I did enjoy blogging however, as I’ve learned along the way, a lot of insecurities bugged me. The ghosts of my past—from thoughts of not being able to express myself properly, misguided outline to glitches in grammars. I persevered somehow but writing became sporadic until last year.

I had a good reason to blog less because I was writing more. In case you’re confused, I am trying to finish my long overdue thesis. To give you a preview of how near I am to finishing, visit this blog (cue in sound of crickets in the night).

Despite the discouragements, heartaches and close to manic episodes, I am still positive that I will still be able finish writing. I have attended a lot of seminars on writing and recently joined a writer’s support group. Now, I just have to be consistent in writing. If you’re writing almost the same topic over and over, it seems like an endless interrogation that you agree to every suggestion that anyone gives. It feels like people are poking arguments at me that I did it wrong, you’ve got to do this again and, as I am a “friendly” writer, I give in to almost every suggestion thrown at me. So, I suppose you can imagine what I had to go through just squeezing in all those ideas that sometimes didn’t fit.

In the end, I blame myself for putting myself in this quagmire. But on second thought, I might be too harsh. If I think hard, I do still enjoy research especially if I go back to the reason I let myself into this. The feeling was similar to what I had when I started to study DevCom at a state university back home. I had a noble goal, i.e., the grassroots stakeholders in the Greater Mekong Subregion stand to benefit from my study.

OK, I’m aware that I am already off track. So going back to the topic, yes, it’s been five years since I first blogged. I moved to wordpress on August 2006. I’ve lost a lot of online friends along the way because of my intermittent blogging although Massa P. and Doc Jun are some of my most loyal online friends I’ve ever had. Five years on I’m still enjoying blogging albeit at another platform—microblogging on Plurk and Twitter. I have made some good online friends but missing my good old ones (misteryosa, Ezraulo, Spilling my own thunder and Milking the cash cow among others).

Now cheers to another five years. I leave you with a music video, the message of the song might not be related to my topic but I just love the song and it might probably fit still… Blogbastic is five years!

When the buzz about a bloggers association in the Philippines came alive, I decided to just watch the exchanges. After all, I was on blogging “hiatus” anyway and I am really not familiar with all the issues presented. What I know is that the call for a blogging association was reignited when a mainstream journo/columnist revealed that a public relations firm in Manila has a blogger in its roster. The blogger allegedly threatened a restaurant owner of giving it a bad review unless they give in to his/her demand. This incident, as they say, opened a can of worms and gave Pinoy blogging a bad name.

As Ms. Janette explained the vision to have a bloggers association in the Philippines was discussed about two years ago. Who wouldn’t support the idea? There were already groups of bloggers nationwide who formed their local associations anyway. And as pointed out by other bloggers, these bloggers associations are very active that some have regularly sponsored Word Camps and bloggers’ training in their localities or Region. While some associations or informal group persisted some group died naturally. However, I reckon that the purpose of forming a bloc persisted, i.e., promote blogging and support one another technically among others.

Some bloggers had merits in their decision not to join this initiative while others have taken a (very) personal reason not join, which I really pity. I think I have nothing more to add to the issue. If you want to read more, following are some links to some good reads about it as suggested by Jayvee:

• Janette Toral
• Aileen Apolo: Blogging is a mass of niches
• Jonas de los Reyes asks Yahoo! Answers
• Regnard Raquedan suggests to make it a professional association
• Mommy Bloggers Club
• Viloria.net and this one too
• Caronongan.net
• Mayabanana
• Blogie’s take
• Juned Sonido’s thoughts
• Atheista
• BlogWatch’s Take

I am not aware of any bloggers association here in Australia but I am aware that there was a bloggers’ conference held recently. This is different from the Word Camp of WordPress. My point here is they did not need an association to organise a big event. They were united by the blogosphere. However, the case of the “big bad blogger” should be treated as a red flag for every Pinoy blogger anywhere in the world. We know that one person or group can manipulate laws, regulations, policies or guidelines in the Philippines. So, the idea of a National Bloggers Association might be a good one. I think we need it to protect ourselves and help one if one needs it.

I do question, however, how the “manifesto” was circulated secretly and this does not sit well really to most bloggers, I reckon. While Tonyo explained the move behind this, I think this inadvertently showed that blogging used to be a class A-B activity and the move to ‘circulate’ the manifesto to a ‘chosen few’ implied that those at the C, D or E might muddle the thing. Despite this however, I strongly believe that it is in the best interest of everybody, whether you’re against it or not, to get the ball rolling. As I have pointed out earlier, unless we can trust our lawmakers and/or we are certain that there are laws that can adequately protect bloggers, then certainly we do not need any association that will promote and protect our rights as Pinoy bloggers.

If you agree with me, I believe it is time that you sign up  now. I just did.

As you’ve learned in my earlier post, my father almost fell as a scam victim. I reckon he came close to being one again this time.

He found a website online advertising about paid volunteer opportunities.  As with other charitable institutions, they sometime ask for some fees to enter just to cover administrative matters. They are a charity anyway. However, what made me suspicious, after my father asked me to confirm the legitimacy of this organisation is the inconsistencies in the website. I might leave the more rigid examination to you but following are some of the things I initially observed:

• Some wrong spellings noted in the website.
• Googled the CEOs name and it doesn’t appear anywhere. It’s a bit odd for an “international charity organisation” boasting of spending more than US$12 million on charitable activities??
• The address points to an apartment unit in Victoria, which I reckon is not authorised to house any business but is only authorised for for residential purposes
• The telephone number seems bogus.

The last thing that cemented my suspicion was when I searched the organisation in the list of charitable institutions here in Australia via the ABN lookup website. The organisation doesn’t exist.

So, off to to the Scamwatch I go to report.

UPDATE: I have found this credible thread in this forum online. I hope these Filipinos seek the help of the nearest embassy or consulate to be able to return to Manila. Unfortunately, justice is quite hard to find in the Philippines especially if you are a victim of international scammers.

I immediately explained to my dad the situation. He couldn’t believe what he’s hearing and was adamant that he’s being scammed. He was really convinced that it was legitimate despite my explanation—a more legitimate source since I’m already employed by that organisation. He just retired and he said that he would like to join the workforce again as times are really tough in the Philippines. After some prodding, he finally gave in and did not pursue the application or deposit around US$2,000 in training fee to a Chinese bank account.

It took him a while to talk to me again.

Fast forward to today. I recently advertised my car for sale on a number of online networks, i.e., Facebook, Perth gumtree and other local ad media. The one from Quokka gave me some attention. At first, I wasn’t able to reply to the inquiries as the emails from Quokka got caught in my spam folder (I should have heeded this as an omen!). So, when I found the seven inquiries, I immediately emailed them and told them my asking price.

They all replied and I chose to pursue the transaction with the highest bidder. Scott Bonnie told me that he was out of the country and will have somebody pick-up the car from me. It was my first time to sell online so I thought this was the norm. He also asked me to open up a Paypal account. I do not have a Paypal account as I do not have the need at the moment. I guess this was the time to open one, so I opened an account. I sent Scott the payment request and I promptly received an email from Paypal. Here’s the email:

(click on the image for a larger look)

What do you notice?

If you look closely, you will notice the email sender was from accountant.com, which is a parked website. Also, the sum of the price and shipping cost doesn’t add up.

Here’s the second email that I received purportedly from Paypal.

And then I receive an email from Scott Bonnie (an email that I really wanted to edit!) telling me that he has sent the money. He explained that he sent an additional $5000 for the shipping cost, $2,200 of which needed to be sent via Western Union. Ka-ching! You’re busted.

I stopped communicating with him and forwarded the emails to Paypal security and the Australian Scam Watch.

Some lessons learned, scammers are the best risk communicators on the earth. They have talked me to opening a Paypal account “for my safety” and they even cited safety as the reason for asking me to advance part of the shipping cost before they can credit the whole money to my Paypal account. Remember to check the source of your emails, check your the website address of the site you are visiting to ensure that it is legit.

Now as the authorities say, if it’s too good to be true, IT IS too good to be true.

Filipinos overseas have trooped Philippine embassies worldwide to cast their votes. There were reported glitches in some areas however the overseas voting went well smoothly, generally.

As an overseas Filipino, I participated in the absentee voting through post. I received the official ballot early March. Some of my friends decided to post it right away while mine gathered dust as I contemplated on this hard decision (yet again) to vote for the person/s who, I think, will be good for my country.

If taking a multiple choice exam, which only has about 4 choices the most, is hard enough, try choosing from almost 10 candidates of presidential candidates. Add to this we have to choose 12 senators from about 61 candidates and choose one out of the 187 sectoral parties. While some might just choose their candidates based on convenience, that is, who is the most popular or trust what their mates say about this certain candidate or just give everything to lady luck, well I tried, as much as I can, to research more about the candidates and the party list. I reckon some Filipinos in the past have made their decision out of convenience and not out of an informed choice.

As most paid surveys showed, there were some candidates who easily appealed to me, at least in name recall, that is–Noynoy Aquino, Manny Villar and Erap Estrada. As the news coverage about the potential candidates dragged on, names of other aspirants knocked on recall zone–Gibo Teodoro and Dick Gordon. Then there’s the pervasive Eddie Villanueva and first time (but not nuisance, according to the COMELEC) candidates Vetallano Acosta (who was later disqualified), Nicanor Perlas, JC De Los Reyes and Jamby Madrigal.

My initial shortlist: Teodoro and Aquino. The former appealed to me because of his performance in the forums hosted by a number of organisations while Aquino appealed primarily because of the possibility of change. While Teodoro might have acted ala Obama in terms of presenting himself and even coming up with a sensible platform, it seems that his cousin is also gunning for the Obama strategy playing the change rhetoric.

Generally, all of the presidential candidates have learned a thing or two from the Obama election strategy. Some of them claimed to use grassroots volunteers while others claimed of using new media to reach more people.

Now let me give you a quick overview as to how I came to my decision to pick MY candidates.

I initially thought that I will be deciding for the top two posts the last however it proved that the convenience of inspecting their background and platform online was easier than I first thought that I was able to arrive at a decision even before the official OAV started.

As if catching up with the automated system of the election, most of the candidates had their platform and other information posted online. It made comparison among the candidates more easy and intensive.

After a lot of contemplation, research and prayers, I have decided to vote for Eddie Villanueva. It might be late to explain at this stage but for most of us, our respective candidates is the best for the country. To put simply, most candidates have promised good things and have a track record (whether good or bad) to boast of. Most of the candidates have presented mostly a wide-ranging platform which their respective supporters deem is best for them. Past presidents had them and they, if they did, tried to deliver. We had an economist as a president yet the economy barely survived the global financial crisis and the standard of living in the Philippines never really improved. I believe that Mr. Villanueva is perfect for the post not because he believes that he is the one but because of his proven sincerity. His spirituality also influenced me, while for others this might not be a prerequisite for the presidency however for me this meant a lot as to how my candidate will decide for his country–not that he will go to a crystal ball to consult but I’m rest assured that it will be decided upon with conviction and with the people’s welfare in mind.

As we all know, Aquino overwhelmingly triumphed while my candidate did a fair showing during the election. The turnout for the OAV was low but still was a success, I reckon. Whether it is an indication of how Filipinos abroad feels but there were some surprises in the OAV results. The election will be concluded and Filipinos will have a president, my apparent president-elect, Benigno Aquino III. I hope everyone moves on and work hand in hand as we Filipinos abroad do our share, as we always do.

Mr. Barnett estimates that the cost of the damages could run into hundreds of dollars as impact assessment has yet to be completed. The west.com.au also reported that damages to the Perth Domestic Airport caused chaos and delays as the airport ceiling gave in from the torrential rain and hail. They also reported of homes affected by landslides at the base of King’s Park.

A number of schools are closed today because of flooding damages while some businesses remain close due to power outage. TV reports quoting Western Power representatives said that it might take days to restore power to some of the suburbs as their staff are overwhelmed by number of damaged substations or downed powerpoles. There were no reports of injury or death related to the storm.

We were caught on the road as the wild storm started, small marble-sized hail pummels our car, it was terrifying. © Blogbastic!

As the storm progress, visibility was near zero. © Blogbastic!

More than 20,000 lightning struck Perth during the wild storm yesterday. © Blogbastic!

The hacker, apparently a supporter of leading presidential candidate Noynoy Aquino, posted this blog entry. The hacker acknowledged the people behind pinoyhacking.com. The website or group does not exist.

It reads as follows:

Hacked by Kris Aquino

Omigosh kalerky to the max. Imagine, may I gamit pa mga kids sa commercial to make sipsip to the poor. Pano naman kaming mga richhh! Wala ba candidate na magpapakatotoo “For the rich, because I am rich!” Dapat ganun devah! Love it! So many eklat and whatnot. Why pa magpakahirap sa business kung mas mataas kita sa government di ba? Like I said to Boy regarding sa interview nila. “Taas ng TF. Amiinin!” Hay naku, vote for my brother Noynoy na lang, manang mana sa kanya si johs, ang cute di baah! Basta, for my hair magtahnk you na lang ako sa mga baklush sa pinoyhacking.com Sila rin nagtina ng buhok ni MannyVillar ever! Greet ko na rin mga taga pinoygreyhat.org, makers ng gown ko, hay naku ang aarte nyo, puwede na kayo maging National Artist! Thanks din sa mga members ng ph****, ang official Kris Aquino fan club! Hug! Kisses!!! muah muah muah! At sa mga samu’t saring pinoy hacker group, mga kumare asan na kayo!? Text text nyo nman me at makapg lamierda tayo! Love it!

It took around 30 minutes before website managers of Manny Villar took notice and took down the blog post.

Tech journo, Joey Alarilla, on the otherhand, was sceptic and suggested that the said ‘hacking’ might be an inside job. Other plurkers shared his view and thought of the scheme as a viral campaign to draw traffic to the site.

For Filipinos here in Australia, we have a choice of subscribing to The Filipino Channel or Pinoy TV. Subscription to these providers, however, is a bit pricey so for some the internet is a good alternative where you can also watch some of the broadcast in full but not in digital-clear quality sometimes. For me, I usually wait for the free TV feed from SBS where they show the news presentation from ABS-CBNs Isang Bandila or TV Patrol Linggo sans the entertainment news.

However, I missed yesterday’s show.

Somebody at ABS forgot to deliver the goods. well no worries, we get it from other means.

If it is any indication, the ‘discounted’ price of the pay per view rate of the Pacquiao-Clottey fight seemed to imply that this is a ‘toned down fight.’ The botched Pacquiao-Mayweather fight could have easily been the most expensive fight of all time, however, Mayweather’s trash talking and beating around the bush to avoid the fight ensured that it wasn’t meant to be.

While most publicists tried hard to build the reputation of Joshua Clottey as a reputable fighter for the high-calibre Manny Pacquiao, speculations that Pacquiao will dominate started even before both fighters have started training.

True enough, the fight wasn’t that exciting, in fact, there wasn’t much to tweet about as Clottey consistently assumed a defensive pose almost throughout the fight. While, in some instances, Clottey tried to show that he was no rag-tag fighter, it wasn’t enough to give you the excitement that you would have felt while watching the Pacquiao-Cotto or even the Pacquiao-Hoya fight.

It was a lopsided fight from round 1 and there wasn’t even a heart-pounding moment even when the time for the judges’ decision came.

While the fight was happening, I wondered though if the Commission on Election (COMELEC) would prevent the broadcast of Pacquiao’s fight in the province where he is running for solon (of course, I’m being silly here). I’m sure voters are wise enough to decide who they should vote for, or am I just wishful thinking?

One thing for sure though, Pacquiao has again showed that he is a world-class fighter or should I say entertainer.

UPDATE: Here’s a clip that will go down in history as boxing’s classic or should I say sports entertainment history. Ladies and gentlemen, Pompyang Pacquiaooo! (even Pacquiao almost spat his mouth piece laughing at what happened)

Blogging Pacquiao vs. Clottey fight.

UPDATE: Well, it’s official this post has been my most popular post ever. So as not to burst your bubble that it’s just a photo of an episode in my livetweeting, I’m giving you a link to my thoughts on the fight.