Nominations for the Freedom of Expression Foundation Prize 2018

January 31 2018

Each year, Fritt Ord awards the Freedom of Expression Foundation Prize to individuals or institutions that have shown civil courage and worked to defend and strengthen freedom of expression and the conditions for it in Norway, especially by encouraging dynamic debate.

The Fritt Ord Foundation invites nominations for potential candidates for the prize. Nominations should be a maximum of 4000 characters long and include a brief description of the nominee’s efforts and a grounded justification for why the person or organisation in question deserves the prize. Please do not send attachments.

Nominations for the prize should be submitted to post@frittord.no. The email should be marked: “The Freedom of Expression Foundation Prize 2018”. The deadline for nominations is 12 noon on Wednesday 31 January.

The Fritt Ord Foundation’s Board will review the nominations parallel to considering the Board’s own nominations. The nominations will not be made public.

The prize is the Fritt Ord Foundation’s highest distinction. It consists of the Freedom of Expression Foundation statuette crafted by Nils Aas, and a prize of NOK 400 000.

A list of former recipients can be found here.

News

Call for nominations: Free Media Awards 2025

March 14 2025

In collaboration with the ZEIT STIFTUNG BUCERIUS of Hamburg, the Fritt Ord Foundation has allocated the Free Media Awards annually since 2004 to Eastern European journalists and media that defy every obstacle to tirelessly ensure independent press coverage. Russia’s war against Ukraine and the subsequent wave of disinformation clearly demonstrates the need for independent reporting in the region. Journalist, editorial teams and media companies in and from Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, Russia, Ukraine and Hungary who make a contribution to press freedom through their investigative, independent reporting can be nominated for the Free Media Awards.

Civitates' Tech & Democracy open call

March 6 2025

Civitates – The European Democracy Fund is a pooled philanthropic fund that was set up in 2018 for the sole purpose of addressing democratic decline and closing civic space in Europe. The case for confronting these threats is growing increasingly urgent. Fritt Ord Foundation is one of the initiators and partners of Civitates.

Civitates has launched its Tech and Democracy open call to support organisations working to ensure safer, more inclusive online spaces (social media platforms, search engines etc.) by improving the enforcement of EU tech regulations at the national level.

This open call offers a unique opportunity to strengthen civil society’s role in holding the tech sector accountable, with a focus on key EU regulations such as the Digital Services Act, GDPR, AI Act or the European Media Freedom Act to name a few.

Norwegians increasingly more positive to computer games

March 5 2025

Norwegians are increasingly more positive to accepting computer games as culture

About 17 per cent have developed a more favourable view of computer games over the past year. Six of ten play computer games, and one of three plays computer games weekly. At the same time, computer games are ranked as having lower status than books and music, for example.
“Computer games deserve more attention and discussion”, contends Joakim Lie of Fritt Ord.

– Computer games are also art

March 4 2025

“The problem with far too many media reports about computer games is that they start begin with sentences like: ‘computer games have come a long way since Pac-Man’,” sighs American computer game critic Jacob Geller.

“Let us first simply agree that computer games are indeed an art form and an expression of culture, and then let us examine the works as part of the history of art and culture.