[ Español ]
For the 500+ million Spanish-speakers around the world, the Web is very small in terms of material to read: Only 5% of online content has been written so far in the language of Cervantes and Vargas Llosa. To promote the importance of content in Spanish for the Web, Google, Monografias.com, and various institutions (Universidad de Alcalá, Madrid Plataforma del Español, Instituto Cervantes, la Fundación Gabriel García Márquez para el Nuevo Periodismo Iberoamericano) have joined together again for the launch of the third edition of Concurso de Blogs en Español (Spanish Language Blogging Contest).
The jury, this year, is formed by writers Lorenzo Silva and Leila Guerrero, journalist Olga Lucía Lozano, and the Academic Director of the Cervantes Institute, Mr. Julio Martínez Mesanza.
For people willing to participate in this contest open to anyone, the participants must be 18 years or older and own a blog created before January 1st of this year. Each participating blog must be active during the contest for the three awards to be given. Among the categories: Best Blog to disseminate Hispanic culture, Best Young Blog (for people between ages of 18 and 26), and Best Blog for Teaching Spanish. If a blog meets the qualifications, it can be submitted via the contest’s web site (www.concursoblog.com); the online voting ends on June 1st. Also, bloggers who enter the contest will have a chance to win 3 e-books from Monografias.com.
Once the five finalists in each category have been selected by the jury, visitors to the web site will vote for their favorite blogs, from June 25th – 30th. The winners will receive a tablet, as well as a scholarship for a course, depending on the category they’re participating in. Over 450 people participated in last year’s contest. The deadline to submit blogs ends on June 1st, 2014.
A very interesting note from the press release may convince you to enter the contest:
The Internet has come to occupy a central place in our culture. With this initiative, we seek to inspire writers and content creators in Spanish to express themselves in the digital world, contributing to the promotion of our language and bringing their content to millions of Spanish-speaking Internet users.