Watson the computer aces 5-word Webby speech

IBM computer Watson, which became renowned for beating top human players at Jeopardy!, was ready with a five-word speech at the 15th annual Webby Awards in New York on Monday.

The ceremony, a triumph of nerdy humour hosted by Lisa Kudrow, is notable for demanding its winners limit their speeches to five words. The winnerswere announced on May 3, well ahead of the gala.

Watson was declared person of the year for its win in the "man vs. machine" episode of Jeopardy!.

"Person of the year, ironic," a computerized voice speaking for the machine said while receiving the Webby on Monday.

"That was clever," said Kudrow, who presented the award. "You're quite the word processor."

Vogue editor-in-chief Anna Wintour also was ready with a cogent acceptance: "Sometimes geek can be chic," she said.

Canadian winners no shows

Most of the big Canadian winners, including pop singer Justin Bieber, who won in the comedy category, Montreal band Arcade Fire, which won for the video The Wilderness Downtown, and Hollywood actor Jim Carrey, were not in attendance.

It Gets Better Project founder Dan Savage used his speech to excoriate Tracy Morgan, the 30 Rock star who reportedly made anti-gay remarks last week.

"Tracy Morgan can suck my," said Savage, whose project aims to build acceptance for gay and lesbian teens.

Humour website Funny or Die took home eight awards. Will Ferrell broke the five-word rule in his acceptance speech for Webby film and person of the year on behalf of Funny or Die.

"Thanks for this award," he said via video link. 'I will put it in my house next to my instructional poetry textbooks.Thank you."

Martin Cooper, who designed the first mobile telephone in 1973, was honoured with a Webby Lifetime Achievement Award.

"Can you hear me now?" he said in his speech, holding his original prototype.

Tribute to social media in Egypt

In a more serious vein, the awards paid tribute to Egyptian protesters who used Twitter and Facebook in their bid to oust Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak.

"Injustice, oppression, social media equals revolution," filmmaker Mohamed Diab saidafter accepting a Webby dedicated to the Egyptian people.

Another Webbyfor innovation in use of a social media went to Ushahidi, a service launched to map violence that followed a 2008 election in Kenya.

Peter Vesterback, creator of mobile game Angry Birds, gave a cryptic speech referring to the game itself, which involves firing cartoon birds at the heads of pigs.

"Get those pigs!" he said, after winning the Webby and People's Voice Awards.

Groupon CEO Andrew Mason used his speech to explain what his website did after winning the award for breakout of the year. "It's short for group coupon," he said.

Actor Zach Galifianakis took home four awards for his sporadically released web series Between Two Ferns with Zach Galifianakis. He won best web personality/host, best comedy short and best online variety show.

The Webby Awards are presented annually by The International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences.