REDMOND, Wash., July 10, 2006 (PRIMEZONE) -- On July 15, 2006, MSNBC.com marks its 10-year anniversary. As the Internet became a critical part of Americans' daily life over the past decade, MSNBC.com exploded in popularity. From humble beginnings -- 3 million unique users viewed text, a smattering of photos and fewer than 10 videos per month on the site in 1996 -- MSNBC.com now is visited by an average of 30 million unique users each month, and provides them with more than 100,000 videos, hundreds of photo slideshows, interactive applications and user-driven "communities" like blogs and message boards.
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Chartered to marry the journalistic assets of NBC News with the technology of Microsoft, MSNBC.com set out to reinvent journalism, utilizing technology to tell stories and instantaneously deliver them to readers. That vision has been realized and the site is the solid leader in the online news category. MSNBC.com has also become a profitable and viable business.
"The evolution of journalism never moved faster than it has in the last ten years," said Charlie Tillinghast, president of MSNBC.com. "When we launched MSNBC.com, the possibilities for this new medium were endless and we have gone farther than anyone imagined at the time. We broke ground not only with the way we tell stories, but our technology has enabled us to put the stories out there for consumers in new and innovative ways, all while taking our business into profitability and great success. I can't wait to see what the next ten years hold."
As the exclusive online home for all of NBC News and sole provider of general news for the MSN Network, MSNBC.com led the way covering the big stories of the last ten years including three presidential elections, Sept. 11, 2001 and the Iraq war. MSNBC.com's original journalism also made a significant impact. Important stories were told, and sometimes broken on MSNBC.com, including shortcomings in the TSA, major credit card and identity thefts and the site's biggest original project, Rising From Ruin (www.risingfromruin.msnbc.com), which tells the story of two towns' struggles to rebuild after the devastation of Hurricane Katrina. The project combines blog-style field reporting, citizen journalist dispatches and in-depth multimedia reports in a dynamic, constantly updated format. In addition, MSNBC.com was the first online news site to launch a number of groundbreaking blogs and video innovations in collaboration with NBC News, including "The Daily Nightly," the blog for "NBC Nightly News" and "Baghdad Blog," dispatches from NBC News reporters in Iraq.
"MSNBC.com has always been the leader in the way we tell stories and deliver them to our consumers," said Jennifer Sizemore, managing editor of MSNBC.com. "We're immensely proud of the reporting we've done over the last ten years and will continue to innovate and change as the medium grows."
MSNBC.com's technology leadership is unmatched in the industry. MSNBC.com's proprietary publishing system allows the site to publish all its pieces instantaneously as many times as needed throughout the day. As a result, MSNBC.com is consistently the first online news site to report breaking news, whether on the site or directly to consumers through breaking news alerts, emails, blogs and RSS feeds. A pioneer of streaming video along with MSN Video, MSNBC.com had video on the site at launch in 1996, although clips were download only and most clips were only 10 to 15 seconds long. Today, MSNBC.com has over 100,000 videos available for streaming in any given month and viewers watch an average of 45 million per month. Viewers can also get the best of NBC News and MSNBC.com when and where they want it with the Netcasts, online, on-demand versions of NBC News programs, and MSNBC.com's podcasts, downloadable audio versions of NBC News programs.
The outstanding journalism at MSNBC.com has been consistently recognized in the industry with numerous awards and accolades, including five EPpy awards, four National Press Club "Best Site" awards, three Online Journalism Association awards, two Edward R. Murrow "Best Web Site" awards, two Pictures of the Year International awards and three National Press Photographer's Association awards, as well as countless awards recognizing the excellence of MSNBC.com's original reports. The site has also been recognized by the press as the leader in online journalism. In October 2005, MSNBC.com was selected to Brandweek Magazine's "Website Hotlist," the only news and information site to make the list, and in February 2006, the site was chosen in the "Best Online Publishers" issue of OMMA magazine as the top news and information site.
About MSNBC.com
MSNBC.com, celebrating its 10th anniversary this year, is the exclusive online channel for the NBC Universal News family, which includes the Today show, NBC Nightly News, Dateline NBC, Meet the Press and MSNBC TV. MSNBC.com's driving force is to provide the optimal consumer experience, presenting a diverse range of original content and the best from partners in a rich multi-media environment that includes interactive features and free streaming video, allowing users to access the news and information they want, when they want it, 24 hours a day. Based in Redmond, WA, MSNBC.com is a joint venture of Microsoft (Nasdaq:MSFT) and NBC Universal News (NYSE:GE).
The photo is also available at AP PhotoExpress.
