Quote Originally Posted by Pravit
There are no strict rules for transliteration; Yevgeneya Belyakova is as good a transliteration as Yevgeniya Belyakova, Jevgenija Beljakova, Evgenia Beliakova, and so on. Given that most English-speakers pronounce "ey" as "ee", it works fine.

"I" in transliteration almost always represents long "e", and "e" short "e"(this is a rule in almost every transliteration of any language). This is so people won't be confused between the two types of "e." So if you see the name "Dmitri", don't pronounce it "Dmitrai."
Yes, but in translits to English, И going to E is very dodgey.
I think Robb got confused between the way he was taught that И "is pronounced like a long e, as in feet" and it's transliteration as I.
Remember И in Ukrainian and Belorussian is I.
But anyways, because in English pronunciation is so messed up, there will always be problems.

In other languages, i.e. Spanish, they can get close pronunciations due to there regular spelling. Also, as in Spanish vowels are accented to indicate stress, stress can be conveyed.

E.g. in Spanish, Ивaн would be written Ivan (Because due to Spanish stress rules, the stress would be on the A anyway).
But Владимир would be Vlad