It may be April 1 but the following story is serious :

As part of French attempts to challenge Google, and what President Chirac sees as the Anglo-Saxon dominance of the Internet, the French Government has ordered the Banque de France to acquire prime Web assets in a daring money-no-object operation. We can report that Syntagma Media is one of the first to fall.

Analysts on Wall Street and in the City of London have been astonished by the swiftness of the coup de grace. A figure of $48 million is being mentioned at Nasdaq, comfortably beating the sale price of Weblogs Inc to AOL last year.

Owner John Evans said at a hastily-arranged press conference: “Chirac has got a bargain. I was reluctant to sell under $50 million but they threw in a nice Camembert and a case of St Emilion.”

Asked if the President approached him personally, Evans said: “He phoned. I didn’t recognize him at first as he spoke perfect English. I thought it was Duncan Riley.”

We understand that other assets likely to be acquired by the Elysee Palace include, Robert Scoble’s chef, Gawker Media’s religious blogs, ICANN (thought be a Can Can website) and Google’s “holiday home” in Mountain View.

Fasten your seatbelts. We’re in for a bumpy ride.

Syntagma Media is seeking a personal finance blogger with specific knowledge of the U.S. market. The blogger will be able to write reasonably authoritative posts on this topic and avoid the usual spammy, keyword-overloaded fare commonly seen on finance sites.

The terms are 75 percent of gross site revenue to the blogger, plus, in the unlikely event the network is ever sold, 10 percent of the sale price of any sites which the blogger has single-authored for more than three months.

The site will be new, so the blogger will be building it from scratch. Email me at:

Quingdao, sailing for a home port win.

Syntagma Media’s 16th blog, Sailing Latest, goes live today with an up-to-the-minute report from the Clipper 05-06 Round the World Yacht Race.

The new site will cover news, boats and gear, and report from the world’s premier sailing grounds.

This is Syntagma Media’s first “sports” blog, and will not be the last.

Here’s a pick-’n-dip tour of some of the highlights of Syntagma Media’s blogs this week:

Royal Anecdotes: Prince Charles Saves the Day

Classy Classical: Enya, First Lady of Celtic New Age Vocal

London Stock Exchange Latest: LSE’s Clara Furse May Buy Swedish Exchange

Google Future: Google Deletes its Official Blog by Mistake

Spiritual Nirvana: Kahlil Gibran Week

Supernatural: Is This How Astrology Works?

Golden Agers: Employers Losing Out as Baby Boomers Retire

Vista Office: Was HP Behind Windows Vista Delay?

Take a look at some of the variety on our blogs. We’ll include a few more next week.