Digital Filipino Web Awards 2008 winners announced
Congratulations to the winners of the Digital Filipino Web Awards 2008! The awarding ceremony was held last November 5 at Taste Asia, Mall of Asia.
Apparel / Fashion Category - Tesoro’s Philippine Handicrafts and Barongs
Art Category - Hiraya
Association / Organization Category - Information Technology Association of the Philippines
Auction / Shopping Portal Category - KabayanCentral
Automotive Category - AutoIndustriya
Beauty Category - Godiva
Blog - Corporate Category - The Belo Medical Group Blog
Blog - Personal Category - The D Spot
Blog - Professional Category - Tech at Hand
Books Category - OMF Literature
Community Category - TipidPC
Computer / Consumer Electronics Category - Villman Computers Philippines
Consumer Banking / Bills Payment Category - Philippine National Bank
Corporate / Professional Category - Syntactics
Events / Conferences Category - WordCamp Philippines
Financial Services Category - Absolute Traders
Food Category - Filipino Recipes
Games Category - RF Online Philippines
Gifts Category - Express Regalo
Guides / Review Category - ClickTheCity.com
Home Furnishings / Improvement Category - Philippine Interior Design & Feng Shui Tips
Jobs / Employment Category - MyNimo
Magazine Category - Candymag.com
Music / Movie/ Film Category - TitikPilipino
Newspaper Category - Inquirer.net
Pharmaceuticals Category - GlaxoSmithKline Philippines
Podcast Category - The Daily PCIJ
Politics Category - Filipino Voices
Real Estate Category - BF Homes Properties
School / University Category - De La Salle University - Manila
Services Category - Load.com.ph
Social Networking Category - GreatPinoy!
Tourism Category - Cebu CeBoom CeBlog
Travel Category - Philippine Airlines
Blog Action Day 2008: Poverty
Blog Action Day 2008 happens this October 15 and the topic is poverty. Exactly what is it?
Blog Action Day is an annual nonprofit event that aims to unite the world’s bloggers, podcasters and videocasters, to post about the same issue on the same day. Our aim is to raise awareness and trigger a global discussion.
Here’s a promotional video:
This year’s topic is especially close to Filipino hearts, so I’m sure a lot of bloggers from the Philippines will be participating. Be sure to join as well!
Voting opens for the Bloggers’ Choice Award at the 2008 Philippine Blog Awards
The Philippine Blog Awards 2008 has just announced the nominees for the Bloggers’ Choice Award and the voting has opened. The process has changed since last year:
- You need to be a Filipino blogger with a blog, which “must be established at least three (3) months from today with a minimum of 10 posts.”
- You need to pick one nominee and write a blog post about why he/she deserves to win. “Yes, you can vote for your own blog. And no, you cannot vote for a blog that is not on the list of official Bloggers’ Choice Award nominees.”
- You need to include the list of sponsors in your blog post.
- You need to submit your blog post here.
So why would you go through all the trouble of doing that? Every blog post counts as one raffle entry (but one post per blogger only). Prizes to that raffle will be announced soon.
Finally, congratulations to the nominees:
- ·´`·.¸.» j u l i a ·´`·.¸.»
- Adventures of the Coconuter
- Alfredo B. Palconit Jr. Blog
- Basta Igat, Sikat!
- Basta…
- Batang Yagit
- Behind Wonderland
- bikoy.net
- Buhay Coy on Campus
- Comicology
- Confessions of a Pinoy Blogger
- Day-toDay Heroes
- Dog Are Us!
- ederic@cyberspace
- Filipino Voices
- Flavored Tongue
- FruityOaty
- Heart of Rachel
- Hola Filipinas
- Indistinguishable Gibberish
- just curious
- kain pinoy
- Kiss the stars with me
- L A G A L [ O G ]
- Life’s Existence
- LUCKWATCHERO: My STORY. My PRIDE. My THOUGHTS.
- Macuha.com
- Makoy’s Memoirs Of A Certified Blogger
- marketmanila.com
- Mico Santos’s Lagalag
- Mike Villar
- My Boring Life… Now A Blog!
- Mykiru Isyusero
- NewIvory
- Octwelve
- Philippine Nursing Resource & Updates
- Philippine Nursing Seminars & Trainings Source
- Pinoy Ambisyoso
- Ready To Be Rich
- Reel Advice
- Seed Interactive
- Senor Enrique
- Serena Mithane
- The Heritage of Cebu
- The Journal of The Jester-in-Exile
- The Konoha Ground
- TurfSite Manila
NurseAko
It’s nice to have an online community that celebrates our modern day heroes in the business of saving lives. One where they can describe their experiences whether they live abroad or here in Manila, still in school or already practicing in the real world.
NurseAko is calling all Philippine nurse bloggers to stand up and be counted in its blog round-up.
Visit NurseAko.
Speaking Our Native Tongue on the Web
When WordPress Philippines first launched, I left a comment saying we should try to write in our native language. We it owe it to all our heroes who died fighting for our right to be free. Language is one of the most important signs of sovereignty. And besides, if you’ll look at the sixth box of links at the footer, all those foreign WordPress sites are written in their own language!
It appears blog provider giant Blogger has recently translated its service to “Filipino” and this has got me thinking. Google owns Blogger. Google also provides localized versions for several other services for us Pinoys. Several other sites do, too. But what does a “local” version mean, really? Is it the Filipino language? Or is it Tagalog?
Filipino o Tagalog? Ano ba talaga, kuya?
Google Language Tools: When you select Filipino as the language of your choice in viewing Google Search, the abbreviation in the link is “tl”, which clearly stands for Tagalog.
Google Directory: When you click on the Filipino language under World Languages, it is actually linked to Tagalog.
Wikipedia: There is no Filipino language version of Wikipedia, only Tagalog, Bikolano, Cebuano, Chavacano, Ilokano, Kapampangan, Pangasinense, Waray.
All of this is pretty ironic considering the page on the topic Filipino says:
Note: “Philippino” and “Philipino” are misspellings of this word and are not considered part of standard usage. Pilipino is used to describe the people of the Philippines. The term “Filipino” is commonly used when you are talking or writing in English or other foreign language. “Filipino” is the Philippines’ national, official and constitutional language (While the Filipino language is largely based on Tagalog, pure Tagalog has slight differences to Filipino).
This is the accepted definition of Filipino, as well as Filipino versus Tagalog, right? Then why do these websites—which are multi-million dollar companies no less—assume that in order to be a little more user-friendly to its Filipino visitors, it should create a custom language version in Tagalog instead of Filipino? What gives them the right to do so? As Filipinos, should we accept their bad judgment on something that affects no one else but ourselves?
Philippine-based wiki competitor WikiPilipinas has acknowledged this and created a Filipino language version of its wiki. But then there seems to be no Tagalog counterpart along with other provincial languages. So did they drop the Tagalog because it’s essentially Filipino anyway?
Ano ang problema?
I know I’m getting into a huge debate here, one that might never ever be resolved so long as our country remains an archipelago, so long as we have strong affinities for provincial languages, even foreign ones. After all, we are a nation of provinces and a nation of balikbayans. Our national language has never been that strong especially in the midst of the languages we’ve had to deal with.
But I am not asking you to be a little more patriotic (especially in the spirit of the EDSA Revolution, whose anniversary we commemorate on Monday) by choosing to write in our own language. I just want to underline what we may be overlooking:
On the web, is it correct to say that a Filipino speaks only Tagalog? Are these two terms interchangeable?
Should we be content that websites like Google consider Tagalog as the language of choice for Filipinos?
Should we be content that other Philippine languages from Cebuano to Waray are represented on some websites, but not the lesser known but equally Pinoy ones?
The Web is as liberating as speaking in one own’s tongue. Blogging, for example, lets you do exactly that. How lucky are we to find a new medium by which we can express ourselves as Filipinos? Other times, however, our identity as a people gets eroded just because a website assumes and restricts, despite the best of intentions. We accept it because we know technology still hasn’t found a way to seamlessly translate any language into another. Or is it because it just doesn’t matter anymore?
Get Ratified!
You might remember that we got this WordPress Philippines party started by asking you to contribute in several ways: submitting themes and plugins, posting at the forums, and tagging your blog posts with “wordpressph”.
This time, we’re encouraging all of you to get your Philippine blogs listed at Ratified.org. Ratified ranks Filipino blogs according to various stats from Google, FeedBurner, and Technorati. And yes, Ratified is for Pinoys, by Pinoys. Sa’n ka pa!
