Date published: 01.09.08 - not release date

UNLTDWORLD, THE SOCIAL NETWORK FOR SOCIAL ENTREPRENEURS REACHES FINALS OF NEW STATESMAN NEW MEDIA AWARDS

The New Statesman New Media Awards, previously won by David Cameron and No 10 Downing Street has named its list of finalists for the 10th annual 2008 awards, including UnLtdWorld, a Social Networking site aimed at connecting individuals making a difference.

Britain’s awards winning current affairs magazine New Statesman have announced the finalists of their 10th annual New Media Awards, and have named a UK social networking platform for social entrepreneurs as one of four Innovation finalists.

The award has been won previously by Conservative leader David Cameron and No 10 Downing Street for their commitment to ensuring positive impact of new media technology on public life, and government backed www.UnLtdWorld.com are amongst the finalists vying for the prestigious accolade.

The awards are in recognition of organisations and initiatives that show evidence of creative implementation of technology; a willingness to exploit the potential of new media; and an effort in making content as widely accessible as possible. The intention is to focus on those who have achieved something of benefit to others, whether in their community or in wider society, which UnLtdWorld are becoming renowned for.

Users of the platform include representatives from high profile charities such as Oxfam and Bullying UK as well as 1000's of social entrepreneurs and socially minded individuals and companies, such as Quotes4Charity.

As well as being announced as a finalist in the New Statesman New Media Awards, www.UnLtdWorld.com was declared the runner up of the recent Start-up 2.0 2008 award’s 10th Digital Global Congress in Barcelona; which was partnered by Microsoft, La Caixa Bank and Sun Microsystems. The prominent competition sought to promote and reward the most innovative European start-ups that work in the field of Web 2.0 technologies.

Alberto Nardelli, chief strategist of UnLtdWorld said,

“We're absolutely that UnLtdWorld has been selected as a finalist in the New Statesman New Media Awards 2008.

It is an honour to have been nominated and selected from such an array of fantastic projects, and to be a finalist alongside a truly amazing and inspiring group of initiatives.
A special thanks to the UnLtdWorld team, supporters and partners for all their hard work, commitment and belief in our vision, and above all to the UnLtdWorld community; for its passion is contributing and deeply shaping UnLtdWorld into the platform that it is, and aims to become.”

The winners will be announced at an awards ceremony next week. A list of all finalists can be found here: http://www.newstatesman.com/nma/nma2008/finalists08

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Editorial notes:

For more info contact Andy or Rich, 10 Yetis Public Relations Agency on 01452 527898 – andy@10yetis.co.uk

To speak to UnLtdWorld contact Alberto Nardelli at alberto@unltdworld.com or on +44(0)2075661137 or on Twitter at http://twitter.com/alberton

- UnLtdWorld aims to foster a community of socially-minded people

- Over 8 minutes spent in average per user on the site per day, 10 pages viewed/user/day, 1000s of objects added to the site

- On average one in four members logs in everyday.

- UnLtdWorld is a finalist in the 2008 New Statesman New Media Awards, Innovation Category

- UnLtdWorld was runner-up at Startup 2.0 2008, an award aimed at recognizing the most innovative start-ups in the Europe.

- For an overview of the sites functionality visit: http://unltdworld.com/downloads/UnLtdWorld_Overview.pdf

- A dedicated media section (with logo, screenshots and select media coverage) is available here: http://unltdworld.com/pages/media.php

- The UnLtdWorld Blog: http://unltdworld.com/pages/blog.php

- UnLtdWorld is supported by UnLtd – The Foundation for Social Entrepreneurs, a unique and dynamic organisation whose mission is to reach out and unleash the energies of social entrepreneurs (www.unltd.org.uk)

UnLtdWorld is powered by Elgg
- Elgg is an open platform that allows anyone to build socially aware applications.


Further Information

UnLtdWorld is aimed at connecting social entrepreneurs, social innovators, socially-minded people and organisations that invest their efforts in changing the world for the better, and enabling these audiences to find and share targeted information.

Most social networks are built around relevance of contacts and broadcast information within circles of acquaintances. UnLtdWorld is about commonality of purpose: fostering new connections and matching information through the power of community and relevance of context and content.

For example through a feature called Neighbourhoods, members are dynamically matched around parameters of similarity, such as location, issues of interest and skills.

On UnLtdWorld you can connect with others, search and share resources and opportunities, find and list services and products, share answers to key questions, create and join groups, promote and find events, support inspiring projects and lots more.

UnLtdWorld is established on the principle that social entrepreneurship is not a special interest, but a complex market with specific dynamics. Social enterprise in fact now contributes to over 1% of GDP in the UK. UnLtdWorld isn’t about duplicating or substituting real world dynamics, but aims to complement and add value to the array of fantastic positive action and efforts happening around the planet, and thereby enable even greater impact.
This may for example mean, dynamically linking individuals working in the same location on similar issues, efficiently connecting buyers and sellers of relevant products and services, more effectively linking diverse stakeholders and groups, or making it easy for social entrepreneurs to learn from each other while sharing information and building knowledge collaboratively.

In parallel to fostering a vibrant community, UnLtdWorld aims to help build the capacity of social entrepreneurship, and enhance the efficiency of relations between social entrepreneurs, relevant stakeholders and the general public. We aim to do this mainly through the UnLtdWorld Research Lab, the world's most powerful mapping and graphing of social entrepreneurship, and of social and environmental issues. Through the Research Lab, UnLtdWorld provides critical social insight. Anyone, no matter their size, can access, use and take advantage of this platform, and by doing so co-create even greater value.

Beyond technology, our focus is on people that are investing their energy in changing their communities and the world for the better. Our efforts, passion and enthusiasm is in providing the most powerful possible platform to support the true innovators and enablers of positive impact – those that in unexpected ways can change the way the world is.

High resolution images available upon request