Lessons I Learned from iBlog4

Last year I did a post of the same title for iBlog3 and I'd like to say congratulations first to Janette and the UP College of Law for a very successful and fun-filled iBlog4!

I unfortunately arrived only in time for Juned's talk, but here's a rundown of what I picked up from the speakers:

Juned Sonido, Photo Blogging - if you are passionate about photography then just keep on taking photos! I've been actually bugging him the past few weeks for tips on taking photos and he's given me a couple of reading assignments. It helps!

Jonas Diego, Blog to Print - he shared that he managed to make his passion (which is comics) work for him. His web comics was immortalized in print and he's doing good business as well in making storyboards (shared that bit in Stitching). He also uses his blog to promote his business and hobby.

Coy and me, Podcasting and Vlogging - we weren't able to show our "conclusion" but what we wanted to say is "follow your passion". If you're shy, then try out podcasting, but if you feel like you can wing video blogging, then go! Just do it! Our videos are up, check this out for the podcasting bit and this for vlogging.

Luz Rimban, Manolo Quezon, and Janette Toral, Political Blogging - I agree with what they said that media focuses more on the candidates during elections rather than the real issues. The speakers surmised that blogging about politics will help stir things up and bring out the real issues. They also said that this will work especiallyf or provinces which really don't get any media coverage.

Atty. JJ Disini, Legal Challenges in Blogging - ahhh there are legal challenge in blogging, copyright infringement was much talked about during this segment. Coy and I also mentioned during our talk that one must use original material at all times. JJ also mentioned that in following "fair use" don't quote more than 10% of the whole blog post if you must mention it as a referral. It reminded me of a certain blogger who copied 75% of my post and just said one line about it in the end of his entry. It made me freaking mad! I was supposed to give a short talk about "How to deal with blogger abuse", but due to time constraints (good thing!!!) JJ didn't call me anymore. I have a video for it, I'll probably post it sometime soon in You Got Tech.

Noemi Dado, Blogging for Advocacy - Noemi shared her story about FilipinaImages.com where they tried to show the other side of the Filipina. We all know that when you search for Filipina in search engines, the not-nice side always comes out. I think it's a worthwhile project and should not be shot at because of search engine semantics.

Ria Jose, Blogging from the Countryside - Ria's talk was the most fun talk! I have been to Davao a couple of times and I think it's a more fun place to live in. Manolo asked the question, "What should an outsider do when he comes to visit so that the locals won't be freaked out?" Ahhh, I've experienced that a couple of times since I've managed to visit and meet bloggers from other cities. My tip, just make sure you know somebody in the city you are visiting and make sure you don't come off as someone who's going to dominate the place. LOL.

Here's a short video of my iBlog4 experience!



Up next (well hopefully soon!) will be my video about the party. And here's some photos I took -



Some more posts about iBlog4

• iBlog 4 and The 88db.com Blogger’s Night: Because I Felt The Need To Embarrass Myself More
• iBlog4 ramblings
• Snippets from the iBlog4 and 88db.com Bloggers Party
• Lost Money But Was Happy
• Being Offline is Fun
• iBlog4 and Morphxchange
• Avi Siwa at iBlog4
• iBlog4 experience
• Morph at iBlog4
• iBlog4 Summit
• iBlog4 Summit bloggers party with 88db.com
• iblog4 Summit
• iblog4 Blogging Summit and Meet Up
• Anger always come from frustrated expectations
• Umleo23.com at iBlog4 Summit???
• Unofficial Philippine Blogger Day
• So wassup?
• iBlog4, Altar Boyz Mosh Pit Party, Nick Weekend Carnival, & 88DB Bloggers Party
• iBlog4
• FilipinaImages.com in iBlog4 Summit
• iblog4 (old friends, new friends)
• Jester-in-Exile Goes to iBlog 4 and the 88DB.com Bloggers’ Party (or, the floppy hat has gone out of style boohoohoo)
• iBlog 4 and The 88db.com Blogger’s Night: Because I Felt The Need To Embarass Myself More
• iblog4 Philippine Blogging Summit
• Of a very long week
• iblog4: the day after
• iBlog4 Summit
• Chickens invade iBlog4
• iBlog4 summit and 88db.com party
• Blog events
• The 4th Philippine Blogging Summit iBlog4
• iBlog4 Experience
  

The J.S. Manila Tour

Thank God it wasn't so hot today since we brought around Manila our Davao blogger-friends, Andrew, Ria, Winston, Blogie and Migs. Here was our itinerary:

The Binondo Round - walked around Quintin Paredes, the Binondo Church, Ongpin, and then around Reina Regente (?) then back to Savory. We had an interesting lunch at the Estero.


Intramuros - drove around for a bit until we settled at the San Augustine Church (my patron saint!) where we witnessed 3 weddings in the 2 hours we were there. Went around the museum as well.


Manila Bay Cruise - who would've thought of taking a cruise at Manila Bay? Well we did and we had so much fun taking photos.


Mall of Asia - ended up having merienda at Razon's (yummy halo-halo!) and then we tried to look for the non-existent Giligan's at the San Miguel Bay Park. We ended up having dinner at Gerry's Grill (most of us wanted sisig!) and we were joined by AJ, Benj, Jeff and Fritz. (Uyyy... sino bagong love team sa blogosphere? meron ba?).

Juned Sonido was the official tour guide. (Thanks so much Juned!).

And here's a special message for someone...

Snippets from the iBlog4 and 88DB.com Bloggers Party

So much to blog about, but so little time!!!

Here's just a glimpse of the fabulous day I had at the iBlog4 -


And here's Janette hugging the chicken who won the "Come as Your Blog" contest. He blogs at ChickenMafia.com


It'll probably take a few days before I'll manage to make a proper post. Here's a couple of posts about the events (please leave a comment if you have a post) -

Sharie
Sarah Cada

Top 10 Emerging Influential Blogs of 2008

Last year I won a car during the top 10 emerging influential blogs of 2007 party. I remember being in a daze during the party because I just came from a looooong walk from Ayala to Max's Restaurant. Good thing best friend Anne and Lolo Harry was there with me to keep me calm and collected.

I was fortunately included in the 2007 list and the plaque that was given to me last year is displayed in my Dad's office (home lang). It feels like ages since that party and so much has happened to me as a blogger (I'm also vlogging now!) in the past year. Ahhh, blogging is just really fun, fun, fun!!!

Janette recently announced that she has decided to have another project, the "Top 10 Emerging Influential Blogs of 2008". To join just 10 blogs you think are "influential", remember the blog should have been created from July 1, 2007 onwards. Hmmm... I hope I meet a lot of new bloggers here at iBlog since I have yet to come up with my list. For more info kindly visit Janette's post.

Happy blogging!

P.S. If you like my shirt you can order from me or JayDJ. If you are shy to leave a comment here, please email me at me at aileenapolo dot com.

Speak-Art

The other day, I found myself in the middle of an "accountants meeting". It had nothing to do with me, I just tagged along since I had to rest before heading home. My Dad wanted me to become a CPA lawyer and I was actually enrolled in Political Science and Accounting in my freshman year in college. After a couple of units in accounting I realized I had no real love for numbers so I shifted to Political Science and Legal Management. I looooved my PolSci classes, but I was absolutely bored out of my skull during my law classes. I'd rather go through tomes of data than tomes of laws, EOs or bills. It's just not my thing (I'd probably end up like Elle Woods in court).

So that little meeting I found myself in made me realize that aside from different languages and the multitude of dialects we have, there's also the smart-speak of professions. I have observed this since I was a kid and I have learned to adjust how I communicate depending on who I'm speaking with. In sixth grade, my school diagnosed me to have the "gift of language". Duh, don't ask me what that means, my Kuya was the one who attended the session about it.

Anyway, I'm just rambling and thought how difficult it is really to mingle with many different types of people. Here's a couple of languages I encounter from time to time:

1. Geek Speak - ahhh, I'm no techie and that's why I ask a lot of questions when I don't understand something. I often ask Sweetie to explain to me a lot of developer-speak. I also bug a lot of my colleagues to explain things. What's great about developers is they explain things in a structured manner, albeit it's quite difficult to communicate in layman terms, but I have found developers to be very patient teachers.

2. Numbers Speak - accountants. One cannot live without them when you have a business. If you did not have business/accounting units back in college your nose will definitely bleed when they start exchanging accounting terms such as "schedule" (simply means "report"), "trial balance" (watered down version of a balance sheet), and "balance sheet" (that thing that measures your assets and liabilities). I used to do bookkeeping for my Mom's business. It's HARD.

3. Law Speak - if you've had the chance to read blogs written by lawyers you'd know what I'm talking about. The way they write and speak is very logical. It's like a formula, if A is B, and B is C, then A is C. Make sure there is no fallacy in how you do things or you'll get caught. I loved my logic classes back in high school, well that's just what I loved about law. So whenever I had to ask permission from my Dad, it had to follow that fool-proof formula and I had to be ready with evidence to defend my choices.

4. Edu Speak - this is one "language" I have not mastered. I have yet to understand how they manage to put things in modules so they could deliver it in understandable chunks to their students. It's all about learning. Educators ask a lot of questions. If you want to have a very stimulating conversation, go have coffee with an educator.

5. Religious-Order Speak - I used to spend a lot of time with priests since I used to have time to do our parish newsletter. I'd be in their convent at least twice a month and I'd hang-out with them. Everyone seemed to be happy, calm and collected at all times and they managed to weather any challenges with a lot of faith. I guess the religious speak the language of peace.

Well, keep your ears open and observe how people speak. And these are just based on "professions". What about the "language of love"? Kid-speak? Dog-speak? A lot huh? And this is just me thinking aloud.

What language do you speak?

What is This? What's This?

Good thing I did not stumble... I'm glad I'm a nerd and not a beauty queen.

Don't forget about the party! Sign-up here.

The Sesame Street Personality Quiz and the Party

You Are Cookie Monster

Misunderstood as a primal monster, you're a true hedonist with a huge sweet tooth. You are usually feeling: Hungry. Cookies are preferred, but you'll eat anything if cookies aren't around. You are famous for: Your slightly crazy eyes and usual way of speaking How you life your life: In the moment. "Me want COOKIE!"

The Sesame Street Personality Quiz

Me want cookie!!!

I still haven't figured out what I'm going to wear for the party on Saturday. How do I make myself look like an Apple? Oh, Juned suggested I should go as Eve... very funny Juned, nobody's going to attend the party if I do that. I'm sure some of my friends are going to wear their blog shirts (I don't have that). Some are really preparing for it and I wonder who's going to win the Sony PSP.

There will also be a congregation of bloggers from Davao who are coming for iBlog4 and the party. A rare occasion for all of them to come (kinulit ko kasi) and anyone's welcome to join us on Sunday. We'll be painting Manila (more of Binondo) red and probably take a cruise around Manila Bay in the afternoon. Sama na!

Party's this Saturday already... sign-up for it now!