elections
That was the year that was
One year ago. December 2008. I just remember being incredibly stressed out; and, remarkably, that Tibo was even more so. We were up against the deadline for signing the “online” contract with our agency. We maybe didn’t realise it at the time, but in that contract the shape of WebCom’s annus mirabilis could already be discerned.
I take it all back…
Well, some of it anyway… Hardly had I pressed the “publish” button on the last post than the Parliament provided its big surprise of the week.
Post-electoral depression
Nothing matters any more. The day-to-day work seems quite boring. What’s the aim of the articles we write, if not to increase the turnout in the elections?
The Times They Are a-Changin’
Writing in Prospect magazine this month Steven Johnson and Paul Starr debate the question of whether the changes brought to the media by the internet herald “a golden age of serious journalism” or whether it will bring down standards. As someone whose job is to write on the web, I naturally hope it will be [...]
No equal representation? No sex!
The European Parliament currently has 31 % of the seats filled with female MEPs. This figure made Commission Vice-President Margot Wallström recently question the representativeness of this potentially most democratic European institution: “Women account for 52% of the EU population. They must have equal representation. How can we speak of representative democracy when half the [...]
A bilingual chicken, a naked chicken
The “beauty queen” of the communication campaign for the elections is the chicken. By popular request. One of them even got a love letter in the form of graffiti: “Je t’aime, poulet” (I love you, chicken).
Yikes! Suddenly we are doing all this stuff
Seems only yesterday… It’s not long since we were in the happy position of being the ones pushing for all kinds of trendy, new-fangled ideas against a hidebound establishment. This blog seemed like a distant mirage – it was just too far outside the comfort zone of the way European institutions do communication to be [...]
Why vote? A question of generation perhaps
Just a quick one today, based on an observation about something we have just published on the site. We pounced on a lunch held in honour of former EP Presidents held last week to ask them why they think people should vote in European elections. (Perhaps they could improve on our ten reasons, which have given [...]
“It’s Your Choice” goes viral
Well, it didn’t take long… EP-webeditors’ congratulations to Cédric Puisney (a.k.a. l’Européen jamais content) for his reinterpretations of the European elections campaign banners, posted yesterday. Nice work, and the bar set suitably high for future satirists… The emails were flying around the office this morning, with everyone selecting their favourite from Cédric’s versions of the [...]
Waiting for the New Year
We had several New Years already this year. In the beginning of January we celebrated the New Year we all know, in mid-January it was the orthodox New Year, at the end of January it was the Chinese New Year and last week – the Iranian one. However, there is still one to come – [...]
A big cheese and sacred cows
Afficionados of the elections website may have noticed our debate of the week focuses again on economic matters. Of course. “It’s the economy, stupid”, it was once famously observed – and that was in relatively good times. Right now, with the sense of slight unreality with which the current crisis was perhaps initially viewed (all [...]
A Cornish tale to savour
I have become a fan of 24 year old Sarah from Cornwall. The other day someone at work sent me the link to her video “UK & EU Date” which I really liked. Basically it starts with her looking through the personal ads of a newspaper where she eventually stumbles across a “strong, protective, multi-cultural entrepreneur who loves [...]
It’s a man’s world
On my way to work this campaign caught my eye: A photo of a man and a woman and the question: “Is your work valued the same?” Yes I like to think so. And that as woman I have the same career opportunities as a man. But statistics gives another picture. Women in Europe are [...]
Will we be “United in diversity” at the ballot box?
To be memorable elections generally need narratives. The recent US Presidential election had it in spades but the last three decades of European elections have, in my view, thrown up stories of their own
The election website in one picture
Editors write and Web-designers, well, design. So when comes their turn to post here, they’d rather do it in a graphical way. From Fred and Sophie, our talented web-designers, and Nicolas, our analyst, comes the summary of a year of collective work. In one picture. A la Feltron.
The flood gates open
Call it the Obama Effect, call it the Tide of History, call it about time, but whatever it was it happened this week. A big week for the web team. We got the go ahead for a series of new enterprises we have been working on behind the scenes for a while now.
How not to be a top communications agency
On 29-30 September, Parliament’s Directorate for the Media upped sticks to one of those leafy locations in the Brussels commuter belt for a day and a half’s think-in about our plans for the 2009 European elections. It is often hard to say what one gets out of such large scale seminars, though the bonding value [...]
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