I use this site more as a reader than a writer and am always blown away by the quality of commentary and analysis. That does not mean I agree with any of the people who write here - but it is distinctive - as is the ambition of having a working trans-european blog in the 'style' of DKOS.

If you want to get better known and become visible - ask your contributors to each invite 5 of the best bloggers in their territories, and ten of their online contacts - who they imagine would appreciate being invited - to contribute.

Bitter virtual scraps are part and parcel of any attempt at an ideal agora. I come from an indymedia background - a place which pioneered citizens media and know far too much about them for my own good.

What they taught me is that an agora to survive - needs to be controlled by the community - in as dispersed way as possible - if it is to become an agora - rather than become someone elses public house where you can have a smoke and drink if you pay and have to hold your tongue.

You do a fantastic job - you are a very acute writer - you write across the atlantic in an almost unprecedented way. You should trust the community you built and stop taking all the stress of normal problems on yourself. If there werew 20 people in control you could do 1/20th of the worrying.

As we used to say in Indymedia Ireland - "All Power To The Commenteers!"

There is a fair amount of economic expertise already here. Get together, decide on a particular agenda, research the hell out of it, and post, post, post. Become the place to come to for political/economic news and commentary for EU and trans-Atlantic issues.

• NATO countries are contributing how much to the security and rebuilding effort in Afghanistan? How long can that level of spending be maintained under current financial and economic conditions?


• What are the challenges of integrating new and old Europe and how is that saga progressing? Hungary, among other new European countries, evidently has no domestic banking institutions. They were bought out by old European firms. What are the chances that these institutions will enact protectionist policies which freeze out the new Europe nations desperately in need of development financing? Game that one out. There are some scary scenarios there. For instance, Putin at Davos:

  "Let us be frank. Provoking military-political instability and upper regional conflicts is also a convenient way of deflecting people's attention from mounting social and economic problems. Regrettably, further attempts of this kind cannot be ruled out."

  Foreign policy Implications of the Global Economic Crisis, quoted by Niall Ferguson in testimony given to the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee, 11 Feb, 2009, Last accessed 18 Feb 2009.

You don't have to tell me how much work that can be, but some can be delegated, and the core effort can be streamlined. If you decide to go down this road, don't try to go it alone, you don't need to.

I don't know if dkos actually pays some people to blog, but obviously at least some of the front pagers there are those whom you named "insiders."

"It Can't Be Just About Us"
--Frank Schnittger, ETian Extraordinaire