IUPUI New Media Grads Crowned ‘People’s Voice’ Winners in Web Contest

INDIANAPOLIS – Water and fire.

A devastating excess of those two elements is what fueled Chris Podell and Zachary Shields to combine their creativity and technology education to reach out to a forgotten people whose lives had been set adrift in the wake of a killer tsunami and two young burn victims.

But the two young men’s efforts have not gone unnoticed by the International Academy of Digital Arts & Sciences, which today crowned them as the “People’s Voice Award” winners of the 10th Annual Webby Awards (Student Category), for their Web site, www.notseennotheard.com. Their top placement was determined by on-line voters from around the globe, who were invited to choose their favorite sites.

The Webby Awards, which have been dubbed “the Oscars of the Internet” by the New York Times, is an international contest honoring excellence in Web design, creativity, usability and functionality. This year’s contest had 5,500 entries from 40 countries, competing in 69 categories.

Podell and Shields are recent graduates of the new media and arts program at the School of Informatics at Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis. Their road to recognition was spawned in June 2005, when they were planning their Capstone project, a requirement for all students graduating from the School of Informatics.

“We agreed that if we were going to put great effort into a project we wanted it to matter to somebody in some way,” says Podell. “Our project had to be more than just demonstrating our technological skills.”

It didn’t take them long to determine their project was 10,000 miles away from the Hoosier capital: Indonesia – a country whose mainland and islands were rocked by an earthquake and resulting titanic tidal waves in December 2004. The catastrophes killed more than 156,000 Indonesians.

Some of Shields’ college friends had traveled to the area after the disaster to assist in relief efforts as part of University Volunteers International. He was moved by their first-hand accounts of what they had witnessed. He discussed it with Podell and they concluded they could help by sharing victims’ stories with the world – particularly those hardest hit in remote areas – and creating a Web site where visitors could learn more about their plight and donate to the non-governmental organization relief organization, Island Aid (www.island-aid.org).

Shields arrived in Indonesia in July 2005 to begin filming. His five-week visit took him to three different island groups, interviewing disaster victims and showing how their lives had been affected.

One journey took him to the remote hilltop village of Sifalago Susua, a place University Volunteers encouraged him to visit. It was there he encountered Erniwati Lai. She and her cousin Soteria had been horribly burned in kerosene fire a month before the quake and tsunami. Though they survived the blaze their prospects for corrective surgery and other treatments were virtually nil.

“When I met Erniwati, I knew our Capstone project focus would become more than what Chris and I originally envisioned,” Shields says.

After Shields returned to Indianapolis, he and Podell immediately began to work on their project and Web site.

“The name of the site seemed appropriate because after that region had its 15 minutes of fame and time in the media spotlight, it seemed as if the world just kind of forgot about what happened there,” says Podell.

Podell took the lead in designing the Web site and its programming features. He and Shields then applied the multimedia and production skills they had learned and honed at the School of Informatics.

Joe Defazio, interim associate director of the School’s new media program at IUPUI, knew Podell and Shields were on to something special with their work.

“Not Seen, Not Heard demonstrates passion and a very high involvement on a humanitarian level,” says Defazio, who also directs the Capstone course. “It also demonstrates the unique ability of incorporating leading edge technology that allows their story and message to reach many individuals throughout the world.”

What began as a required course to complete their college studies became something far greater. Chris Podell and Zachary Shields are using their education and skills to help those the world might otherwise not see nor hear.

Like two cousins named Soteria and Erniwati living in a remote village half a world away.

To view Podell’s and Shields’ Web site and learn how to help disaster victims of the 2004 earthquake and tsunami, go to www.notseennotheard.com. More information about the Laia cousins can be found at www.gomogirlsfund.com.

More information about the 10th Annual Webby Awards and this year’s winners and entries can be viewed at www.webbyawards.com.