Sonic Foundry Seeking Nominations for Fifth Annual Rich Media Impact Awards

MADISON, Wis. – December 12, 2008 – Sonic Foundry, Inc. (NASDAQ: SOFO), the recognized market leader for rich media webcasting and knowledge management, today announced it is seeking nominations for the annual Rich Media Impact Awards. Mediasite users are invited to create webcasts about their award-worthy projects and submit them at www.sonicfoundry.com/nominate.

Now in its fifth year, the Rich Media Impact Awards have strengthened the Mediasite user-community by inspiring innovation and honoring more than 70 programs from both the United States and around the world. Past winners can be viewed at www.sonicfoundry.com/resources/impact-awards/past-winners and include Technische Universiteit Delft – Netherlands, Prudential Financial, Shen Milsom & Wilke for the University of Michigan Ross School of Business, Rush University Medical Center Department of Ophthalmology, Oklahoma Merit Protection Commission, Johns Hopkins Center for Clinical Global Health Education, Atitude Digital Media – Brazil, Memphis City Schools, Association of Public Health Laboratories, Te Manu Aute (University of Auckland, New Zealand) and St. George’s University.

“Being honored with a Rich Media Impact Award for Global Reach has definitely impacted our campus community. This is a meaningful award for St. George’s University because it helps the students feel like they’re part of something bigger than just going to school everyday. The award was-and still is-a catalyst for the faculty, who are inspired to use streaming media to stretch their ambitions and imaginations for their e-learning projects,” said Anu Goyal, e-media designer and communications instructor at St. George’s University.

“Over the past five years, the rich media industry has evolved dramatically and Sonic Foundry’s Rich Media Impact Awards mirror that growth. Each year the quality of nominations exceeds our expectations as customers push the creative and technical boundaries of the Mediasite platform. Their passion, innovation and results continue to shape our road map and serve as inspiration for any organization using webcasting to improve how people work and learn,” said Rimas Buinevicius, chairman and CEO of Sonic Foundry.

Deadline for entry is March 20, and finalists will be notified on April 3. Winners will be announced at UNLEASH 2009, the Mediasite User Conference on April 28, 2009 in a ceremony at Monona Terrace Community and Convention Center.

This year Sonic Foundry added three new categories, Prolific Use, Student Impact and Best Outtake, to reflect the increase in large-scale deployments, research on Mediasite’s positive impact on student outcomes and camaraderie within the growing Mediasite user community:

The complete list of award categories is:

• Enterprise Award: recognizes a company who improved its business outcomes through rich media communication.
• Excellence in Education Award: recognizes a higher education institution that enhanced learning and outreach through rich media.
• Facility Design Award: recognizes a professional AV design or consulting firm that created innovative rich media rooms and facilities.
• Global Reach Award: recognizes any successful initiative that connected the international community through rich media.
• Government Award: recognizes a local, state or federal government initiative that implemented rich media for training and outreach.
• Healthcare Award: recognizes an organization that implemented rich media to benefit health and wellness.
• Prolific Use Award: recognizes an organization that has dramatically scaled its rich media program to achieve a broad deployment across its enterprise or record number of presentations, views or audiences.
• Rapid ROI Award: recognizes an organization that used rich media to quickly achieve a measurable ROI in its training, communications or outreach initiatives.
• Scholastic Achievement Award: recognizes a school district or other organization serving the K-12 educational community that harnessed the power of rich media to improve communication, learning and outreach.
• Student Impact Award: recognizes an individual student, as well as his/her college or university, whose educational experience has been enhanced through rich media.
• Best Outtake Award: recognizes an organization that captured a humorous or potentially uncomfortable moment with rich media, yet rose above the unfortunate circumstance with grace and dignity.