A Bugged Life: Journey Through the Years
Posted by Jayvee Fernandez at May 26th, 2011
Hello. My name is Jayvee Fernandez and I’ve been the sole proprietor of A Bugged Life for more than 5 years. Back then, the site was hosted on a free platform with this URL 20six.co.uk/abuggedlife. This post, thanks to the way back machine, is a look into all the past templates of my personal blog.
Click on the images for bigger versions.
The World is Just Awesome (Boom De Yada) done WWF Philippines style
Posted by Jayvee Fernandez at February 23rd, 2011Thanks to Joanne Ignacio of WWF Philippines for sending me the raw file on Facebook. Hamilo Coast in Nasugbu, Batangas is one of the areas heavily tended by WWF Philippines for conservation projects. I had joined the WWF team before for a giant clam seeding SCUBA run in December 2009 and a crown of thorns extraction / cleanup in Hamilo in May of last year. WWF Philippines is composed of a brilliant team of visionaries. . 
Add WWF Philippines on Facebook for several projects you may want to be involved in.
Original text from Facebook:
Chances are, you’ve already seen Discovery Channel’s “The World is Just Awesome” station ID – the one with the catchy “boom de yada” lyrics. Yes, this is the one where their hosts as well as people from different walks of life proclaim why they love the world. And, chances are, the song probably stuck around as your “Last Song Syndrome” for a couple of days.
This year, Discovery Channel is airing a different version of their popular “The World Is Just Awesome” station ID – WWF-Philippines style! Of course, our National Ambassadors Marc Nelson and Rovilson Fernandez and even staff from WWF and Hamilo got in on the action!
Thank you Discovery Channel Philippines and Hamilo Coast for helping us make this happen!
Off to Barcelona for Mobile World Congress 2011
Posted by Jayvee Fernandez at February 11th, 2011
Dear readers,
I leave tomorrow night for Barcelona, Spain to attend Mobile World Congress 2011. For the unfamiliar and non-geeks, let’s just say that if the fashion industry has Fashion Week, us nerds have Mobile World Congress (formerly known as GSM Conference).
In the same way that fashion week is a gathering of designers and brands to dictate what’s in and what’s not, MWC ’11 is a gathering of all the telcos and phone manufacturers around the world to unveil everything that will be launched in 2011. If it’s got a SIM card or a data plan, it’s in MWC.
Conferences and product launches in the morning, cocktails and parties in the evening. I’ll be covering the floor together with Andi Manzano of Magic 89.9. So apart from daily summaries which you can read here, I’ll also be Tweeting (follow @jayvee on Twitter) and updating Facebook from the floor. You can also view global updates using the hashtag #MWC2011
On Wednesday late afternoon (exact time to be confirmed) I will also be on live video via Flippish to do a mid-week wrap up of the events thus far. Since it will be live, feel free to join the Flippish chatroom so we can discuss the new products and services that are being unveiled.
Wish me luck! In my next post, I’m going to show you the gadgets I’m packing to cover the floor live.
And our second winner is…
Posted by Jayvee Fernandez at January 15th, 2011Happy weekend! OK so here we go — I LOLED at most of the entries till about 2:00AM and decided to call it a night before I did a last glance this morning. Great entries — especially the cheezy ones (paging entries of ‘Shiela’)!
Also, sayang ang entry ni Third — he has something going, but I felt it wasn’t witty enough (and perhaps too long). But good job pa rin!:
Search. Add. Confirm. Poke. Poke. Poke. They changed relationship status. Engaged. Married. Guy forgot to send gifts on Farmville. Single.
Anyway, this was fun guys! Time to announce the winner! Congratulations to TheGreatMorinda for her short but sweet entry:
They had a baby. They got married. They fell in love.
This is a good pambawi as TheGreatMorinda almost made it in the last contest and appears to have fans among the other contestants.
Congratulations to everyone who joined! Enjoy the payday weekend!
Philippines: Bongga Ka Dive! My idea on how to boost tourism
Posted by Jayvee Fernandez at November 19th, 2010EDIT: Because I believe in localization, the vernacular tagline is now PHILIPPINES: BONGGA KA DIVE!
As a diver, I am biased. Beyond the traditional way of viewing the Philippines as the “land of the smiles” and having some of the “best hospitality in the world” and “great beaches” one of the recreational activities that isn’t highlighted is the SCUBA diving. Sorry if I’ve been hankering about this for weeks but if there’s anything that the Philippines has that most countries don’t have — we have the best reefs in the world. We are a world class diving destination in the same way that the Galapagos, Palau, the Great Barrier and Indonesia are as well. But we aren’t just “one of those” other diving sites. The Philippines is situated at the center of the center of the Coral Triangle, one of the centers of biodiversity in the world. We’re world class. It’s all just beneath the surface.
This is an idea I’ve been bugging some dive friends for months and since the recent ruckus about the DOT campaign, I’d like to lend some expert advice on how to do the following:
1. Promote the Philippines as a world class diving site
2. Organically grow the diving community
3. Contribute to the knowledge of tracking and recording marine life for their preservation
Concept
What I’m essentially proposing is a community portal for divers, targeting first the local and tightly knit diving community. The site’s goal is to help divers be more informed about the surrounding flora and fauna underwater. It goes like this:
Divers can upload photos and videos of their trips. These are then tagged (in the same way we have Flickr tags) according to what they saw, when they saw it and where.
For instance, I can upload this photo:
and add the following tags:
Subject: Clown Fish Amphiprioninae Pomacentridae
Date and Time: November 15 at 3:00 PM (EXIF data can take care of this)
Dive Site: Secret Bay, Anilao
On a collective effort, photos that are uploaded (either locally or through mere links from Multiply, Flickr, IMGUR) can be sorted through tags, dive site and date and time. The result is a database of critter information which you can sort just by mere tags (I was thinking of applying this via Google Maps or Bing but I honestly think geo-tagging is too complex for us regular folks).
Here’s the best example — I always wondered if the whale shark that we saw in Pescador Island travels to other places (i.e. it’s said to have come from a site called Dolphin House which is also nearby). Looking through the crowd sourced photos and video from divers who frequent Pescador, you’ll eventually be able to track a pattern in the whale shark’s movements. This data can be useful for both recreational divers and for scientific study since marine biologists in the Philippines are very scarce given our enormous coast lines.
How does this help tourism? Seeing is believing. You now have a one stop shop for foreigners to go through to read user generated content from fellow divers. Pygmy seahorse locations? No problem. Is that whale shark the same one going around three dive sites? We’ll know. Coral bleaching and COTS sightings? We can track the degradation of the reefs because of the date and time tags. And the best part about this is that the divers don’t feel like it’s work. It’s practically fun. It’s all about how the data can be used by the WWF and the Marine Wildlife Watch. So there. We help tourism. We encourage more people to dive. We help the environment.
If I’m a foreigner and I want to dive the Philippines I can easily plot my trips and get tips from other divers on which resort has this certain house reef as well as get insider information on who they can hire as the best spotter for that flamboyant cuttlefish.
This isn’t a campaign. It’s a site that can be used to build campaigns. I don’t believe that we can promote tourism the traditional way. We need to get smarter when it comes to using the Internet to attract tourists. I’m not an expert in travel, but I do love the diving — and many other foreigners I dive with stay here for months to learn and to dive.
P.S. I know there is risk of me posting this idea out in the open. If you’re an angel and want to fund this project, I’ll build it. My email is jayvee[dot]fernandez[at]gmail[dot]com. What I’ve written here is merely one component of the site. I have figured out a monetization scheme as well to make it self sufficient to run forever. I’ve tried setting meetings with Mr. Bertie Lim and Mr. Romano way back but it seems that having a site “sponsored” can have its pitfalls (meeting never pushed through). So there. That’s one component on how to help tourism. I have more ideas. This is something I believe in and I want to build it. Anyone interested?
And now, a special message from the author of this blog
Posted by Jayvee Fernandez at November 18th, 2010Dear readers,
I’ve served as the resident blogger and proprietor of A Bugged Life for the past 5 years. Even longer if you count my original domain at http://20six.co.uk/abuggedlife (sadly I don’t have the password anymore). I thought long and hard to see how I could celebrate this milestone and decided that there are really two reasons why this blog has grown to what it is today. Note that I never intended A Bugged Life to be a site for tech news. It was originally intended as a repository of my articles before Mobile Philippines was revamped (those were the good ‘ol days). As I got into the blogging groove, 2007-2008 became the year of SEO so updating the blog almost daily and concentrating on keywords became tantamount. Also, sticking to your niche for Adsense purposes.
The blog changed in 2009 where I realized that I wasn’t happy “reporting.” In truth, the site was always more like a personal blog to me which is why I also do insert some of my geeky cravings (such as reverse vacuum coffee) and of course, diving in the Philippines.
For the holidays I wish to celebrate Christmas by giving away a lot of things. I love gadgets. So do my readers. In a way it pains me that none of the things I will be giving away go to me, but I guess that’s really what giving means — IT HURTS! Netbooks, Android phones, an Android Tablet, an iPhone … well the list goes on. These are all prizes worth winning and I wanted to make sure that every prize is highly coveted.
During the months of December to January I will be holding a gadget raffle. These are all high ticket items from IT companies that have helped me out in the past 5 years in blogging. I had hoped to do this once a week but realized that December is a hectic month so we will be splitting the raffle into two parts — one that starts next week towards the middle of December and another that resumes after the holidays. On a side note I think bloggers should learn to take control of their sites. By this I mean that things like contests and events should be executed with them taking the lead, and not just on the client’s end. I am so happy to have several companies supporting this effort and if it is successful I’ll probably do this regularly throughout 2011.
Next week we start with SMART Communications. They’re giving away a Samsung Galaxy Tab. Stay tuned
I’m in this month’s issue of Monday Magazine
Posted by Jayvee Fernandez at October 4th, 2010
I was asked to showcase my daily gadget haul for Monday Magazine. It’s a great mag run by great people including Conch, someone I used to work with during my days in Hinge Inquirer. Thanks to Mia DeVega for sending me the hires pegs. Click on the images to see the bigger versions.
Two big photos after the jump.
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Justice for Alexis and Nika: The September ’10 Issue
Posted by Jayvee Fernandez at August 27th, 2010
Text from an editorial note I made after sifting through our Afterburner section to upload online:
I remembered Eggy today after looking through the archives of our Afterburner section for the magazine. Unlike most, I was introduced to Alexis outside his career in film, as we went to the same college, he being a batch lower. We were friends. Later on in the following semesters, we got involved in a point of conflict, details of which I would rather not talk about — but it is suffice to say that these were, in his words to Erwin Romulo, “a little bit of weirdness.” We parted ways. Many years later, we were in touch thanks to the wonders of Facebook, but never got to speak in person. I was excited to hear from Erwin that Alexis would be working with UNO. That we’d both be working together. But alas, fate had other plans. Today I still read his work. It’s the next best thing to talking to him again. — Jayvee
——————
A note from the editor, Erwin Romulo (@erwinromulo)
I wish this issue didn’t have to exist.
It’s been a year since our good friends Alexis Tioseco and Nika Bohinc were murdered in their home. Up until now, there has been no movement on the case and none of us know why they were killed. All I know is that it wasn’t a robbery and that the authorities have not done a proper investigation. I should know. Along with the Tioseco family, I’ve met too many police officials, bureaucrats, investigators, lawyers, politicians, psychics, and inept people named Agnes to say otherwise.
Alexis, in particular, meant a lot to those of us here in UNO. He’d even sit in during our editorial meetings. (See picture.) He was very much a part of what this magazine was all about, why we all chose to take on the challenge of doing it. But our friendship with him went well beyond working together. At least for me, he was no less than a brother. And I’m lucky that I was able to tell him that I loved him before he died. I told it to him quite often actually and he never gave up on me even when I gave up on myself.
It’s also with heavy hearts that we mark the recent death of another friend, cinematographer Miguel Fabie III. Miguel wrote to me last year, shortly after Alexis died. The letter is excerpted below:
Dear Erwin—
I met [Alexis] after one of the first screenings of Batang West Side—he approached me, introduced himself, commended me, then slowly… in editing lingo—“dissolved to black.” That was my first feature film and though he sounded like he knew what he was talking about, I was taken aback by this young punk who seemed so sincere and passionate that my selective-memoried brain decided to keep him in its archives.
Anyway, in his case praise came across not as something to feed my ego but actually inspired me to better my craft. The same way Eddie Romero did on our first introduction when he commented about the same flick (Batang W.S.)—“Young man, either you’re extremely stupid and just plain lucky, or a genius”… To this day, I am trying to prove it’s not the former. The latter is something I believe is a DNA thing; you can’t work to be a genius, but you CAN work to be a better cinematographer/writer/musician/doctor ON YOUR OWN TERMS.
In [his famous letter], Alexis hoped that he and Nika would be together in/’till “the end.” Maybe they’re just beginning, but if this is the first step toward that direction or a major leap to the eternal we have yet to find out for ourselves in OUR own time, willingly or otherwise. Wake up call: get ready to be willing.
May we ALL rest in peace, in WHATEVER stage or phase in life.
Peace,
Miguel
I couldn’t agree with Miguel more though it’s tough for those of us they left behind.
In that Alexis-written piece reprinted in this issue in its definitive form, he says that “There’s a line in Aguila where a Moro secessionist is told his cause is lost. He replies that winning doesn’t matter, it’s doing what one feels one should do. That’s wisdom for you.”
With this issue we mourn, we mark, we reminisce, we remind. Let not another year pass before justice is done. We fight, not just against forgetfulness and the apathy that follows, but because it is what we feel we should do.
Here’s to Alexis, Nika and Miguel. And, yes, we’ll keep on going no matter what. ‘Till we hopefully meet again.
Erwin Romulo
Editor-in-Chief
Original sources are here and here.
—
Rhian Ramos is the current endorser of NUVO City.
Annicka Dolonius
Posted by Jayvee Fernandez at May 6th, 2010
My generation is jaded with politics. And how can we not be jaded? I grew up in the Philippines of the ‘80s. We are the That’s Entertainment generation. We are the poster children for the jaded. We grew up against the backdrop of the Aquino assassination, the snap elections, the Mendiola massacre, the power outages, the Metro Manila Film Fest fiasco, and the showbiz career of Kris Aquino. We’ve survived an earthquake, the Mt. Pinatubo volcanic eruption, waist-deep floods, dengue outbreaks, three days of darkness, bird flu, and the showbiz career of Kris Aquino. Somedays, I feel like we’re trapped in a poorly written sitcom that is starring bad actors with poor makeup, in a show that is in a perpetual state of re-runs—with Kris Aquino. [A Note from the Editor]
DiscOVIries Week 3 Contest: Display Your Gadgets
Posted by Jayvee Fernandez at October 12th, 2009
The photo above illustrates 75% of all the gadgets under my custody. I own 50% of that. Inside the boxes and crates are more gadgets, chargers, cables, and over 10 lenses for my SLR. Not seen in the photo are my podcasting equipment (mic, desktop and boom stands), 2 portable drives, ACER desktop, two MacBooks, all in one printer, Quad Core rig, my dive gear, my Randall amplifier, and extra LCD monitor.
I run a tech blog with a pinch of travel and food here and there. Before blogging, I was a tech journalist and have, in sum, reviewed hundreds of gadgets. Several dozens of reviews and 7 years later I’m still doing what I love to do. I’ve written 60 issues worth of tech-related articles and overflowed the rest into 2,500 blog posts across various sites.
I salute the more established tech journalists who have done so much more!
THEME: Display Your Gadgets
Show me yours and I’ll show you mine! The photo above is an example. Take a shot of all your gadgets and tell me your story. For such an impersonal piece of amalgamated plastic and aluminum, there is always a good human interest story somewhere there. That’s what I want you to narrate.
P.S. You know, the term “gadgets” isn’t limited to tech. If you’re a beauty blogger, show us your loot! If you’re a travel blogger, show us your gear. Show off your passion!
My favorite gadget thus far was a freebie from a press conference. It’s what I use to communicate with Art Samaniego. Clue: it’s not the mic.
The contest rules can be found here. This will run from today till Sunday 11:59 PM.
Have fun!
———–
I’d like to announce the winner of my contest for the second week. The winner is Hannah Villasis of FlairCandy.com. She wins a P2,000.00 GC from Ayala Malls and a chance to win a Nokia phone at the end of the contest period!
Sorry Carl I know you uploaded a ton of photos during the latter part of the week, but oh well. Better luck next time! 
The #1 Reason Why I Like Google’s New Search
Posted by Jayvee Fernandez at August 12th, 2009
Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you would have noticed that Google is road testing a new version of their search engine. Not only is it faster, the results are also different. Should be interesting to see how this unfolds in the next few months.
But going back, the cheap-ass reason why I like this new search is because finally, my complete name pops up first in the suggestions for autocomplete when you type the word “jayvee.” Before, it would always lead to the Jayvee Dance Performance Arts Theater at jayveedance.net (BAH!)
Try out the new search in preview and share your stories.
