By the time this year's Asian Digital Media Awards were presented, DMA conference delegates knew exactly why Apple Daily publisher Next Media had taken the biggest share of prizes.

Not only had digital strategy director Christina Lo backgrounded development of the Hong Kong paper's mobile app with a crisp video - itself a demonstration of the Next group's capability - but chief executive Cassian Cheung outlined the passion behind it (see separate story).

In a marketplace where "everyone could be a publisher", posting some version of news events, Lo told how Apple had differentiated itself with the 2009 launch of its mobile app which has grown to account for an 86 per cent share of total traffic and more than three million unique visitors.

The paper's involvement in coverage of the Hong Kong fight for democracy - and the "Umbrella revolution" - is another story... and accounted for another medal when awards were handed out at the end of today's opening day of WAN-Ifra's Digital Media Asia conference in Singapore.

In all Next Media's Apple Daily operations in Hong Kong and Taiwan took seven of this year's medals with one - for the Apple Daily Hong Kong 'Next Generation' app going on to take a global award in the World Digital Media Awards, presented in Amsterdam last month.

Another world winner was Fairfax Media for its The Age tablet edition, and tablet editor Fergus Shiel was present not only to collect the award, but to tell how the tablet team had gone from a low point when staff had been leaving to gain the highest engagement level of any app in Australia.

"An enabler culture is vital," said Shiel, explaining how journalists were convinced technical problems could be fixed, and progressively "malaise gave way to action and inspiration".

Another winner backgrounding their achievement was Thomson Reuters graphics deputy head Simon Scarr, who took delegates through the hard coding and manipulation of a "massive data set" behind creation of an interactive infographic on China's corporate debt.

And Ignatius HardantoSubagyo, business director of Kompas Media Nusantara explained the challenge of creating its Buktikan Suaramu campaign to counter apathy over the presidential election, leading to an award for reader engagement: "If democracy fails, talk will never be as cheap," they had argued.

Awards were:

News website: gold- The Age (Fairfax Media); silver- The Indian Express; bronze- South China Morning Post Publishers for SCMP.com.

Multimedia campaign: gold- West Australian Newspapers for Pledge for Nate; silver- Next Mobile for Sony Australia Trip; bronze- Next Mobile for Estee Lauder Micro Essence.

Online video: gold- Living Media India for So Sorry; silver- Thomson Reuters Japan for Fukushima worker exploitation; bronze- Mongoose Publishing for Time Out Kuala Lumpur Kopitiam.

Data visualisation project: gold­- Thomson Reuters Asia for Satellites; silver-MediaCorp Press for Safer waters; bronze- Thomson Reuters Asia for China's Corporate Debt.

Mobile service: gold- Apple Daily for Apple Daily Next Generation App; silver- Apple Daily Taiwan for Eat & Travel App; bronze- The Straits Times for Shooting Down of MH17.

Tablet publishing: gold- Fairfax Media for The Age tablet app; silver- South China Morning Post Publishers for SCMP Tablet Edition; bronze- Apple Daily Taiwan for Apple Fashion Tablet Edition.

Reader engagement: gold- Apple Daily Taiwan for Apple Daily Taiwan; silver-Kompas Media Nusantara for #BuktikanSuaramu; bronze- Apple Daily Hong Kong for Defending Democracy Summer Campaign.

Outstanding new product: gold- AFP Agence France-Presse HK and Infoplum (Melbourne) for AFP World Cup 2014; silver- South China Morning Post Publishers for SCMP Tiananmen; bronze- South China Morning Post Publishers for SCMP Chronicles.

Above: Winners of the 2014 Asian Digital Media Awards

On our homepage: Apple Daily's Hong Kong and Taiwan publishing operations took seven medals