• EU | "You can offer a policy expert a bridge, but you can’t make him cross it."
  More on the debate on the role of eurobloggers in (possibly) shaping policy: Ralf Grahn comments on Mathew Lowry's post on building bridges outwards:

• EU | The Brussels Blogger Study
  Brussels based PR company Waggener Edstrom has recently published a study on the EU blogosphere, called the Brussels Blogger Study (here available - but not downloadable). Many eurobloggers attended the launch event of the report (you can see all the Twitter reaction with the hash tag: #bbs10) [edit: as it was pointed out, almost all of them attended the event via Twitter, after Jon Worth - who was actually there - started tweeting. And he precised: "Odd then that I heard about the event via other bloggers, and had to invite myself to attend"]. But many of them weren’t convinced with the criteria that were used to determine influence and ranking.

• UK | iPhone apps or no iPhone apps? That is the question...
  A couple of weeks ago the British government started reviewing its 820 websites as part of a bigger plan of efficiency in the Public Administration. As it turned out from a BBC Freedom of Information request, a big expense (£10,000 - £40,000) is related to the development of iPhone applications.

[We are getting suggestions from our readers about interesting initiatives and speakers for the PDF Europe conference. Thank you all.]

• EU | The European Commission Youtube channel...and a strange brand association
  EUtube is the Youtube channel of the European Commission, providing instructive and sometimes funny videos on many issues and EU initiatives, with a pretty innovative attitude.
  For example, watch the funny "Chemical party":

In 2008, Obama's campaign blog engaged supporters with on-the-ground stories and profiles. But for every story online about ordinary people, there were many more blog posts appearing elsewhere seeking to undermine the work of the campaign.

Indeed, as lead Obama campaign blogger Sam Graham-Felsen later wrote, "For every megaphone the Internet provides to truth-tellers and democratic organizers, it also elevates con-artists, hate-mongers, violent extremists, and most troublingly, government authorities who aim to crush free expression."

How can you best use your organization's blog to drive the right kind of conversations?

Join the PdF Network on Thursday, April 29 as Sam Graham-Felsen, Lead Campaign Blogger, Obama for America shows us how blogging brings campaigns, candidates and people together.

Thursday, April 29th at the PdF Network
Voices from the Campaign Trail: Best Practices in Campaign Blogging
1-2 p.m. EST

Join the call!

Check out our upcoming PdF Network calls...

• Germany | Creating a more transparent Frankfurt
  Frankfurt-Gestalten.de (Create Frankfurt) is a new space for citizen participation: the aim is tracking local political decisions, making them more transparent and motivate citizens to connect locally and to discuss on how to change their neighborhood.
  The website offers information in form of geo-referenced data and documents properly tagged. It also offer an email service and space for comments and proposals.