NEW YORK (June 23, 2009) — Stephen Bates, contributing editor, The Wilson Quarterly, published by the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, and Jonathan Roubini, editor-in-chief, Lab Review, have won the Public Relations Society of America’s (PRSA) 2008 Awards for Excellence in Technology Journalism.
The awards were presented on June 9 at a special ceremony in New York during the 2009 PRSA Technology Section Conference, hosted by PRSA’s Technology Section, a Professional Interest Section focusing specifically on technology, in cooperation with the PRSA New York Chapter. The annual gathering, now in its 12th year, attracts public relations practitioners from corporations, nonprofits, governmental agencies and public relations firms from around the country. 2009 also marked the 12th year the Awards for Excellence in Technology Journalism have been presented. The awards competition was judged by an independent panel of peer editors, writers and reporters from the national general, business and trade press.
Bates’ award-winning article, “The Day the TV Died,” entered in the general/business category, appeared in The Wilson Quarterly, Spring 2008 issue. The eight-page story, based on the digital TV transition, which occurred on June 12, 2009, traces the long and arduous trail of similar efforts toward standardization for numerous technologies over the past 100 years. In his article, Bates describes the continuous competition between RCA’s late David Sarnoff and FM radio inventor Edwin Armstrong, as well as the many hard-won standards battles between the CBS and NBC color TV systems, VHS vs. Betamax videotape standards, the HD DVD vs. Blu-Ray high definition DVD formats and many others.
As Bates reported in his Wilson Quarterly article, “for a typical technology, death comes slowly,” “decisions about standards frequently reflect the clout of their proponents,” and the battles are “fought by people who feel that their economic or intellectual interests are at stake.” He concluded, “Some Americans who have tuned out the urgency of the FCC in favor of the urgency of ‘CSI’ will be startled by static early Saturday morning. For everybody else, digital TV will be pretty much the same as analog TV, just a bit sharper with a few more channels.”
In the competition’s trade/technical/professional category, Roubini’s award-winning article was a review of the Palm Centro cellular phone, which appeared in the Jan. 12, 2008, issue of Lab Review.
Roubini’s critical review holds no punches. He reports, “The keyboard is a bit tight, but this smartphone has all the features novices are looking for at a rock-bottom price.” Roubini notes that the Palm Centro plays music, as long as it’s not face-down on a table, receives live television and video-on-demand from CNN and Comedy Central, and “at only $99, it’s a bargain for first-time smartphone users, as long as you can live with the tiny keyboard.”
“This year’s winners emerged from a tough competitive field of entries for work published in 2008. Each winning entry appears to be the product of substantial investigative reporting,” said Joel Strasser, APR, Fellow PRSA, chair of the 2008 Awards for Excellence in Technology Committee and head of independent technology communications firm, Joel A. Strasser & Associates, based in Brick, N.J. “Each of the two winning entries is a strong work that underscores great technology reportage and writing style. They both follow a tradition of our earlier award winners based on their value to readers, clarity of communications and significance in technical innovation and newsworthiness.”
Each winning entry received a cash award of $1,000, plus a pair of crystal trophies presented to the winning writers as well as their publishers.
Judges for this year’s competition were Roger Allan, contributing editor, Electronic Design; Walt Boyes, editor in chief, CONTROL Magazine; Bettina Chavanne, pentagon reporter, Aviation Week’s Aerospace Daily & Defense Report; Nicholas Cravotta, contributing technical editor, EDN Magazine; Olaf de Senerpont Domis, West Coast bureau chief, The Deal/Tech Confidential; Gregg Early, executive editor, KCI Communications; Nan Fornal, editor, The Home Entertainment Group; Lauren K. Hoyt, senior editor/ SEO strategist, Tech Target Networking Media; Dr. W. Jeffrey Hurst, co-editor, The Chemist; Don Loepp, managing editor, Plastic News, Crain Communications Inc.; Rob Spiegel; Sandra Wendelken, editor, Radio Resource Media Group; and Angela Wilbraham, chief executive officer, A-Team Group.
About the PRSA Technology Section
The PRSA Technology Section consists of professionals who counsel and create public relations and marketing communications programs for technology companies and/or use technology-based tactics in their public relations practices. Members are provided with the news, events, tools and resources to help them do their jobs efficiently. For more information on PRSA’s Technology Section, visit our Web site.
About the Public Relations Society of America (PRSA)
The Public Relations Society of America headquartered in New York City, is the world's largest organization for public relations professionals with nearly 32,000 professional and student members. PRSA is organized into 109 Chapters and 10 Districts nationwide, and 20 Professional Interest Sections and Affinity Groups, which represent business and industry, counseling firms, independent practitioners, military, government, associations, hospitals, schools, professional services firms and nonprofit organizations. The Public Relations Student Society of America (PRSSA) has 302 Chapters at colleges and universities throughout the United States, and one Chapter in Argentina.
