This week marked the 11th annual Webby Awards, presented by The International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences (IADAS). With 550 members consisting of Web experts, business figures, visionaries and creative celebrities, the IADAS presents awards in myriad categories to honor excellence on the Internet. As The Wall Street Journal describes, the Webbys “Celebrate sites that pave important paths to the internet’s next phase.”

This year saw the addition of Online Film & Video Awards, evidence of the recent explosion of video on the Web. The Webby Awards have certainly evolved since their inception in 1996, and the changes reflect “the tremendous growth of the Internet as a tool for business and everyday lives,” as the Webby Awards site states.

The Hollywood Reporter’s article, “Webby Awards celebrate original content” points out the distinct situation for ambitious content creators as they work to balance monetizing and maintaining control of their product online. For the Web is a unique realm in which content producers can “retain a greater control over their product than almost any artist-distribution combination in the industry.”

Yet Web popularity does not automatically translate into profit. While Webby Awards and praise are well and good, content creators are still looking for simple solutions to the question of online monetization. Webby’s executive director David-Michel Davies believes that the relative novelty of online video coupled with producers’ desire to turn a profit will create “a massive transformation in how content is created and consumed.”

Check out the Webby Winner’s Gallery for a glimpse into the Webby Awards 2007.