JFS - Site awards

n April 2004 this site won a major award!
I entered it, for the first time, in the annual British Federation of Film Societies awards and was delighted to win "Best Website".

James is equally delighted with the award, “It's clearly a specially commissioned glass plaque from Catrin Jones, the stand is more difficult but from the distinctive bevelling I'd guess at Remi Couriard. I have a Dom Perignon '53 – at the ideal temperature – that would complement it perfectly.”

Here's the citation:

BEST WEBSITE
In this "Internet Age", the transmission of information is no longer the exclusive domain of posters, leaflets and programme notes. This new award has been instigated to recognise the film society that makes the best use of the World Wide Web to communicate with members and non-members alike. The type of sites operated by film societies varies enormously from the all singing all dancing sponsored sites operated by some, to the self-generated simple sites operated by many.

The judges considered accessibility, usability (navigation), clarity and adherence to standards in support of these aims. The quality of design - the "knobs and whistles" - was only considered as a secondary element in the assessment.

There were some excellent entries for this category - all offering slightly different things. The judges adopted a set of criteria against all were scored but admit that finally overall, theirs was a subjective opinion. The judges were disappointed to see how few site actually referred to the societies membership of BFFS-Cinema for All - and how few used the logo. Shortlisted were Bracknell, Edinburgh University, Jersey, Ipswich, McGuffin Film Society, Oxen Park, Winchester.

In addition to the above the judges looked to see whether the site provided general information about itself with contact details and details of membership and how to join. Did it have a copy of the current programme, did it provide film notes, an archive, was it up to date and did it have a map or directions showing how to get to the venue? What sort of links did it have, did it use images and lastly what was its overall appearance and feel.

Our winner did all of these things (admittedly as did most of the shortlist) - but its site is amazing. Very colourful, packed tight with features, reviews, archives, quizzes, humour and lots and lots of other stuff. If anything it almost leads to electronic indigestion - and never getting any work done - whilst you browse its 600 pages, almost 500 pictures and its 56-year archive. It includes a very interesting section on how film society selection works, the behind the scenes skulduggery and corruption, what films didn't make it and why. Its general appearance was considered excellent, if a tendency to being over the top.

The judges awarded Commendations to Bracknell, & Edinburgh University for keeping up the standard of their site. The winner is Jersey Film Society.

And now for the bad news - are we too middle class? - BFFS funding stopped by UK Film Council.