Today my Wordpress plugin, Daily Top 10 Posts, won during the 2008 Philippine Blog Awards for best blog plugin/extension. Initially I was glad to hear that I made it as one of the finalists, as did Ria and Winston, who got multiple noms for their nicely written blogs. But ultimately it was meaningful for us because we are very good friends who all hail from Davao City and in a sense we are representing the often overlooked Mindanao region. In total we received seven nominations, which was awesome. We won two. Winston bagged the coveted Bloggers Choice Award and a Nokia N95 to boot.
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After much careful perusal of the Internet, here are my nominees for Janette Toral’s Top Ten Emerging Influential Blogs of 2008:

You Got Tech - The tech blog for non-techies.

Bloggers Da Who - The blind item blog that I hope I’ll never be featured on.

Rarely Ordered - Food blog about overlooked menu items. Very interesting concept by a group of startup bloggers.

Fritzified - Because he’s Fritz.

Manila Foodistas - Great pictures and impeccable writing about food. A must-read.

Pass the Sauce - Phoebe talks about food and her experiences as a culinary student.

Chefie’s World - Ok, another one about food. This time by acclaimed Chef Junjun de Guzman. Learn from his cooking adventures here and abroad.

Work With Ria - The blog of my cousin Ria, jill of all trades.

Migs Mobile - My good friend Migs Hipolito’s blog on everything mobile.

Digital Puto - Winston Almendras’ photo blog. Pretty good shots but pale in comparison to mine. Haha.

EDIT: I didn’t notice I listed eleven blogs. I will sacrifice my photo blog then. -_-

Davao Photo - My photo blog.

iBlog4 was a huge success, but I have to admit that 90% of the time I wasn’t paying attention to the speakers. For me, it was a success because bloggers got to meet bloggers they’ve never met before. Ok, me being the blind antisocial one, I only met a few for the first time, such as Shari, Jerome, Markku, Fritz, Ade, Benj … my memory is failing me. It was nice to see AJ, Noemi, Aileen, Jay, Miguel and Juned around too. I expected to see Jehz there, but apparently his dictator of a girlfriend dragged him to Pangasinan for a scientific expedition. iBlog4 wouldn’t be complete if it weren’t for the company of my Davao friends Migs, Winston, Blogie and cousin Ria, who I might add, brought Malcolm Hall down with her entertaining talk. Yeah, Mindanao bloggers rule! ;p Kudos to Janette for a job well done.
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Here goes another survey! This one is a bit longer than my past surveys. Hope you could spare a few minutes to help me out.

I’d like to know what your Internet usage habits are. Are you emailing most of the time? Stalking people on Friendster? Chatting till the wee hours? Playing Dota? Yeah, I wanna know!

1. Please break down your habits by percentage. (ex. email 50%, Friendster 10%, chat 20%, reading blogs/sites 10%, downloading 5%, online gaming 5%)

2. Out of all your Internet activities above, name the one that you cannot live without.

3. For you, what is the hottest Internet trend nowadays?

4. If there is one thing that has not been done on the Internet that you would like to see, what would it be?

5. Do you consider yourself Internet savvy? What qualities would make a person deserving of that adjective?

To participate in the survey, please place your answers in the comments section. Thanks for your time! I’ll publish the results soon.

Noticed a big, big drop in my Feedburner stats once again. My number of reported subscribers has been slashed by more than half, and I noticed big movements in the Ratified.org rankings due to this (I dropped 7 notches). I checked my Feedburner account to confirm my suspicions. Indeed, Google Feedfetcher wasn’t included in my subscriber report, just like 4 days ago. What’s going on Google?

Once again, I’d like to thank everyone who helped make our Mindanao Bloggers Summit last October 27, 2007 a success! This success sparked an unprecedented interest in blogging and blogging-related activities in Mindanao. To keep the momentum, the Usual Suspects has a lot of cool stuff planned out for the not-so-distant future.

I’d like to invite all bloggers from the Philippines and around the world to join our “You Got Blogged” contest. Get a chance to win up to $150 just for reviewing a Mindanao blog! For more details, visit this page.
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Play MMORPG’s much?

If you’re perpetually in front of your computer, consider taking short 15-minute breaks every few hours. I’m not a doctor, but it’s sound advice. You save yourself from unnecessary health problems such as stress, eyestrain, poor posture, headaches, not to mention poor social skills. Like the saying goes, too much of something can be bad for you.
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As my entry for Janette Toral’s Filipina Writing Contest, I’d like to put the spotlight on a few Filipina bloggers that I enjoy reading.

First and foremost, and not just because she’s a friend, I make it a point to visit Aileen Apolo’s blog every chance that I can. Aileen can talk about the most mundane things in life but still manages to be profound and entertaining. I love it when she talks about the stuff that make us uniquely Filipino. Warm, fuzzy feeling indeed!
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Voting for Paolo Mendoza’s Pinoy Evil Blog Awards has begun! This awards is the best thing that happened to our blogosphere before Malu Fernandez ate her way into the limelight, albeit to the dismay of our heroic OFW’s.

My blogger friend Winston Almendras of Batang Yagit informed me about the Pinoy Evil Blog Awards and rightly so because I nominated him for the Boy Bastos Writing Award category. I am officially the campaign manager for Winston to nab this award. Please vote for him!!

I’m one of Winston’s biggest fans. He’s a good kid with a big heart and extraordinary talent. Now, let’s all show him our support by voting for him as the next Boy Bastos. Incidentally, I also nominated my homeboy Jehz Laurente for the Evil Blog of the Year Award, but was disqualified because he’s one of the twin geniuses behind the whole thing. Shame.

The poll for the Boy Bastos Writing Award is here. Winston’s blog is Batang Yagit. Registration is required before you can vote.

VOTE NOW!!

The biggest blogging party is all set for tomorrow, August 23. Nameplates are being printed, but it’s not too late to register. Kudos to Aileen Apolo.

Jayvee’s Blog and Soul movement launched yesterday at the Manila Pavillion, with a pile of cookies to boot. Mrs. Fields sponsored this event to do their own launching of the Mrs. Fields Cafe in UN Avenue. Now, they just put my two most favorite things in one place: coffee and cookies! Not too thrilled about it being on UN Avenue though.

Noemi meets with Alan Ocab, the kid blogger’s dad. They patch things up and learn they’re both Cebuanos. If I might have hurt father and son, apologies are in order. Sorry Carl. The beauty of freedom of speech is you can blog about anything you want, but be prepared for the worst. I’m not part of a mafia nor trying to shove my “ethics” up anyone’s noses. No, you got it all wrong. Filipinos have creative imaginations though.

Malu Fernandez and Jayvee Fernandez are not related. Of all scandals that got the local blogosphere fired up, Malu takes the cake. She ate it, and it shows. Happily, Jayvee moves on.

Win a date with Ria Jose! Applications ongoing.

Ratified.org now ranking Australian blogs. Thanks to Meg for the plug.

There are now more than a hundred blogs listed in the Mindanao Blog Directory. I bet there are hundreds if not thousands more we’re not aware of. Bloggers on Livejournal, Multiply and Tabulas should seriously speak up and make themselves known.

Know more about the Mindanao Blog Awards 2007. It aims to give recognition to the finest of weblogs of, in, or about Mindanao. I designed the logo, btw.

I found out I’m not that addicted to blogging after taking this nifty quiz. I’ve seen much higher scores from Abe or Jayvee or Aileen.

58%How Addicted to Blogging Are You?

58% is pathetic! Tsk. Read Full Entry

Many people hate my guts, I know. But my last post on link trains was done in good faith. I did not mean to hurt anyone in the process. I read from Abe’s blog that John “Googlebomb” Chow was banned from Google. Even if you search for his name, his blog won’t show up. That’s right.. it won’t.
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For a couple of years now I’ve been looking around for talented people here in Davao who have the potential to make an impact in the blogging world. Not necessarily to make big money, but to have a medium where they can have a big voice. So far, I’ve invited three people, one girl and two guys. Sadly, the girl is the only one who remains dedicated to her blog. That’s Kim Castillo, the author of the rockin’ Southisms blog. Anyway, I’ve gotten another girl on board recently, but right now we’re still working on her blog so I can’t reveal the site just yet. There’s another girl I’m trying desperately to convince since last year. But there’s a problem — the domain she wanted is already taken.
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With all the controversies being hurled left and right about the recently held Philippine Blog Awards 2007, the Pinoy blogosphere had just become a hundred times more interesting than it was before. One particular raging issue being discussed is whether blogging is a privilege or a right. Let me say this. Blogging is a way of expressing freedom of speech. We are all born to express whatever it is that’s on our minds. I have that right, and I chose blogging. Abe Olandres puts it quite clearly:

Yes, blogging is a privilege. It is not for everybody. It is only for those who have internet access. It is only for those who have enough time on their hands. It is only for those who have something to write or say.

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The Davao Blog Party was a big, big success!

The day started with a little “executive” meeting with head organizer Blogie Robillo, cousin-blogger Angel Abella, Jun Macarambon and special guests Janette Toral and Aileen Apolo. Aileen did a presentation on Google Apps and Janette talked about her Digital Filipino club, which I am going to join very soon.

Janette Toral (left) and Aileen Apolo.
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