Greg Isenberg’s 5by emerged victorious at last night’s Webby Awards in New York, taking home the People’s Voice Award for the category of Entertainment (Handheld Video). The Webby Award for that category went to the Team Coco Sync App, for the Conan O’Brien Show.
The Montreal-born, San Francico-headquartered startup was also named and honouree for Best Use of Mobile Video.
5by calls itself “your personal video concierge,” and scours the internet for the best videos, delivering the ones users want to watch for free. It was founded and built in Montreal before being sold to StumbleUpon in September. It still operates as an independent entity within StumbleUpon.
Isenberg provided us with a message to our readers:
The 18th version of the Webby wards celebrated excellence on the Web last night at Cipriani Wall Street at honouring pioneers of a free and open Internet. Webby Winners, Special Achievement Honorees and Presenters included legendary hip-hop trio De La Soul, Orange is the New Black stars Taylor Schilling and Natasha Lyonne, street artist Banksy, legendary musician Patti Smith, NBA player Jason Collins, esteemed journalist Charlie Rose, and intellectual property activist Lawrence Lessig.
The awards show not only celebrated this year’s winners, but commemorated the Web’s 25th anniversary. World Wide Web inventor Tim Berners-Lee gave a speech about the hotly debated topic of net neutrality declaring, “The internet has got to be free and open and neutral.” He brought the audience to their feet with three words, “Up to us.”
Webby Award winners are only allowed to give a five-word acceptance speech. There are over 100 different categories for awards.
The 18th Annual Webby Awards were hosted by critically acclaimed comedian, writer, and actor Patton Oswalt, who offered a few suggested five-word Speeches including, “I think therefore I am,” and “that weed isn’t mine, officer.”
Some of the more notable five-word speeches included:
George Takei – Shatner, eat your heart out.
The Onion – Too many died for this.
Huff Post Live President Roy Sekoff – Anyone can come on us.
The Guardian NSA Files Decoded – More privacy, less NSA surveillance.
Airbnb – We’re sleeping in your bed.
Here’s a picture of Isenberg with 77-year-old George Takei, the famous actor from Star Trek. We don’t know who the other guys are, but we’ve noted that they all have very nice suits.
