The worst part of your Internet based business is when the Internet connection refuses to cooperate. And it is a little sad too especially when the site that always cooperates and loads is … Friendster!
And when the sites I do need up do decide to go up, GMail decides to take a breather.
It’s back to the Ice Age for me!
Joey Alarilla wrote a piece about the “Filipino and the Blogosphere” in his regular column at CNET Asia.
According to Duncan Riley, “Some of the worlds best as yet undiscovered bloggers reside in the Philippines.”
What then makes the Filipino Blogger Competitive in this International Industry? I have cited a few items here:
Good Command of Written and Spoken English
The Philippines has two national languages – the local Filipino and English. There are many other dialects spread throughout the islands but English has always been the “modern” language which Filipinos “spake” ever since the American occupation. The medium of instruction at schools is English and there has been, for some reason, a strict compliance to good grammar and language.
EDIT: I guess when I wrote about a strict compliance to English, I was referring more to a generation before the GenTXT craze. I remember back in grade school and high school we went through rigorous classes in grammar, penmanship, English and Filipino literature as well as composition classes. But maybe this was an isolated case since the schools I went to were very strong in the Humanities (we took 4 years of Latin) but a little poor on the Math and Sciences.
Affinity to Technology
The Philippines is the “SMS Capital of the World.” Probably next to Japan in terms of the cellphone craze, we are years ahead of the west when it comes to technology services. Several foreign companies set camp in the Philippines and hire them as programmers, network administrators and operations managers. The technology scene in the Philippines is quickly becoming a mainstream item as most Filipinos always want a new phone or computer every four months.
Good Compensation
Filipinos who start to work with blog networks are motivated to perform because of the cheaper cost of living here. As Darren Rowse once told me in a quick chat, your US dollar goes a long way when you’re in the Philippines.
Care to add / affirm / challenge these insights?
The best moments I spent with the crew of HIP was spent behind the scenes. Yeah, behind the magazines are tons and tons of model photo shoots (both babes and gadgets – two things that geeks lust for), a lot of food and a lot of late nights.
You can bookmark this page which contains all the Youtube director videos of HIP including behind the scenes footage of our babe photoshoots.
Again, the address is http://youtube.com/hingeinquirer.
Literally actually! I’ve been shooting at Medium to Large format lately with my 350D. And it has come to the point where I’m losing hard disk space.
I’m in the market for an external drive in the 100GB++ range. Right now I’m thinking of a LaCie brand external HD mainly because it sounds cool and also because I seem to have a bad affinity with Seagate throughout my geeky years – they always break down.
For the budget, I am also considering a generic desktop HD with an external casing. The drawback is that it doesn’t look as cool.
I will be filling the drive mostly with all my media – songs, pictures, movies — all of these are really cool (the best of Kenny Loggins — what could be cooler that that??? :P) so the drive must look cool too!
As I begin to write this post I am finding it very hard to think of a title – and dear reader, whilst you read the finished post, know that I have been thinking of the perfect way to end the year with my last post since November last month.
Back to headline writing. It is evidence of similar problems I had back in grade 6 where I had trouble thinking of the perfect post title. I learned a technique which I picked up from reading too much Neil Gaiman, which would be to say it plain and simple and let the words flow from your pen keyboard. So hence my title, plain and simple.
There are many people I should thank for such a wonderful 2006. A toast to the following people:
To Poch, Adel, Eva, Jaja, Mitch and the rest of the quirky editorial team at HIP for helping me find my “happy feet heart song”
To JV, Joey, Erwin and my other friends from the INQ7 team (now Inquirer.net)
To fellow tech journalists, writers, PR folk, marketing and product managers including Joey Server, Ed Geronia, San San de Leon, Agnes Espino, Sheila Rada, Jane Chua, Jed Quiambao, Miles Montecillo, Kit Arines, Sherlyn Co, Denise Haak and the other Ogilvy girls – for being with me in the countless press cons and media events!
To Cathy, Jenny and Sorsi – the Globe Innove “Blogger’s Angels”
To Kiven for taking over the helm of my former position.
To my other blogger friends too many to mention and to the other colleagues I have failed to mention because of my passing into the old age of “late twenties.” 🙂
As I end 2006, I look forward to my “new” work that has everything and anything to do with blogging. Starting January 1 2007 I take over the position of Technology Channel Editor for b5media Inc. A big thank you to the guys at b5media – to Duncan Riley who got me into this in the first place, and to Jeremy, who trusted me with this stuff.
Though this won’t take up my 9-5 I intend to use the free time to pursue other things that have to do with – and also nothing at all with the publishing industry.
Here’s to a bright and optimistic 2007!