new barca reading material

under the title "fc barcelona 2010. covering the race to the presidency of the greatest sports club in the world", i have launched a small niche blog that will focus on next year's presidential elections

we will follow all pre-electoral movements and will start with a series on the espionage case that was made public last week

you can visit the new blog at:

http://barcaelections2010.blogspot.com/


former collaborators and readers of this blog have meanwhile set up "totalBarca", a new fc barcelona news project.

you can read them at:

http://www.totalbarca.com/

How not to be anonymous on this blog?

Apparently some new readers have difficulties finding out how not to be marked as "Anonymous" if they are posting a comment on this blog. I indeed would recommend it that you choose a name when you comment here, because that makes everything more personal. Of course everyone is free to choose what he wants, but if you don't want to be marked as "anonymous", this is the way to do that:

- You click on "post a comment" or "... comments" under the post. Then there appears a pop-up, on the bottom of which you have a box where you can write your personal comment.

- Under that box, there's a "Choose an identity" section. If you don't do anything, you will be marked as anonymous. When you don't want that, you can click next to "Name/URL". Then two new boxes appear and in the "Name" box, you can type your real name or a fantasy name. If you have done that and you publish your comment, it will appear under that name.


I jump to the occasion to ask that people would refrain from personal insults on this blog, towards each other, the club and the players. This blog focuses on Barcelona, we all like the club, we want to share our thoughts about the players and the games, we're all having our own opinions and we all think that we're right and that all the others don't know anything about football but that doesn't mean we should lose our heads.

There are people from almost 200 countries visiting this blog, all have their own culture, tradition and sensibilities. Besides that, every person has its own character and way of expressing himself. I'm not always there to remove unappropriate comments, so just behave a little. Not too much, but let's try to have a basic respect for our fellow Barcelona fans, the players and the club.

How not to be anonymous on this blog?

Apparently some new readers have difficulties finding out how not to be marked as "Anonymous" if they are posting a comment on this blog. I indeed would recommend it that you choose a name when you comment here, because that makes everything more personal. Of course everyone is free to choose what he wants, but if you don't want to be marked as "anonymous", this is the way to do that:

- You click on "post a comment" or "... comments" under the post. Then there appears a pop-up, on the bottom of which you have a box where you can write your personal comment.

- Under that box, there's a "Choose an identity" section. If you don't do anything, you will be marked as anonymous. When you don't want that, you can click next to "Name/URL". Then two new boxes appear and in the "Name" box, you can type your real name or a fantasy name. If you have done that and you publish your comment, it will appear under that name.


I jump to the occasion to ask that people would refrain from personal insults on this blog, towards each other, the club and the players. This blog focuses on Barcelona, we all like the club, we want to share our thoughts about the players and the games, we're all having our own opinions and we all think that we're right and that all the others don't know anything about football but that doesn't mean we should lose our heads.

There are people from almost 200 countries visiting this blog, all have their own culture, tradition and sensibilities. Besides that, every person has its own character and way of expressing himself. I'm not always there to remove unappropriate comments, so just behave a little. Not too much, but let's try to have a basic respect for our fellow Barcelona fans, the players and the club.

Become a blog writer

Because we would like to bring the Barcelona fans more, faster and better news, we would like to create a pool of writers and therefore we are looking for people who could write posts for the blog.

We are talking about on-time news posts here, not opinion pieces. Such a post can go from basically translating a news report to putting a story together yourself based on one or more news reports. We will give you some guidelines, but we already want to mention the following.

You should be able to adapt to the style of this blog, which is quite basic but nevertheless quality-oriented (regarding content, language and lay-out). To keep things readers-friendly, it's probably best that this continues to be the general line. Of course you can add your personal accents.

You should therefore also have a decent knowledge of the English language (without English having to be your mother tongue) and preferably also the Spanish language (or you should be excellent with google translate or other translating tools).

You should be able to take initiative. If you see a story that is interesting, you basically can start writing. You shouldn't wait for permission.

Although it's of course volunteer work (we also remind that this is a charity based blog with the benefits going to good works), we would ask some sort of minimum commitment. For example, you can say "Ok, I can give you fifteen minutes a day and write one post", or "I can be around for one hour, but only during weekdays" or "Only in the weekend". This will enable us to organize everything a bit.


We think it could be a great chance for some people to develop their skills in a global environment, to get some experience and to get to know other people. If you are passionate about Barça and news gathering, interested and motivated to help out, you can contact us at:

fcbtransfers [at] yahoo [dot] com

How not to be anonymous on this blog?

Apparently some new readers have difficulties finding out how not to be marked as "Anonymous" if they are posting a comment on this blog. I indeed would recommend it that you choose a name when you comment here, because that makes everything more personal. Of course everyone is free to choose what he wants, but if you don't want to be marked as "anonymous", this is the way to do that:

- You click on "post a comment" or "... comments" under the post. Then there appears a pop-up, on the bottom of which you have a box where you can write your personal comment.

- Under that box, there's a "Choose an identity" section. If you don't do anything, you will be marked as anonymous. When you don't want that, you can click next to "Name/URL". Then two new boxes appear and in the "Name" box, you can type your real name or a fantasy name. If you have done that and you publish your comment, it will appear under that name.


I jump to the occasion to ask that people would refrain from personal insults on this blog, towards each other, the club and the players. This blog focuses on Barcelona, we all like the club, we want to share our thoughts about the players and the games, we're all having our own opinions and we all think that we're right and that all the others don't know anything about football but that doesn't mean we should lose our heads.

There are people from almost 200 countries visiting this blog, all have their own culture, tradition and sensibilities. Besides that, every person has its own character and way of expressing himself. I'm not always there to remove unappropriate comments, so just behave a little. Not too much, but let's try to have a basic respect for our fellow Barcelona fans, the players and the club.

Become a blog writer

Because we would like to bring the Barcelona fans more, faster and better news, we would like to create a pool of writers and therefore we are looking for people who could write posts for the blog.

We are talking about on-time news posts here, not opinion pieces. Such a post can go from basically translating a news report to putting a story together yourself based on one or more news reports. We will give you some guidelines, but we already want to mention the following.

You should be able to adapt to the style of this blog, which is quite basic but nevertheless quality-oriented (regarding content, language and lay-out). To keep things readers-friendly, it's probably best that this continues to be the general line. Of course you can add your personal accents.

You should therefore also have a decent knowledge of the English language (without English having to be your mother tongue) and preferably also the Spanish language (or you should be excellent with google translate or other translating tools).

You should be able to take initiative. If you see a story that is interesting, you basically can start writing. You shouldn't wait for permission.

Although it's of course volunteer work (we also remind that this is a charity based blog with the benefits going to good works), we would ask some sort of minimum commitment. For example, you can say "Ok, I can give you fifteen minutes a day and write one post", or "I can be around for one hour, but only during weekdays" or "Only in the weekend". This will enable us to organize everything a bit.


We think it could be a great chance for some people to develop their skills in a global environment, to get some experience and to get to know other people. If you are interested and motivated to help out, you can contact us at:

fcbtransfers [at] yahoo [dot] com

Become a blog writer

Because we would like to bring the Barcelona fans more, faster and better news, we would like to create a pool of writers and therefore we are looking for people who could write posts for the blog.

We are talking about on-time news posts here, not opinion pieces. Such a post can go from basically translating a news report to putting a story together yourself based on one or more news reports. We will give you some guidelines, but we already want to mention the following.

You should be able to adapt to the style of this blog, which is quite basic but nevertheless quality-oriented (regarding content, language and lay-out). To keep things readers-friendly, it's probably best that this continues to be the general line. Of course you can add your personal accents.

You should therefore also have a decent knowledge of the English language (without English having to be your mother tongue) and preferably also the Spanish language (or you should be excellent with google translate or other translating tools).

You should be able to take initiative. If you see a story that is interesting, you basically can start writing. You shouldn't wait for permission.

Although it's of course volunteer work (we also remind that this is a charity based blog with the benefits going to good works), we would ask some sort of minimum commitment. For example, you can say "Ok, I can give you fifteen minutes a day and write one post", or "I can be around for one hour, but only during weekdays" or "Only in the weekend". This will enable us to organize everything a bit.


We think it could be a great chance for some people to develop their skills in a global environment, to get some experience and to get to know other people. If you are interested and motivated to help out, you can contact us at:

fcbtransfers [at] yahoo [dot] com

Become a blog writer

Because we would like to bring the Barcelona fans more, faster and better news, we would like to create a pool of writers and therefore we are looking for people who could write posts for the blog.

We are talking about on-time news posts here, not opinion pieces. Such a post can go from basically translating a news report to putting a story together yourself based on one or more news reports. We will give you some guidelines, but we already want to mention the following.

You should be able to adapt to the style of this blog, which is quite basic but nevertheless quality-oriented (regarding content, language and lay-out). To keep things readers-friendly, it's probably best that this continues to be the general line. Of course you can add your personal accents.

You should therefore also have a decent knowledge of the English language (without English having to be your mother tongue) and preferably also the Spanish language (or you should be excellent with google translate or other translating tools).

You should be able to take initiative. If you see a story that is interesting, you basically can start writing. You shouldn't wait for permission.

Although it's of course volunteer work (we also remind that this is a charity based blog with the benefits going to good works), we would ask some sort of minimum commitment. For example, you can say "Ok, I can give you fifteen minutes a day and write one post", or "I can be around for one hour, but only during weekdays" or "Only in the weekend". This will enable us to organize everything a bit.


If you are interested and motivated to help out, you can contact us at:

fcbtransfers [at] yahoo [dot] com

Looking for writers

Because we would like to bring the Barcelona fans more, faster and better news, we would like to create a pool of writers and therefore we are looking for people who could write posts for the blog.

We are talking about on-time news posts here, not opinion pieces. Such a post can go from basically translating a news report to putting a story together yourself based on one or more news reports. We will give you some guidelines, but we already want to mention the following.

You should be able to adapt to the style of this blog, which is quite basic but nevertheless quality-oriented (regarding content, language and lay-out). To keep things readers-friendly, it's probably best that this continues to be the general line. Of course you can add your personal accents.

You should therefore also have a decent knowledge of the English language (without English having to be your mother tongue) and preferably also the Spanish language (or you should be excellent with google translate or other translating tools).

You should be able to take initiative. If you see a story that is interesting, you basically can start writing. You shouldn't wait for permission.

Although it's of course volunteer work (we also remind that this is a charity based blog with the benefits going to good works), we would ask some sort of minimum commitment. For example, you can say "Ok, I can give you fifteen minutes a day and write one post", or "I can be around for one hour, but only during weekdays" or "Only in the weekend". This will enable us to organize everything a bit.


If you are interested and motivated to help out, you can contact us at:

fcbtransfers [at] yahoo [dot] com

Follow the latest Barcelona news on Twitter

You can also follow this blog on Twitter, a social networking and micro-blogging service, which can be a way for some of you to be informed faster about the latest news stories.

We won't bomb you with messages, we'll focus on the most interesting posts of the blog and give some more background info. And when you ask us a twitter question, we might even answer...


You can find us at:

http://twitter.com/barcastuff

See you there!


P.S. If you want to share a story put up by this blog with the followers of your own personal twitter account, you can click the "Share" button you find under each post and then click "Twitter". A link to the story will then automatically appear on your twitter homepage, you can add a little comment and publish it on your twitter account. Besides that, you can also forward tweets we sent you. Thanks for sharing!

How not to be anonymous on this blog?

Apparently some new readers have difficulties finding out how not to be marked as "Anonymous" if they are posting a comment on this blog. I indeed would recommend it that you choose a name when you comment here, because that makes everything more personal. Of course everyone is free to choose what he wants, but if you don't want to be marked as "anonymous", this is the way to do that:

- You click on "post a comment" or "... comments" under the post. Then there appears a pop-up, on the bottom of which you have a box where you can write your personal comment.

- Under that box, there's a "Choose an identity" section. If you don't do anything, you will be marked as anonymous. When you don't want that, you can click next to "Name/URL". Then two new boxes appear and in the "Name" box, you can type your real name or a fantasy name. If you have done that and you publish your comment, it will appear under that name.


I jump to the occasion to ask that people would refrain from personal insults on this blog, towards each other, the club and the players. This blog focuses on Barcelona, we all like the club, we want to share our thoughts about the players and the games, we're all having our own opinions and we all think that we're right and that all the others don't know anything about football but that doesn't mean we should lose our heads.

There are people from almost 200 countries visiting this blog, all have their own culture, tradition and sensibilities. Besides that, every person has its own character and way of expressing himself. I'm not always there to remove unappropriate comments, so just behave a little. Not too much, but let's try to have a basic respect for our fellow Barcelona fans, the players and the club.

Follow the latest transfer news on Twitter

From now on, you can also follow this blog at Twitter, a social networking and micro-blogging service, which can be a way for some of you to be informed faster about the latest news stories.

We won't bomb you with messages, we'll focus on the most interesting posts of the blog and give some more background info. And when you ask us a twitter question, we might even answer...


You can find us at:

http://twitter.com/barcastuff

See you there!


P.S. If you want to share a story put up by this blog with the followers of your own personal twitter account, you can click the "Share" button you find under each post and then click "Twitter". A link to the story will then automatically appear on your twitter homepage, you can add a little comment and publish it on your twitter account. Besides that, you can also forward tweets we sent you. Thanks for sharing!

Live Match Chat is back !!!

You have had to miss it for almost two months but tomorrow Omar and his Dream Team are finally back with the FC Barcelona Live Match Chat.


So this is just a little reminder that you can chat with fellow Barça fans

and follow and comment every Barcelona game

live as the action happens

every match day from two hours before until two hours after the game

at the following place:


http://fcbarcelona.hopto.org/



Tomorrow our pre-season kicks of at 7 pm barcelona time,
two hours before the treble winners play their first game of the 2009-2010 season against Tottenham at the Wembley Cup.

See you there!

Good to be back!

24 hours ago, I couldn't imagine I would write this post, but... We're back! A new, enthusiastic team has taken over and is in charge of the blog from now on.

The first days and maybe weeks won't be easy, the pieces of the puzzle still have to fall in place. Have some patience with the new guys, I had the chance to grow in the shadow since I was building the blog from scratch, they immediately have thousands of people closely following their work. I'm sure very soon we'll be back on track as we were before and from then on things will only get better.


I also jump to the occassion to re-invite interested people to join the new team. I really think it's a unique chance to work on a global project with people from all over the world. What we at this moment need most are people who want to write reports that can go up on the blog as well as people who have (basic) knowledge of Spanish and English.

If you are interested and think you can help, you can mail us at:

fcbtransfers [at] yahoo [dot] com

(I saw some new offers to help this morning in the mailbox, will reply all of you this evening guys!)

Good to be back!

pep

The New Blog Team: Editors

As the blog rises from it's ashes, we want to present ourselves. As a starter we present the editors, and in a few days time we'll present the rest of the team, including writers, designers and everyone else who is a part of this blog from now on.



Nick: Aeneas
Real Name: Bill
Age: 23
Position: Editor
Location: Los Angeles, USA
Favorite Player: Toure Yaya

Nick: Sbah
Real Name: Sebastian
Age: 17
Position: Editor
Location: Vaasa, Finland
Favorite Player: Iniesta

Nick: Vj
Real Name: Vijay
Age: 20
Position: Editor
Location: Mumbai, India
Favorite Player: Xavi Hernández i Creus

Nick: Toka
Real Name: James
Age: 25
Position: Editor
Location: Canada
Favorite Player: Rivaldo

Back soon

Over the past two days, a few people have been discussing the continuity of this blog. Since we think it would be a shame that all what has been built would be lost, we've decided to give it a go and try to form a new blog team, that will keep this blog going and try to take it to another level.


Everyone who feels he can add something to this new project, is motivated and wants to get involved can contact us at:

fcbtransfers [at] yahoo [dot] com

In the first place we are looking for people who can do the news updates (by gathering the news and/or writing posts). But we are also looking for people with experience in webdesign who want to form a team that builds a new site, and basically everyone mentioned here.


We want to be up and running in the coming days, so stay tuned!


- the new blog team -

The End

It has been almost one a half year and over 5000 posts but this should be the last day and post.

I've received earlier this week a job offer that gives me the chance to play in the Champions League of my profession. Intellectually (and yes, financially), this is a once-in-a-lifetime chance that I cannot let pass, so I've accepted the offer yesterday.


This sadly means that I won't have the time anymore that I think is necessary to keep up the level of this blog. The quality of the content has always been my main concern and quality asks time.

I didn't only bring the big stories that attract the most readers. I didn't only checked the main sources and took the most sensational stories from there. If there were five articles on a story, I didn't use one but I wanted to have them all included in my post. I actually checked my sources. I think I can say this has been the place, all professional sites included, where you have been able to find the most reliable Barcelona information.


It started as a little personal blog to keep track of what really was going on and it has been growing ever since. Over the last month we've again doubled everything one can double, visitors, visits, page views, revenues. Yesterday was the best day ever, the day before the second best. This blog stops at its peak and that's the way it probably should be.

The timing of all of this couldn't be worse, since we were just bringing new and enthusiatic people in and were ready to take all this to another level. I was very much looking forward to work together with a group of fellow culés, to work out all the ideas I had, but it wasn't to be.

This blog will stay up as a remembrance of the best season ever in the history of the greatest club. If you're going through a bad time, you can come and get some renewed energy here.


To avoid the cold turkey, I've decided to start two little new blogs:

Barça Cartoons will have every day one (or maybe two, but surely one) cartoon

The Nose of Txiki will have every day a translation of one (or maybe two, but surely one) opinion piece published in the Spanish or Catalan press

That last is something I wanted for a while, but I didn't have time for it. I think both blogs can give you some kind of inside view of what is living in Spain and Catalonia.

I have some more ideas, something about Spanish referees, the long awaited Ultimate Barça Wags blog, a Presidential Elections 2010 blog, but if I'll start one of those, that'll probably be for September. If it's good, I'm sure the word will spread again and you'll hear about it. You can also follow all my current and future Barça-related adventures on Twitter. If people have ideas or want to start something on their own and want my support or feedback, they know where to find me.


I want to thank all the people who have been involved with this blog, writing things, translating things, looking for things, sending me suggestions, offering their help. They made this blog to what it was. I want to thank you for reading and for spreading the word. It has been a pleasure working for you, you were a great public, take care.


Visca'l Barça!

Moderating comments

Since last week, this blog has become a target of spammers. Long comments that force people to scroll down, insults, commenting under nick-names of other readers, taking controversial stands to trigger discussions, etcetera.

It seems that people setting up another Barcelona news project are putting more negative energy in damaging the "competition" than positive energy in building their own quality site, and deliberately want to harm this blog by heating up or slowing down the discussions in the comments sections, hoping that people will stay away. This has forced me to introduce the system of moderating the comments.

During European day-time, not much will change, there will most of the time only be a small delay of a couple of minutes. During European night-time, that delay could be a little to a lot longer, but we'll see what we can do about that. Since there are anyway no posts and so less traffic and comments during that time, this shouldn't be too much of a problem.

Several people had commented me before that they were unhappy with the quality of the comments on the blog. I didn't yet have time to look into that but a pleasant side-effect from the moderating seems to be that most of the shouters and the people who are looking for instant satisfaction are going to other places to do their thing. As Johan Cruijff said: "Every disadvantage has its advantge."


My apologies for the inconveniences and thanks for your understanding!

The Big Call: Help This Blog And Your Club

Less than one year and a half ago, I started a little blog. Now it has turned into something quite big with thousands of visitors every day.

Over the last year, I've become convinced that - through the internet - the fans can play a crucial role in spreading the name and fame of the club of our hearts and in attracting new fans.

I have many (many!) more ideas, but the time is lacking since I'm already stretched to my limits trying to combine a professional life, a private life and this hobby.

I on the other hand also feel that a lot of people are willing to help out in one way or another. Some have offered their help already, to most I have said "wait some more, I'll launch a big call soon". They must have thought this day would never come...

A few already joined in and I have to admit that I have truly been surprised by not only the motivation and the willingness to help but also the quality of their contributions.

I think now could be the right time to bring new people in and to take all of this step by step to another level. I think it would be great to form a group of people from all over the world working together on one project and developing some of their skills further. And on the way, making new friends.

And we all know how these things go: you visit someone, he offers you a room and you meet his beautiful sister on your morning trip to the shower. If it happens, we'll all invite ourselves to the wedding!!!

But enough sentimental stuff. What are we looking for?



1. news gatherers
We need people who go out on websites and look for Barcelone-related news. Maybe you're already surfing around the whole day looking for news: perfect.

Of course, Spanish, Catalan and English websites are the main sources of information, so every help is welcome there. But it would especially be nice if we could have some people to cover the Italian, Portuguese, Brazilian, French and German media too.

Everybody is of course also invited to send us reports that appear in whatever media anywhere in the world and that are linked to FC Barcelona.


2. report writers
In a second phase, people could help to transform the news found on the web into articles that can be put on the blog. Decent English should be enough, let's say that my not-at-all-perfect english is the standard, so that cannot be very hard to match.


3. opinion writers
Do you have an opinion you want to share with others and you're tired of just putting some comment on blogs, forums or sites where it immediately disappears in an ocean of comments? Grab your chance, turn your opinion into an article and send it to us, we'll publish it if it has some value.


4. translators
We're looking for people who can translate articles from Spanish to English. There is a lot of interesting stuff out there about the club and it would be nice we could bring that to you.

We've lost some people along the road (mainly my fault because I didn't have time for people management), but now we're going to organize things better. Al is so happy he'll be Head of Translations... Non-Barça fans welcome!


5. lay-out
You are too polite to say it, but I will say it in your place: the lay-out of this blog is just *...fill in what you really think...*. I know it and despite the fact that I think the content is the most important thing, this site could use a serious make-over.

So all people who are willing to think about how we could do this and want to form some kind of global dream-team to make it work are invited to do so. Same here: people who're not Barça fans are as welcome. Unless their Madrid fans. Tolerance has its limits.


6. videos
Good videos are a great way to reach out to people, so if you have the skills and/or ideas to make videos, join in. We're also looking for people wanting to help out making compilation videos by going through existing videos.


7. funny stuff
I cannot draw and my computer skills are limited, but I think it would be totally great if we could produce our own cartoons and photoshopped stuff and get them out there on the web. None-Barça fans also welcome!


8. new subjects
We want to broaden the scope of subjects treated a little. Therefore, we would like for example to have people writing about the history of the club, the economic situation of the club, the youth teams and so on. We also want people who could focus on statistics next season.

And last but not least: we want to create our own wag squad that goes out there and finds us the best pictures (and all other relevant information) of the wives and girlfriends of the players. If you're interested in one of these subjects, let us know.


9. your suggestions
You think we're forgetting something? You have ideas about things we should include in the blog? Let us know!




For all this, you can mail me at:

fcbtransfers [at] yahoo [dot] com

just give me some little info about yourself (name or nick, age, daytime activity --- you can lie, don't worry) and what you would be willing to do and I'll get back to you asap. If you want to help but you don't really know how: don't worry, there's enough to do, we'll find you something.

We'll repeat this call every few months from now on, so if you don't have time now, feel free to join in later.

The team difficulty can do better than last season, but the fans can!
Visca'l Barça!

How not to be anonymous on this blog?

Apparently some new readers have difficulties finding out how not to be marked as "Anonymous" if they are posting a comment on this blog. I indeed would recommend it that you choose a name when you comment here, because that makes everything more personal. Of course everyone is free to choose what he wants, but if you don't want to be marked as "anonymous", this is the way to do that:

- You click on "post a comment" or "... comments" under the post. Then there appears a pop-up, on the bottom of which you have a box where you can write your personal comment.

- Under that box, there's a "Choose an identity" section. If you don't do anything, you will be marked as anonymous. When you don't want that, you can click next to "Name/URL". Then two new boxes appear and in the "Name" box, you can type your real name or a fantasy name. If you have done that and you publish your comment, it will appear under that name.


I jump to the occasion to ask that people would refrain from personal insults on this blog, towards each other, the club and the players. This blog focuses on Barcelona, we all like the club, we want to share our thoughts about the players and the games, we're all having our own opinions and we all think that we're right and that all the others don't know anything about football but that doesn't mean we should lose our heads.

There are people from almost 200 countries visiting this blog, all have their own culture, tradition and sensibilities. Besides that, every person has its own character and way of expressing himself. I'm not always there to remove unappropriate comments, so just behave a little. Not too much, but let's try to have a basic respect for our fellow Barcelona fans, the players and the club.