Rare Medium Garners Three National Awards For Graphic Design Excellence; ``Graphic Design: USA'' Magazine Recognizes Rare Medium with American Graphic Design Awards

Business Wire, Sept 6, 2000

Business Editors

NEW YORK--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Sept. 6, 2000

Rare Medium (Nasdaq:RRRR) has been named the winner of three prestigious American Graphic Design Awards presented by "Graphic Design: USA" magazine.

The company was honored for excellence in communication and graphic design for three projects that illustrate high levels of creativity and a focus on superior user-centered design.

Two of the winning projects, dGolpe.com and SmartOnline.com, involved Rare Medium's client engagements. The third winner, called "Lov: The Original Motion Picture Soundtrack," was an internal experimental project.

dGolpe.com is a Latin American music portal and a venue for emerging Latin artists to have their music heard. Rare Medium's design of the site focused on potential users, modeling and anticipating their needs through a thorough exploration of Latin culture before the site was constructed. The look and feel of the site was inspired by the brilliant colors and constant motion of the Brazilian, Colombian and Mexican graphics studied by the site's designers.

SmartOnline.com is the Web presence for Smart Online, Incorporated, a provider of business information resources for small offices and entrepreneurs. Rare Medium helped establish the company's online brand and developed the information architecture, online software tools and user interface for the Web site. The design of the site includes an animated interactive presentation tailored to the company's target business audience.

"The awards for dGolpe.com and SmartOnline.com are significant testaments to Rare Medium's rigorous user-centered design process," said Nam Szeto, vice president and creative director for Rare Medium. "The results stand for themselves; clear, beautiful designs specifically customized to meet the needs of the end user."

"Lov" was an experimental effort designed to create a unique digital melding of romance and musical composition. The project served as a prime example of Rare Medium's highly creative design culture and its encouragement of experimentation and innovation.

"For Lov, we were able to switch gears a bit and experiment with combining various tools such as Flash(TM) animation and Beatnik interactive audio to create what is essentially a digital Valentine's Day card," said Szeto. "Lov is an excellent and elegant example of what is possible when technology is utilized to produce poetry."

The American Graphic Design Awards were given to projects completed in the past year. Judges included Harri Boller from Boller Coastes and Neu; Gwen Granzow from Design North, Inc.; Ron Lars Hansen from Belyea Design Alliance; Peter Klueger from Ogilvy and Mather; David Salanitro from Oh Boy, A Design Company; Don Sibley from Sibley Peteet Design and Bob Talarczyk from Merck & Co., Inc.

About Rare Medium Group, Inc.

Rare Medium invests in next generation Internet companies and provides end-to-end Internet Services. Rare Medium incubates, finances and manages private companies and also makes strategic investments in independently managed companies that it believes possess superior Internet-focused business models. Rare Medium's Internet Services include development and authoring of business plans and strategies; strategic, creative and technological consulting for Web initiatives; on-line brand development and management; development of content for broadband and wireless applications; and launch of on-line commerce trading exchanges. Rare Medium leverages its Internet Services expertise to increase the overall success of the companies in its investment portfolio.

Rare Medium employs over 1100 people in more than 20 locations worldwide. For more information, visit http://www.raremedium.com.

Except for historical matters contained herein, the matters discussed in this press release are forward-looking and are made pursuant to the safe harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Investors are cautioned that these forward-looking statements reflect numerous assumptions and involve risks and uncertainties that may affect Rare Medium Group Inc., and its subsidiaries' business and prospects and cause actual results to differ materially from these forward-looking statements. Among the factors that could cause actual results to differ are Rare Medium's limited operating history; competition; low barriers to entry; reliance on strategic relationships; rapid technological changes; inability to complete transactions on favorable terms and those risks discussed in the company's filings with the SEC.