Web Site Seeing // Sun-Times Takes Award // Newspaper's Online Guide Hailed

Creating a unique link between the printed page and the onlineworld has earned the Chicago Sun-Times Connected pages an InlandPress Association Innovation award.

"It's precisely the marriage between the online World Wide Weband newspapers' traditional role of simplifying things and makingthings easy for readers," said Buck Ryan, director of the School ofJournalism and Telecommunications at the University of Kentucky.Ryan led the judging of this year's competition.

Connected, published in the Sun-Times on Thursdays and Sundays,contains articles about newsworthy, entertaining and informativesites on the World Wide Web, as well the addresses for those sites.

"One of the major problems (with the Internet) is findinginteresting sites," said Fred Lebolt, Sun-Times director of onlinepublications. "What we wanted to do is break through that barrier tothe Internet."

But, according to Lebolt, the ink and paper version of Connectedis only half the formula. The other half is the paper's own site onthe World Wide Web - Chicago Sun-Times Online - found atwww.suntimes.com.

When readers browse the online version of Connected, they caninstantly travel to the Web sites listed simply by clicking on theaddress.

"The mouse becomes a channel-changer. It's a no-brainer,"Lebolt said.

In addition to Connected, visitors to Sun-Times Online can finddigital postings of sports schedules, restaurant reviews, letters tothe editor, auto reviews, a computer column, and traffic and weatherinformation.

The Sun-Times will relaunch its Website Tuesday. In response toreaders' requests, the new Sun-Times Online will be short on graphicsand long on content.

This means the aesthetic "front page," with a fish-eye view ofthe downtown skyline, will disappear.

But in exchange, users will get the day's news stories by 6 or 7in the morning. There will be no charge for the service.

"Everyone online says they want content," Lebolt said."Graphics and photos, though pretty, are so slow."

In addition to news, business and sports articles, the newSun-Times Online will have searchable classified advertising.

And readers with multimedia capability will be able to listento sound clips from compact disc releases.

The Innovation Awards, cosponsored by the Inland PressAssociation and the University of Kentucky School of Journalism andTelecommunications, recognize innovation in newspaper content anddelivery.

"In a very competitive environment in the Chicago media,particularly one that is well aware of the new world order ofcommunication, the Sun-Times stood out, and we hope to see more newideas to lead to innovations elsewhere," Ryan said.