INMA announced 40 first-place recipients during its 2024 Global Media Awards competition, with Helsingin Sanomat’s ‘Counterstrike of the Free Press’ taking the global ‘Best in Show’.
During the awards ceremony at the Victoria & Albert Museum in London, the winners were unveiled across 20 categories aimed at surfacing innovation and best practices in news brands, optimizing the use of media features, subscriptions, products, advertising and commerce, Artificial Intelligence, and newsroom innovation.
Winning the coveted ‘Best in Show’, the top award of the evening, was Helsingin Sanomat in Finland for ‘Counterstrike of the Free Press,’ a playable map that hid a secret room where independent information was provided by the newspaper in both Russian and English languages. Judges said this campaign showed an exceptional strategy and creative use of journalism to ensure the delivery of accurate news — an example of how media must think beyond its traditional avenues to get its message out.
The INMA competition, which has been rewarding media excellence since 1937, evaluates news media companies across two segments: national brands and regional brands.
This year, two companies garnered two first places- Bergens Tidende from Norway and Stuff from New Zealand.
The 2024 Global Media Awards competition attracted 771 entries from 245 market-leading news media brands in 43 countries. Participants included newspaper media, magazine media, digital media, television media, and radio media.
An international jury of 60 media executives from 23 countries selected 193 finalists earlier this year.
Judges also selected the best in six world regions from the finalists:
- Best in Africa: Daily Maverick for “Daily Maverick Sports Supporters’ Club”
- Best in Asia/Pacific: News Corp Australia for “National Bush Summit Campaign”
- Best in Europe: Helsingin Sanomat in Finland for “Counterstrike of the Free Press”
- Best in Latin America: Grupo El Comercio for “Todos Somos Santa”
- Best in North America: Bloomberg for “Context Changes Everything”
- Best in South Asia: India Today Group for “AI-Led Newsroom Transformation”
“The 2024 Global Media Awards really highlighted how news media companies must think beyond the traditional to connect with their readers in this era of disruption and news avoidance,” said Earl J. Wilkinson, executive director and CEO of INMA. “Unsurprisingly, this class of winning entries features some of the most innovative we’ve seen. We’re so proud of all our finalists.”
