Jose Guardia was long known in the blogosphere as Franco Alemán, the author of Barcepundit which has both English and Spanish editions. With this bio, he officially reveals his true identity. Jose has been named Western European Editor of the Pajamas Media portal, to be unveiled November 16.

Sought after for his knowledge of new media

I am a native of Barcelona, an inspiring city I really enjoy. I have a law degree from the University of Barcelona — with a couple business courses during and after it — but jumped into business management. I can say I haven’t really worked as an attorney for a single day. I have been involved for almost 15 years with technology and new media, whether as an executive or a consultant.

For the last few years, I have been published or quoted in publications such as the late Industry Standard, Wired, Baquia (which is a technology business online publication in Spain) El Periódico (Barcelona’s biggest daily), and Telenoticies.com, the web service of Catalan regional TV and radio, where I published an article about Kerry’s campaign. And then there’s my two blogs.

An uncommon point of view

As for so many people, there was a precise moment that really shook my worldview. It was early afternoon in Barcelona and the second plane had just crashed into the WTC. I was glued to the screen and the Internet for the next 72 hours, getting no sleep, trying to digest everything. I couldn’t. It was then when I, someone not too deeply interested in politics, definitely became a news junkie and discovered the real power of the blogosphere.

I had already been reading a couple of blogs, mainly Instapundit and the links from there, but hadn’t realized how important their role was. Little did I know that it would be nothing compared to what was going to happen since then. There were so many points of view that were totally absent from the political arena here in Spain. As a consequence, I have drifted much more towards libertarianism, albeit with some mixed conservative and liberal traits in some points; I’m a rare animal.

Which put me more and more at odds with what I was reading and watching in Spain. I would yell at the TV set when seeing the newscasts, which I know is nothing particularly unique. It was when the guy on TV started shouting back at me that I realized I had to do something or I’d go nuts! The angle the media chooses to report has consequences, because people can only build fully informed opinions and then make fully informed decisions when they get two sides of the issues. This one-sided coverage helps to explain, for example, the overwhelming anti-war sentiment in Spain, and at least partially explains Zapatero’s surprise victory in the polls right after March 11.

Last year I launched my English edition. I was quickly linked by big shots like Roger, Glenn, Tim, Norm and Cori (I’ll stop there, otherwise this will sound like the Oscars ceremony). One of my posts was the topic of a full piece by Frank Gaffney over at NRO.

On our direction

As for Pajamas Media I think it’s fabulous that there’s an initiative run by people who know what they’re talking about, because they’re successful bloggers, to enhance the intelligence aggregation which is probably the blogosphere’s most distinctive trait.

It will bring more visibility to what really great bloggers have to say, and if at the same time there’s an income incentive for the affiliated bloggers, well, in Spain we’d say that’s “honey on cornflakes” (we’d say “miel sobre hojuelas”, but you get the point). Personally speaking, it’s not an exaggeration to say how excited I am to be joining the project. I feel like Pau Gasol heading for the NBA; only that Pau is bit taller than me!