Twitter has emerged as a powerful new medium. It combines the features of blogs, instant messages and e-mail. It’s short-form, personal nature offers opportunities for journalists, groups, nonprofits, governments, companies and individuals to communicate in ways distinct from other digital media. It is particularly suited for brief status updates, and seems useful for breaking news.

A contest would provide a systematic way to discover or recognize who’s doing the best job of non-fiction work on Twitter. This grant creates the Shorty Awards. (In its first year, the award drew 50,000 entries). It is expected to become an annual event, with the number of participants growing every year. It is hoped that the winners of the first awards will inspire more journalists and others to use Twitter or similar services.