Last week, the Rutland Herald/Times-Argus won a bunch of awards from the New England Associated Press News Executives Association for their websites. OK, they're not Pulitzers, but it's interesting to see what kind of web work this media organization considers award-worthy.

Congratulations to RH/TA New Media director Ernesto Burden, whose personal blog is linked in the list on the right. Burden and his crew competed in the circ. under 40,000 category. They won Best Overall Site, and awards for reader engagement, sports presentation, public service, and special section. They were the only VT paper to win anything. Were they the only ones entered? Not sure.

Here's what one judge had to say about the Best Overall Site distinction: ... the Rutland Herald/Times Argus site made the strongest attempt to build a relationship with its readers beyond the printed word. I was impressed with its Vermont Press Bureau section, with information about the legislature. The section features a weblog that encourages users to participate and an engine for users to figure out who represents them. The overall site was easy to navigate. And news was well organized according to where a person lived. I can't believe no one brought this to my attention, not even Ernesto, who commented in the RSS thread below.

I wonder if the Vermont Press Association will have any web categories this year. Heck, they don't even have a real website!

And I can't believe that until yesterday, I hadn't heard about Get Real, RH/TA writer Heather Aja's Reality TV blog. It's listed (in very tiny print) right on the site. Are they trying to keep it a secret? What's up, Ernesto?

What a great name.

And fyi, the Burlington Free Press posted this ad earlier this month for a new Online Editor. Not sure if they found somebody yet. According to their website, they've got 4 people on their web team, one of whom is an ad sales rep. Ernesto's RH/TA New Media team has 3, sans ad rep. And that doesn't include Hall Monitor author Darren Allen.