A friend of mine told me that MSM won't adopt blogs in Spain. 

They won't feel the need of blogs and won't allocate extra budget for niche media, he said.

Well, he was wrong. 

Spanish MSM first offered RSS feeds during 2004, and a bunch of them understood the power of blogs and began to use them heavily during 2005. 

El Mundo offers 6 permanent blogs written by columnists of the newspaper, and also has offered special blogs for great events such as the death of Pope John Paul II.

20 Minutos is organising a blog contest with a number of categories.  This free newspaper was the first to offer readers the opportunity to comment all its contents and had RSS feeds.

Qué! is a free newspaper that dedicates one full page to blog content created in blogs by their own CMS.

The example of blogs and MSM that I like most is Informativos Telecinco. Tele 5 is a private TV channel that actually hired one Spanish A-list blogger (Ignacio Escolar) and asked one of his journalists that also is a blogger (Iñigo Sáenz de Ugarte) to run its new internet project. 

Now they are offering news in a "traditional" internet site and have blogs about different topics... and they keep posting in their own blogs! 

There are another examples in both national and regional newspapers that have blogs or even offer their own CMS and I can tell that this is only the beginning of the adoption of blogs by MSM in Spain.

Regarding the topic that MSM may look bloggers as a threat, I can say that the main reason for the quick adoption of blogs by MSM was because they actually felt blogs were threating them because:

- They were not part of the conversation

- They were loosing awareness among influencers

- They were loosing influence

- They were not maximizing their contents' profitability

And also, the most important Spanish newspaper had its own "Elpaisgate".

El País launch a email campaign to promote the online version of the newspaper with this ad:

(Translation: Lots of things could happen in just one day... like September 11th  terrorist attack that change NY skyline).

The reaction for such a bad taste ad was immediate in the Spanish blogosphere and the pressure of dozens of bloggers forced El País to ask for apologies in the front page of the newspaper.

Also, the role of blogs after the Madrid terrorist attack was fundamental, as they were platforms of opinion and political activism that result in the victory of the PSOE.

Regarding the topic of bloggers making money out of their blogs, I can say that in Spain there is one blog publisher (Weblogs SL) that is on the right track to make its blogs profitable with 1 million+ page views a month and with advertising agreements with Nokia, Dell, etc.  As far as I know, some other blog publishers will be launched in the future. 

But I also want to point out that there are several blog companies in Spain: CMS, blog consultancy, blog development, design, agregators, etc.

Spanish blogosphere is a fast moving and pride community, that looks MSM direct to the eye and demand transparency not just to them but to institutions and political parties.

Irish writer Oscar Wilde once said that "the only thing to do with good advice is pass it on. It is never any use to oneself."

It neatly sums up the adoption of blogging among the Irish media.  The potential for blogs to reach, engage and inform an audience, has to date, made no impact on how the media in Ireland deliver news and opinions. The idea of participatory journalism simply isn't on the agenda, yet.

There is a growing awareness of blogging among the media, which is reflected in the increasing number of features on the subject in newspapers, magazines, radio and even television, but while the media has written on the subject, no one has seen it as a useful adjunct to their traditional activities – at this point.

We do have a small number of Irish journalists currently blogging, however these are typically personal blogs with little or no support from their employers.  Examples include Karlin Lillington , Bernie Goldbach and Sarah Carey.

While the Irish media might be dragging their feet, the same can't be said of the Irish blog community which is growing rapidly and capturing a sizeable readership.  Like elsewhere, the majority of these blogs deal with issues around technology and politics.  It's fair to say that many of the Irish bloggers are growing restless with the mainstream media and their approach and view of blogging.

Much of the coverage that has appeared on blogging has been dismissive and has focused on the blogging phenomenon outside Ireland, primarily in the United States.  Many Irish bloggers feel that their efforts are being ignored or misunderstood by the media.  They are unhappy with
the dismissive nature of much of the mainstream coverage of the blogging phenomenon.

Sharon O' Suillibhan, who writes the Irish political blog 1169 and Counting  describes it thus:

"To try and get publicity for the blog is next to impossible , with one radio presenter suggesting that we take out a paid advertisement on their station !  Other than that , they seem to begrudge giving us a mention . I find that some journalists will visit our blog for details on an issue on which they are working ,  but never credit the site  - I no longer attempt to follow them up in the hope of receiving a belated  'credit'  .  Still , we get great satisfaction from our blog and are , hopefully , helping to assist our readers better understand the reasons for the political situation that now exists in this country ."

This is a fairly commonly held view of how the Irish media is dealing with blogs, particularly indigenous blogs.  However, it's not the total story.  One national newspaper is at least is attempting to bridge the divide. The Sunday Tribune, one of Ireland's largest Sunday newspapers publishes a summary of interesting posts from Irish blogs
each week. In addition in recent weeks we are seeing a growing number of formal references to Irish blogs appearing in the media.

There is no doubt that as blogging continues to proliferate, Irish media outlets will be forced to examine how they can use blogs to add colour, opinions and more value to their readers.  However, at this point in proceedings it appears that this process will take longer than expected and will probably be forced upon the various outlets.

Tom Murphy is Director of Corporate Communications with Cape Clear Software.  He's been blogging since March 2002 and covers Public Relations and Marketing, drawing on over fifteen years experience working throughout Europe and North America.
He's still learning....