With E-Blogs, discover the European bloggers

Laurent Delpit, E-Blogs UK editor

E-Blogs closed on December 31st 2010.

- Where did E-Blogs come from? What were its goals?

- Who are the translated bloggers?

- To whom belong the published contents? Who’s translating?

- Who’s cooking E-Blogs? Introducing the team…

Follow the guide…

Where does E-Blogs come from? –> You know WIKIO: the 1st European blogs’ web portal, established in 5 European countries, best known by the bloggers for its blogs rankings, the TOP BLOGS updated on a monthly basis in each country (France, Germany, Italy, Spain, the United-Kingdom). The blogs rankings calculate the number of “backlinks”, i.e. the links from one blog to another. It is the “power of social networking” of each blog, the links’ value, calculated by Wikio. With E-Blogs, we’re not exploring the most linked blogs anymore, but the blogs linking a country to the other. Beyond the links’ value, it is the words’ value that interests us. Each day, we select blogposts from the 5 countries where Wikio is established: France, Germany, Italy, Spain, the United-Kingdom. We then have them translated into the 4 other languages (by professional translators, see below…)

The E-Blogs goals? We wish to make the blogosphere’s contents flow beyond the material and linguistic frontiers, to give them a European dimension. How do we cross those linguistic barriers? How to “read” the European blogosphere? This exploration has a name: E-Blogs (European blogs). E-Blogs is a laboratory scrutinizing the bloggers’ speech. E-Blogs wishes to be the European civil society’s reflection. Our point of view is inevitably subjective and alive. This review of blogs will evolve with the passing weeks, with your feedbacks… to find, we hope, a common meaning, a common link between all European bloggers. By selecting posts to be translated, we will build a European review of blogs. The blogosphere’s contents will flow!

Who are the translated bloggers? or how do we select posts to be translated? We select posts with a dozen criteria in mind, such as: is the content likely to be of interest to readers from the other countries? What is the blogger’s added value? Is his point of view different from a press release? What do bloggers talk about today in Italy, Spain, France…? The selected blogs must be in each country’s Wikio TOP 1000. We’re translating British, French, Spanish, German, Italian blogs which entered the E-Blogs project and wish to be translated. We have currently chosen approximately a hundred blogs per country, so almost 500 bloggers are part of the adventure. We don’t select posts from a blog that hasn’t subscribed to us. If you’re interested and if you’re in the Top 1000, simply send me an email and let’s talk! laurent.delpit @ wikio.com

To whom belong the published contents? The translated contents that are published on E-Blogs remain the blogger’s property. Of course, the bloggers can re-use them on their blogs if they wish to do so. I’ll take this opportunity to remind you that we don’t translate BLOGS in their entirety but a selection of POSTS from different blogs. We also publish pictures and videos from some selected posts. Some of these pictures and videos are taken from the blogs themselves and are the legal responsibility of the blogger applying for translation. In some cases, when the translated post has no illustration, we take a picture downloaded for free from a public photos database. For instance, under a Creative Commons License, respecting the principle of quotation and link towards the authors profiles.

Who’s cooking E-Blogs? A team of editors: we’re 5 editors-selectors (1 for each country), journalists and bloggers. With a literary sensibility and for most of us a double nationality. All the details on who we are can be read here. A translators team: we’re supported by a precious team of more or less 40 translators in all Europe. About 20 permanent and as many supply translators. Introducing the people translating in English: here.

That was our project. Thank you for everything!