Our Spain channel is edited by Ignacio García Ramos. Ignacio and his team will combine translation of ReadWriteWeb posts with original posts about Spain's Web market. Like the mothership ReadWriteWeb, the Spain channel will focus on Web trends and products.

Ignacio gave us the following background about Spain:

"We happen to be a country with very few English speakers (by European standards), so we feel that bringing home a valuable piece of Sillicon Valley and making it accessible to our entrepreneurs, startups and hobbyists is a way of contributing to pushing this country forward in technology. We would like to gather a community of decision takers and influential professionals around ReadWriteWeb Spain and make things happen.

Our economy has largely been based on construction and the economic turmoil has hit us hard. There is talk of "changing bricks for computers". We want to be at the cutting edge of this movement and we found no better vehicle than ReadWriteWeb.

We also share a lot of ReadWriteWeb's interests, like the semantic and the real-time web; and values such as analytical, uncompromisable journalism. It's great to stay current on those issues, thanks to your updates [at ReadWriteWeb.com] and best practices, but we'll also broadcast news and trends from this side of the Atlantic."

You can also follow ReadWriteWeb Spain on Twitter @rwwes - and all of our country sites at the Twitter list rww/international.

The opening post, translated in English here, was written by Jaime Garcia Cantero and is an in-depth look at Internet trends in Spain. Jaime Garcia Cantero is an associate of IDC Spain and assistant professor of IDG Communications of the EOI. He is considered to be one of Spain's most influential analysts.

Our Brazil channel is edited by Diego Gomes. Diego and his team will combine translation of ReadWriteWeb posts with original posts about Brazil's emerging Web market.

ReadWriteWeb has a natural affinity for the international Web - after all, the company was founded by a New Zealander (yours truly)! For more context about our global strategy, read Bernard Lunn's post Do You Speak Global Innovation?.

RWW Brazil Sponsor Opportunities

ReadWriteWeb Brazil already has two key sponsors, who we'd like to thank here:

• UOL HOST, the top .com domain registrar in Brazil and a provider of quality web hosting, e-commerce, e-mail marketing and data center services.
• PagSeguro, the leading Brazilian online payments and money transfer service. It allows users to send and receive payments via e-mail or using credit cards, bank account transfers or bank payment slip.

If you're a Brazilian Internet company or an international company seeking to reach an influential readership in Brazil, please contact the RWW Brazil editor to find out about their sponsor and partner opportunities.

Brazil's Web Market

We last wrote about the Brazil web market back in September 2006, at a time when Brazilians were 70% of the user base of Google's social network Orkut. We noted at the time that Brazilian Web users had a special affinity for community, which was reflected in the web apps that were popular in Brazil at that time.

For an up-to-date review of Brazil's web market, check out this presentation by comScore:

You will see both of these writers on the main ReadWriteWeb homepage, as at this stage we're streaming everything through there.

Dana Oshiro is based in San Francisco, but hails from Canada. She writes about her life in San Francisco at Villagers With Pitchforks. You can contact Dana at dana@readwriteweb.com.

We're excited to announce the availability of ReadWriteWeb's Guide to Online Community Management, our first premium report. It's been in the works for more than four months and we believe it's unlike anything else you've seen. Businesses seeking to engage with online communities on their own websites or all around the social web will find the guide invaluable in getting up to speed on the state of the art and making sure their employees have the foundation they need to be effective.

The end product is in two parts. Part one is a 75 page collection of case studies, advice and discussion concerning the most important issues in online community. Part two is a companion online aggregator that delivers the most-discussed articles each day written by experts on community management from around the web. Read on to see what's included in the guide, how to purchase it and what early reviews have said.

The Guide is available for purchase at a price of $299 from this page. (You won't be charged until you complete a few simple steps on that page.) You can download a free sample section of the report here. This is our first premium report, but we believe that's an unusually low price for an incredible amount of business value. Compared to other reports, or even an hour or two with most consultants, you get a whole lot for your money here.

What The Report Includes

A team of five ReadWriteWeb researchers worked together for four months scouring the web for hundreds of blog posts and articles about online community management. We curated that collection down to the very best articles, then excerpted the best talking points, data points, advice and reflection on key topics. We then wove all those nuggets of wisdom into a cohesive report, mixed with our own perspectives on often controversial topics.

We start out with the basics, our most information-dense answers to the first questions most companies ask about online community. ("Should we be on Facebook? Should we have a blog?") Then we dive deep into four key areas: Return on Investment, Job Description, the Marketing/Customer Service Balance and Dealing With Challenging Community Members. Each of those sections begins with a summary of highlights and one link that we recommend checking out if you read nothing else.

Next, you'll find four extended interviews with successful community managers from four different kinds of companies: one from a very large traditional media organization (Mathew Ingram from Toronto's Globe and Mail), another from a large consumer tech company (Lucia Willow of Pandora Radio), a manager of various software developer communities (Dawn Foster), and a B2B service provider (Connie Bensen).

The final part of the written section of this guide is a collection of additional resources we think you'll find valuable: the podcasts that every community manager should listen to, the best Facebook group for community managers to connect through, and a list of some of the most important community management industry events to attend.

The Online Companion

In addition to the written part of this guide we've also assembled a collection of dynamic online resources that will keep delivering value well into the future. Organizations that purchase the Guide will have access to the Community Management Aggregator. There, you'll find an automatically updated selection of the most talked-about articles being published by the sources that we cite in the first half of the report and more. If you're familiar with Techmeme.com, we think of this section as a little "Techmeme about Community Management".

If you don't want to visit this page daily, you can subscribe to the articles by email or RSS. We've also included a search box where you can search the full archive of all of these top sources we've listed. Think of this as a dynamic reference book made up of the written wisdom of top sources in the field.

What Reviewers Say

A number of experts in the field have looked at the Guide pre-publication and this is a sample of their feedback.

"In normal ReadWriteWeb fashion, the report flat delivers. It's a must-have for businesses wading in or thinking about involvement in the social web."
- Jason Falls, Director of Social Media at Doe Anderson

"It's very good. I like the recommendation parts. I love the sprinkled case studies. I think it's really thorough, long, and full of actionable content."
-Chris Brogan, President of New Marketing Labs

"A broad view of community management from a diverse set of practitioners, including solid recommendations applicable to any company. Very well done."
-Joe Cothrel, Chief Community Officer at Lithium: Successful Communities On-Demand

"This report is a thorough collection of tips for community-building, and for understanding the variety of community management roles out there today. I found quotes on almost every page that had me nodding my head in agreement."
-Janetti Chon, Community Manager for TechWeb/O'Reilly Web 2.0 Expo

"Ask a thousand people what community management means, you'll get a thousand answers. Now, we can just point to the report. It's full of real, actionable and measurable advice for organizations struggling to define the role of community management."
-Holly Ross, Executive Director at NTEN: The Nonprofit Technology Network

Whether you're at a startup, a large company or a non-profit - there's a lot here for you. Non-profit leader Beth Kanter offers a special review with social good organizations in mind. "I reviewed the Online Community Guide and online resource - I think the concept of pairing a summary of the best practices and thinking on paper and creating an online new stream to keep up with best practices is brilliant. The best thing is that this fantastic package is affordable. That's great news for non-profits wanting to set up, manage, and maintain a successful online community."

Again, all of the above is available for the low price of $299. Just visit this page to purchase the written report and access to the online companion or download a free sample section of the report here.

Thanks for your interest and good luck with your online community work!

Welcome Jolie, great to have you on board!

I'm very pleased to announce that Susan Scrupski (a.k.a. "ITSinsider") has joined ReadWriteWeb as our VP Enterprise Content and Programs. Starting today, Susan will assume responsibility for building our editorial and expertise in applying the principals of Web 2.0 to the Enterprise. With a focus on how the Web is disrupting traditional business processes and operations, our Enterprise channel (which will soon be re-launched with a new design) will focus on new products, case studies, and innovative developments involving Web strategy and execution in a B2B context. Yes, B2B is back!

Susan is the fourth full-time member of ReadWriteWeb, after myself (the founder), Marshall Kirkpatrick who joined us full-time in August as VP Content Development, and Bernard Lunn who became COO in December. The rest of our staff are contractors. I am proud of the whole team we have managed to put together without external funding.

Please join me in welcoming Susan into her new role. We have big plans for ReadWriteWeb and we're grateful for the continued support of our readers and sponsors.

Follow ReadWriteWeb on Twitter

Welcome Phil, great to have you on board!

Bernard worked for Aregon from 1979 - 1994, a pioneer in what is now called Publish & Subscribe technology. Bernard led sales and marketing for Aregon in London in the run up to the Big Bang deregulation in 1985, took the company into Europe after the crash of 1987 and then built the US operations from 1990 to 1992 in a recession, with minimal capital, against entrenched competitors. After Aregon merged with Kapiti (back office banking systems), Bernard took over and rejuvenated Kapiti's US operations before moving to Asia in 1994 and then the U.S. after that. You can read more about Bernard's background on LinkedIn.

Many of you probably know Bernard already as a writer at ReadWriteWeb (since July '07) and editor of our new Enterprise channel. He often focuses on business issues in his writing, so we're all excited to see that innovative theory being put into practise here at ReadWriteWeb!

Bernard is the third full-time member of ReadWriteWeb, after myself (the founder) and Marshall Kirkpatrick, VP Content Development who joined us full-time in August. The rest of our staff are contractors. I am proud of the whole team we have managed to put together without external funding - or indeed a presence in Silicon Valley until our recent writing hire of Lidija Davis.

Please join me in welcoming Bernard into his new role. We all have big plans for ReadWriteWeb and we're grateful for the continued support of our readers and sponsors.

The reason ReadWriteWeb has made this decision is to focus on building and extending our core ReadWriteWeb brand. The first fruits of this strategy were the Enterprise Channel (launched in August) and our new Jobwire product (launched last week). We have more channels and products in the pipeline.

A note about ReadWriteTalk, our podcast show. As it was not a network blog, but an extension of ReadWriteWeb, it will continue to be part of our business. Sean Ammirati will continue to host the show.

Stay tuned for more channels and products under the ReadWriteWeb brand.

Hat-tip to Quintura Blog, Center Networks and The Inquisitr for their posts today. Also see Charles' post at AltSearchEngines.

We've been working on it for months, well before the current economic climate unfolded, but we're hoping that a whole site of good news will serve our readers well in these troubled times. Companies are still hiring, people are still getting cool new jobs, and we're going to report on it. We invite you to check out the new Jobwire site to meet the Jobwire team, learn about our special guest editors and check out some of the great new jobs people have landed lately! Click here to read more and meet the Jobwire team.

RWW France will be covering the Web 2.0 Expo Berlin 2008 next week and they have tickets to give away if you're one of our European readers.

Romain gave us some background on why RWW France was created and what they plan to do with the site, along with profiles of the team:

"ReadWriteWeb France was started with the purpose of providing French people another way to read about the web and learn from it. We intend to make the French version not just a translation of the ReadWriteWeb website, but to add to it the French point of view and market knowledge of web experts who have joined the French team - as well as original content to highlight and analyze what's currently happening in Europe, starting with the Web 2.0 Expo Berlin coverage next week.

The French team includes Fabrice Epelboin, entrepreneur and partner at Aladia (branding & strategic consulting shop) and social web consultant at Kantik.com; Damien Douani, Concept & Business Development Manager at Orange / Innovation department - explocentre; Jeremie Moritz, Business Manager Southern Europe - Metaboli (online content distribution); and Charles Liebert, Digital & Interactiv Marketing Manager at Orange Vallée as an occasional author."

Welcome Romain and team, thanks for translating us into French and we look forward to reading your original content (via Google Translate probably).

p.s. Kudos to eagle-eyed Techcrunch France writer Ouriel Ohayon, who spotted RWW France as soon as it began posting.

This is great news for us, because it brings our brand of web technology news, reviews and analysis to a much wider audience. It also means that the innovative and often little known startups we write about daily get a chance to be seen in a mainstream publication. The New York Times has a reputation for quality and in-depth journalism, attributes that we strive for on ReadWriteWeb - so we're excited about this partnership.

Along with ReadWriteWeb, The New York Times will also syndicate content from our friends at VentureBeat and GigaOm. The New York Times re-design is now live, although syndicated content won't go live until October.

Andy Plesser from Beet.TV had the scoop on this story, along with a video interview with Vindu Goel, deputy technology editor at The New York Times.

I want to especially thank Bernard Lunn, ReadWriteWeb's Business Development Manager, for getting this deal. We at ReadWriteWeb are proud to have our growing brand associated with the prestigious New York Times - maybe now our families and friends will understand what we do for a living ;-)

Why sponsor ReadWriteWeb? It is one of the most popular blogs in the world, number 9 currently according to Technorati, and reaches an influential audience. Our site is read by tech and media professionals, early adopters, developers, designers, analysts, CIO's, VC's, media execs, leading thinkers. Email us now for more details.

Calais, powered by Thomson Reuters, brings state-of-the-art semantic functionality into your blog, content management system, site or application.

Influxis provides affordable and reliable Flash Media Server and Flash Video Hosting with free Flash Media Server Components and expert support.

Socialtext is holding a series of 3 webinars for marketing and sales departments to learn the best practices for deploying business social software.

Compete Search Analytics is a way to build and optimize search marketing campaigns.

Strands develops technologies to better understand people's taste and help them discover things they like and didn't know about. Strands has created a social recommender engine that is able to provide real-time recommendations of products and services through computers, mobile phones and other Internet-connected devices.

Direct Media Exchange is a simple solution for managing ad networks that allows publishers to make more money from their websites.

Rackspace provides dedicated server hosting.

The Taxonomy Folksonomy eBook is written by Daniela Barbosa and outlines how enterprises can incorporate social tagging into their taxonomies. You can download the ebook here.

DEMOfall 08 is the launchpad for emerging technology. Over the course of two days, 70 emerging technologies each have six minutes to deploy technology's next big thing. It is on September 7-9, 2008 in San Diego.

EditMe lets you make a web site in minutes and edit the content with a single click.

Quintura is a visual-based search engine, which we are now using to power ReadWriteWeb's main search. Check it out here.

MediaTemple provides hosting for RWW and SixApart provides our publishing software MT4.