HelpAReporter.com, or HARO, won a Mashable Open Web Award in the "social news" category today, beating out finalists Hubdub and regator.

Mashable's blogger's choice award in the same category--chosen by Mashable's 100+ blog parters--went to the granddaddy of social news, Digg.com.

HARO, the journalist-to-PR source matching service started not long ago as a Facebook group. Poynter.org took a look at HARO today and linked back to early coverage of the Peter Shankman's service--including PRNewser's, when membership was just 668--to find the key reasons for its meteoric growth: it's free, fast, and open. The site's motto is "everyone is an expert at something."

Stats, quote, and related posts after the jump:

Shankman commented on the win to PRNewser via email, and eluded to the irresistible allure web-vote competitions are for PR influencers (note PRWeek's blog-off duels):

"People voted for this - This wasn't me voting a ton of times - that means people are using it and it's working for them. That I created it just thrills the hell out of me. Meagan, my assistant, has actually, more than once in the past hour, told me to stop giggling."

According to the email, HARO has over 43,000 members and over 8,000 queries so far.

Related: HARO for Sale? and Adweek: HARO is $800k Business