even more creative and diverse.

This year’s major change was that the Newspaper Association of America created an overarching awards program, encompassing the Digital Edge Awards and the (former) ACME Awards. This new program is called the Media Innovation Awards (MedIAs), and the Digital Edge Awards are now a category within the MedIAs. New, non-Digital Edge categories within the MedIAs reflect the increase in cross-platform advertising by our member newspapers. The nine Digital Edge categories drew 203 entries in total, and the awards judges named finalists from 40 newspapers.

Another change this year was decision to weigh the number of finalists in each Digital Edge category based on the number of entrants. For example, we increased the number of finalists for Most Innovative Multimedia Storytelling, which received 43 entries. Along a similar vein, we decreased the number of finalists in categories that received fewer entries.

At least four judges looked at every submitted entry, giving each a 1 through 5 rating on strategy, creativity, impact in the local market and adaptability to other markets. More than two dozen newspaper digital media professionals volunteered their time and expertise in late 2007 to judge this competition. This is a peer award, and we thank those who stepped forward to review the entries. If you are interested in judging future awards competitions, please e-mail me at beth.lawton@naa.org.

A few notes on this report:

Though the winning entries are included in this report, we encourage you to visit the Online Ideas Gallery, accessible through www.naa.org. All the Digital Edge winners and finalists from 2004 through this year are in the Online Ideas Gallery. In addition, this searchable database features dozens of best practices reports and case studies from newspapers across the world. The Online Ideas Gallery launched in early 2007.

The winning entries that follow are those the entrants themselves submitted in late 2007. We have lightly edited the entries and images for readability and layout purposes. In addition, we have included contact information for each winning entrant so you can easily follow up with your peers in the industry.

We hope these 2008 winning entries and the finalists included in the Online Ideas Gallery are inspirational. Thanks to all those who entered for sharing their stories.