Who doesn’t know yet – last week I was invited to Ministry of Economic Affairs to pitch my blog in front of small audience and the honorable jury.  I showed the promotional video that I prepared for Stanford University audience in summer 2009. I have to admit the video looks a bit funny, because I am saying there that I do not need Facebook and Twitter. That is not true of course.

I explained the jury that for me TestMarket.eu is a one-man-band. And if I would stand by and look at this project, I would consider myself very stupid, yet self-confident. The bottom line is that I consider having a lot ( and I mean A LOT) to learn in this area of tech blogging, but I am still going ahead with the blog bull-headedly.

What am I missing the most? That Estonian startups would be even more active in letting me know about their plans and ambitions. That one day I would find partners in this project that would share the „light and fun“ burden of covering the Estonian tech scene in English. That this blog would have more win-win partnerships with people and institutions that share the same goal.

That I would have more time to look at TestMarket.eu from the business point of view and start testing crazy ideas. It is incredible how many interesting plans I have. Some of them will be realized very soon.

As I told the jury – it is all too much fun and that’s the core. But – believe it or not – if some people think monetizing a blog in Estonia is not possible, then my case proves the opposite.

What else makes it fun? That I receive surprising feedback from all over the world. From Lebanon and Dominican Rebublic, for example, where people ask me if Estonian technology sector has any medical supplies to sell. Or from China, where Mr Chang wonders how much does the Estonian jammer cost and how it works. I wrote a post on a company developing jammers two years ago.

So the jury gathered for 30 minutes and announced me as the winner. I received a small testimonial and will be given „a little something else“ during the grand season-opening business gala, organised by Enterprise Estonia and The Chamber of Commerce in September 7 at the Estonian Concert Hall. Additionally I am going to proudly represent our small nation in „European Enterprise Awards 2010“ final next spring in Budapest.

Anyway, stay tuned for more stories on Estonian startups. Coming this week: Vecly and Baltic Digital Archive. I will be in Garage48 event this weekend with my eyes open. Also in pipeline: lost and forgotten Estonian startups. How to cover a startup failure? Estonia – a hub for global cyber terrorists?

a) Resume blogging on Estonian tech sector in English. My so called identity quest is over. You have probably noticed the name change. TigerPrises.com is now TestMarket.eu, which is more meaningful I’d say.

Another change aside from the visual one is that I will start writing on both, good news as well as bad ones. As I promised in TestMarket’s new Facebook fanpage, a piece on failure of United Dogs and Cats is coming, for example. Some other hurray-type of VC investments have sadly fizzled lately, with many lessons learned. Current times are lot more exciting than those of 2-3 years ago, that’s for sure.

b) I will also start publishing monthly 4-, 5-, or 6-packs of the new Estonian startups I have discovered. A bunch of new gamers each month. First pack already today!

Three more things I’d like to point out:

- I am not a native English speaker, so sorry about my language use.

- Some people ask why am I writing in English anyway. Because it is more fun and the potential readership is much bigger. Will do my best to serve this community with news from Estonian tech sector.

- If you are in Estonia and have a start-up I have not yet covered, let me know: toivo@ekspress.ee

Toivo Tänavsuu
The Editor

What could you expect to read from this blog very soon? Stories and more stories on Estonian start-ups, VCs and other. For example, stay tuned for an interview with Ambient Sound Investments, story about Erply, multi-angle coverage on Estonian preparations to join European Space Agency (in cooperation with Invent Baltics), stories about ”undiscovered” Estonian technology & IT start-ups (in cooperation with Enterprise Estonia) and other great stuff.

It all comes to you from this Monday, March 29th. Some of the stories are in Estonian, others in English. There’s a reason for this bilinguality.

Oh, and by the way, if anyone’s interested to contribute to the mission of this blog, just let me know. 

Here’s how TigerPrises.com looked like 2 months ago:

 And here’s how it looked like in the beginning (from summer 2008 until spring 2009):