WASHINGTON, DC - Today, the Sunlight Foundation received the 2010 Knight-Batten Award for Innovations in Journalism, at a ceremony held at the Newseum in Washington, D.C. Sunlight was honored with the grand prize for Sunlight Live, its real-time investigative reporting platform that combines streaming video, government transparency data and social media coverage during major events in Washington.

In the past year, Sunlight Live covered the White House's bipartisan healthcare summit in February; Congress's Financial Reform Conference Committee meetings in May and June; and the House Republican Leadership meeting with business lobbyists in July.

"We are truly honored to receive this award. Sunlight Live--an experimental, novel and ultimately groundbreaking effort--could not have been possible without the incredible staff here at Sunlight, the support from our grantees and input from users during events" said Ellen Miller, executive director and co-founder of the Sunlight Foundation.

At today's Knight-Batten Symposium, Sunlight announced that it would use the $10,000 grand prize money to develop Sunlight Live into a full open source platform. Among the new technologies it is exploring is the addition of facial recognition capabilities that will allow for the real-time display of relevant data--such as campaign finance contributions, lobbying history or earmarks--as people appear on-screen during Sunlight Live events.

Presented annually by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation and J-Lab, a center of American University's School of Communication, the Knight-Batten Awards recognize the creative uses of new technologies to engage citizens in public issues and showcase compelling models for the future of news.