ET cannot grow as Daily Kos did. Why? Because America is in political crisis and more and more Americans are beginning to realize that each day. They have very limited choices on how to confront their crisis. Daily Kos is a major choice.
Speaking of myself, I was a relatively early member of DK and some days I found it hard to leave DK especially during election time. That is no longer the case for me. It is so big now and gives off so much heat that it's hard to find the light.
ET is great Jerome. It is extremely intelligent and very humane. It will grow at its own pace. I am going to recommend ET to friends who I think will find it an intersting place to spend some time.
In the mean time I am trying to help with the foundation for the next generation of ET ers.
Happy Birthday!

Hey, Grandma Moses started late!

Funny, but my first response is to consider ways we may be able to get more active involvement from people in countries that haven't been as active so far, especially European countries...though I'm not quite sure how to do that...

"Once in awhile we get shown the light, in the strangest of places, if we look at it right" - Hunter/Garcia

By the way, this is from yesterday at approx. 14:00 MET:

VISITS
-Total 413,434

-Average Per Day 1,290 (floating mean)

-Average Visit Length 9:00

-Last Hour 55

-Today 681

-This Week 9,027

PAGE VIEWS

-Total 2,070,871

-Average Per Day 7,439

-Average Per Visit 5.8

-Last Hour 509

-Today 4,052

-This Week 52,073

Migeru asked for site statistics for European Tribune's first year anniversary...and here they are...I tried to copy and paste the yearly visits and views charts...but no luck, so you are stuck with the numbers. Thanks to everyone for making the first year so successful!!

"Once in awhile we get shown the light, in the strangest of places, if we look at it right" - Hunter/Garcia

I'm not on Kos, but maybe we can get the expat kos community more involved with us to help boost the numbers.

I tried advertising on "Drinking Liberally" when I was following US post-election more closely, but nobody responded.

How about somebody cross-posting our get-togethers on Kos and/or Booman to see if we can boost interest that way ? I know it would help if we had more Europeans but can't help I'm afraid, I don't know anybody that gives a rats about politics.

keep to the Fen Causeway

So what I'm hoping for in the near future is (i) more diaries

Diaries are a lot of work. Just posting one weekly, in what would be the features section of a newspaper, takes a couple of hours a week, and that's not based on any original work, just cutting, pasting and commenting.

The amount of work in posting substantive diaries is not trivial.  I'm continually grateful to those who continually put up serious work for ET.

it is tough to say that.. well really tough to say that...it could hurt your feelings..a little bit, but since we are one year old (or on the day after...) I think it is OK to give my point of view (I generally do nto like to give my point of view on some issues.. this is one of them.. but you were so open that I feel I need rto corresponde).

I am afraid Jerome, that you will probably be disappointed if you expect a dramatic growth. As LEP so correctly said, we are not in a crisis, there are mainstream left-wing media, the myth structures in Europe that allow for center-left policies are well in place and people do not feel like politics is so important now.

I agree that the main problem (I ahve no doubt) for ET growth is language. Noone of my friends would like ever to contribute here...it is just not catalan or not spanish. I think I could find  three or four friends interested if it would be in spanish or catalan..but the truth is that on content probably I could convince for sure only one person if it were in spanish.

So, I understand that you feel sorry that we are not more and I sense your slight disappointment. Jerome I would not like you to get sad. I would perfectly understand if you feel like "this is not working".. probably you do not feel it now.. but given the narrative you use I could expect that it could happen to you.

MY humble, humble humble advice..Ok, OK oK no.. no advice...you did this site.. you have all the right to think whatever you want and wish for the future of this site. So I would say.. my humble opinion is... do not take badly if we do not expect this growth and expect (and sometimes wish, not sure about it) that a natural and small growth is better. Small things can also be beatiful...sometimes a pebble in the sand is nicer than a supernova...beauty is in the eyes of the beholder, they say.

I feel sorry if we are not able to bring more people as you expected. And I hope you do not get angry with us...

And I close it here... hoping that this wonderful year goes on for another year....I know I could say more things about it.. but it is time to close the post one-year old thoughtful stupid analysis that I do sometimes.

Forgive me in advance...

A pleasure

I therefore claim to show, not how men think in myths, but how myths operate in men's minds without their being aware of the fact. Levi-Strauss, Claude

that there is a common wisdom amongst our elites which is increasingly shaped by the English language business press, and which we all feel is to a large extent misguided, at least in its trends.

Now, I'm not an economics type person but I think I know what you refer to .

Maybe it would help to state what these "wisdoms" might be in order to define counter-positions to them. Then we can work out strategies to publicise these ideas and make them mainstream. However valuable it is, without an alternative set of principles, all we're effectively doing is pointing to the resultant mess and saying "You needen't have done that".

keep to the Fen Causeway

I too have always gotten lost at dailykos or other sites, even though I always click through when things are crossposted.  But I pledge now to participate more fully here, you are right that it is important.

I'm in Stuttgart Jerome, I'll gladly do a special mojo dance on your behalf for tonight.

By the way, Jerome, have you posted this (or the Kos version) at Booman? Would be good, I'd say...

"Once in awhile we get shown the light, in the strangest of places, if we look at it right" - Hunter/Garcia

It is hard to tell when a message is having an impact, sometimes the chain between cause and effect is hard to see. One of the examples that ET is having an effect is in the reporting of the French unemployment stats.

Recently there was a NY Times article which used the details about school rate and other factors to show that the youth employment rate was comparable to elsewhere. I think this is as a direct result of the discussions on ET.

Getting the public to visit one's site or getting a letter published may move the process along, but it is slow. A more effective path is to try to reach the opinion makers. I think that the fact that many showed up for the Kos convention shows that this is happening. The opinion makers have the megaphone, if you can get some information into their heads then they can rework it and spread it faster than we can.

Just yesterday I had a nice interaction with an author from a US political magazine. I commented on his recent article (via email) he replied and asked me if I had any ideas on the issue (getting noble goals implemented) and I was able to cite some of my web postings and Jerome's energy article. We will see if these themes get into a future piece of his. If they do then this get read by 80,000 more people.

So, I guess my point is to be more proactive and to use the blog as a library of ideas to be cited. This is one of the reasons I'd like to see the wiki part more comprehensive.

Shamelessly flogging the site elsewhere is also a way to increase traffic.

Policies not Politics
---- Daily Landscape

I share your wish for ET to grow, even go beyond: I'd hope ET can become one of the forums developing an EU-wide (as well as European-wide) polity. Upon reflection the EU Constitution debates also underline the desirability of this for me. But I agree with others that it is a long, long way, which will be slow, and we aren't even close yet.

*Traitor*, n.
A benighted individual who perceives an illusory distinction between serving his nation and abetting the criminals who govern it.

I would like to propose that the European Tribune's struggle for legitimacy and import reflects Europe's struggle for legitimacy and import.

You can't "try to be like Daily Kos" for the same reason Europe can't try to be like America.  Different people, different issues, different realities.  Daily Kos developed out of a major historical crisis.  In the olden days revolutionaries met in coffee shops and student unions and basements and barns.  Now they meet online.  The primacy of the need to effect radical political change is very real in America right now.  In Europe, there doesn't seem to be the same need for people to drop what they are doing and devote their free time to LTEs and political campaigns and MeetUps.

Also, Daily Kos has positioned itself as a rather (dissapointingly) mainstream community.  In doing so, Markos has garnered a HUGE audience, but it is also extremely difficult to discuss anything the majority of the people aren't comfortable with, disagree with, or know or care little about.  So there is a real trade off between subject matter and audience size.  

So what can European Tribune be?  And do?  I personally would like to see the following:

~First, you need to tell people why they should care about Europe and the issues facing it.  It may seem obvious to us, but sometimes you have to state the obvious, repeatedly.  

Fill in the blanks:
"European politics/media/society are important because ___.  Everyone should care about European politics/media/society because _____. "

~While I think more contributions from people in Europe is important, I don't see it as dire.  I'm used to reading commentary on Russia by expats.  It can get annoying, but it serves a purpose.  That is, I think the subject matter is more important than the people writing it.

~More diaries are needed, but more encouragement is also needed.  Putting a lot of effort into diaries that get few comments is tough.  I'd ask people (and I need to work on this too) to be more generous with ratings and recommends and Front Paging, but also a little more discriminating.  This is our, and especially the gnomes', chance to shape the site.  When the rec list includes several American diaries also on the rec lists at Booman and Kos, Et looks like a carbon copy.  When the FP is full of open threads, shoe blogging and meta meta stuff (all of which I love...) while something more substantial struggles to stay on the rec list or slides down the recent diaries list with few comments, it seems we're not doing our best to ENCOURAGE more diaries.  

Also, when asked for more diaries, people respond by asking "about what?"  You say, "anything you like."  And we get 15 silly diaries.  But it's probably ok to say, "we could use a diary on who is funding the major newspapers in Europe.  Anyone want to do that?"

Enough bitching.  

ET's strengths:
Breakfast thread.
Media watches.
Weekly installations (trains, clocks, odds & ends...)
Educational pieces explaining the political systems & parties.
Investigative reporting (Chernobyl, pipelines, prostitution, alternative energy, economic models, etc...)
Fun cultural stuff (books, movies, cheese, World Cup, etc...)

Ok, I've gone on enough.  Keep up the good work & happy birthday.


Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. -Voltaire

I, too, would like to see EuroTrib grow over the next year. It will take us all recommending the place to a couple of friends, colleagues, or relatives who we think will either feel at home here ideologically or will enjoy the quality of the discussion and respect the ET ethos.

I was very pleased to see a successful ET meetup in Paris because this helps to strengthen the community and make it richer. I am very pleased to see the Toulouse Meet-up this weekend. These smaller, regional meetups (I do hope that more will follow) may well yield a tighter networks within the larger network of the ET community. These can help ET grow and can be healthy for the overall community as we grow (help us stay on an more human, intimate level).

I joined ET because I was interested in learning even more about European affairs from those who participate in it and because I thought that this could be a way to partially address the long discussed democratic deficit on the EU level of European political sphere. I have become a regular because there are few places where one can civilly discuss political ideas with so many different, intelligent people. The ethos of respect, curiosity, diversity, and comradery is what I really like about this place.

So this is what I hope for EuroTrib for the next year...that we grow...that we grow in quality even more than quantity...but that we still grow in quantity...and that we begin to develop the critical mass necessary to do what Jerome has set forth...to offer a counter-discussion to that provided by the neo-liberal dominated, dominant English discourse and that we begin to work so that we can make our small presence known and felt on an EU level of decision making.  

Some random-ish thoughts:

1. Language. How would people feel about other-language editions of ET? I'd imagine this working like English-ET, but for native French, Spanish, etc, speakers, with native-speaking front pagers. I'm suggesting this because multilingual integration on a single site is a noble aim, but doesn't seem to be working in practice. Obviously the danger is fragmentation, but I'd expect some organic overlap of the 'Did you see...?' sort. And this approach might even help English speakers (like me) to make the effort to follow threads in other languages. Some regional variations on attitudes and viewpoint could be interesting too, and would help tilt the balance Eastwards. We've already seen some of that with the Russians, but there's plenty of scope to include an even wider collection of viewpoints.

2. I think absolute numbers count for a lot less than influence. Corporate think-tanks have a very high media profile even though sometimes they're only staffed part-time by a handful of people; it's all in the presentation. As kc says, the dKos model isn't going to work in Europe, and ET will very likely never have thousands upon thousands of members. So a realistic alternative aim to sheer force of numbers is focussed media activism.

3. Some organic attempts to link up with other related groups could be useful. I have next to no idea who or what else is out there, and I'm sure there are people here who have far more of a clue about that than I do. It could be useful to collectively research a list of other progressive and active Euro-ish blogs and organisation with a view to cross-pollinating and networking with them.

i think she's humming along just right...

more is not always better, and sharp spikes can be followed by sharp falls.

we are getting very good quality here, and there are some amazingly witty and well-informed people here.

kudos to all, a great first year, and many more to come.

it's the synergy, stupid!

If'Madness is the absence of work'(Foucault), then Sanity is the presence of play..

i think she's humming along just right...

more is not always better, and sharp spikes can be followed by sharp falls.

we are getting very good quality imo, and there are some amazingly witty and well-informed people here.

kudos to all for a great first year, and many more to come.

it's the synergy, stupid!

i say that because i visit blogs of my favourite posters, and while there writing us way above par, there are no sparks flying such as are found in the hilarious wordplay here.

and as a penultimate note i'd like to compliment many here on their command of english...i'm staggered at the idiomatic, nuanced use of my mother tongue by you furriners!

i have visited the other blogs on the roll here, and none come close, so...

pazienza

If'Madness is the absence of work'(Foucault), then Sanity is the presence of play..

One welcome change I have noticed here over the past six months or so is a lessening of egregious America-bashing. For a while I was feeling like the purpose of ET was to prove that Europe is better than America in all dimensions--which it may be--but it seems as if the center of discussion recently has moved away from America and towards Europe, which I find useful.

Besides the obviously problem of DK's size, the political philosophy there is strongly populist which is quite frustrating. There are many examples where the DK community "agrees" that such-and-such is the correct way of thinking, and debate is shut off. Obvious examples include the attitudes towards Ralph Nader and Joe Lieberman, and the Dubai ports fiasco. I would prefer to see ET discuss issues of practical socialism in the current European context, issues like nuclear power, immigration, the EU, relations with Eastern Europe, etc. Most of these are already on the agenda anyway, and get much more reasonable discussion than anything does on DK.

Also, I like trains. I'm trying to figure out how to make a decent audio recording of my local railroad situation...

Hello Jerome and everybody,

this seems as good an occasion as any to venture out of lurker status and wish you all the best. Congratulations on having completed the first year! I have been a regular visitor since the beginning of the blog.

Since my nationality (Austria) does not seem much represented on Eurotrib, I am planning to comment now and then from my expatriate perspective, I am living in Hong Kong just now. I get to breathe some of the Chinese coal dust that you were just blogging about ...

And may I say, I like Eurotrib a lot better than DailyKos, and would not want it to become too similar to the Kossacks' place. Quality over quantity, is that not more appropriate to the European spirit and values?

which calls itself "the European Magazine," has a theme issue on European blogs. But does it mention Eurotrib? No siree.

The world's northernmost desert wind.