I was just about to tell you about the top 10 of this year, but I guess you’d read about it much earlier.

If there’s one thing most of the nominated blog have in common (that I can’t stand) it’s that they’re mostly about “HOW TO MAKE MONEY WITH GOOGLE ADSENSE! HOW TO EARN WITH YOUR BLOG” blablabla.

It’s like walking to a bookstore expecting quality writing only to find that they only have stocks of insipid business books.

Will they ever get this right?

have you seen the pieces of crap that have been voted in so far? jeez.

Two words: link bait.

Link baiting is just one of the tactics that bloggers do to drive traffic to their blog, increase their subscriber base, and boost their pr rankings. And by the looks of it, judging on your entry, Ms. Toral’s link baiting worked– she reeled you in quite nicely. Lol.

Some link baits actually have something to say although, one must realize that getting the message across is only secondary to the things mentioned above. In Ms. Toral’s case, she made her message very clear when she encouraged some of those who commented to actually NOMINATE THEMSELVES.

Sorry for the very long comment. But one last thing, have you noted her inserting E commerce between her first and last names? Sure it works wonders for her keyword aspirations, but I think it’s completely tasteless.

hi zo. it would have been cool if you left a link to your site.

anyway, as for the link baiting, i don’t think there’s really any doubt about it in the first place. these kinds of contests are double-edged—it drives traffic both towards the participants and the contest manager. that’s a fair trade, in my view. one does not do these things for free.

Janette “E-Commerce” Toral? srsly? where?

Ah man, eto nanaman, it is the nature of people *sighs* Obviously, you haven’t seen the internet.

Did you know that this is NOT THE ONLY contest that has this kind of problem? It can’t be helped if popularity is really a large factor here after all influential also means popular >.>

Did you know outside the net, we have what we called, “Misao Awards”

Despite having controversy upon the winners, it’s still ongoing for FOUR YEARS and still popular. Because it doesn’t matter if YOU think they aren’t influential or whatnot, it’s just more people really liked the site, there’s nothing you could do about it. It varies from opinion to opinion. For a first time contest it was successful enough and gained an audience.

So hopefully, with that amt. of audience, more interesting entries and results would come in.

Hope this wakes you up >:o
Be thankful enough that some people are trying to make the filipino blog-o-sphere active enough.

im kind of appalled that you didn’t understand what i wrote.

If you based that over one insert about the popular thing I said about I’m amazed :3

I understood exactly what you wrote.
But if you really have problems regarding this contest, nominate someone, let the community decide, and let them see what you think is “influential and yet emerging”

Besides, this time, not only filipino bloggers are coming in, even foreign ones.

no, this is what i think you did not understand. besides that boo-boo.

“Obviously, the voters want a popularity contest. We should ask: why can’t Ms. Toral oblige them so as to avoid another contest as pretentious as last year’s? Or, why can’t voters oblige Ms. Toral? The line must be drawn somewhere and I think that the creator of the project is the one to do it.”

“Personally, I just don’t want to lose my belief that Filipino bloggers (in general anyway) are smart people with sensible convictions. Hence, I want bloggers to bear in mind that “influential” and “popular” are two related but entirely different things. I want our community to be represented by real Top Ten Emerging Influential Blogs—no more, no less, and no pretensions while at it.”

and what im doing about my issues with it is writing about it and trying to persuade whoever might be interested in the topic. the reason why i am not voting is because of the problems i have mentioned above.

honestly, i dont know a new blog (started after July 2007) that is influential at the moment.

Did it ever struck you that they are voting the blog because they like it rather than because it’s popular?

Why can’t voters oblige?
You’re not voting yourself.
Who are you the to oblige?

To me, you just dislike the participants.

er?

yeah, i do dislike some of the participants. i don’t believe that they are influential in the sense that i defined above.

as for the people liking the blog—have you heard of blog whoring? link baiting, as Zo kindly mentioned? also, its not the Top Ten Blogs People Like. its the Top Ten Emerging Influential Blogs. big diff.

I am completely aware of the blog whoring and what not. But are you classifying that to Every.Single.Person voting on that contest?

[sarcasm]Oh krud, I’m hurt, I’m voting someone because they’re popular [/sarcasm]

That is how YOU think, it’s amazing how you insult the participants basing on your choices.

Oh, i guess you don’t want to answer my question “what right do you have to oblige again?” (since voters, as you said, should be able to oblige)

I can’t be bothered to comment again since I have to get working on my game. Ciao.

hi Liz! it’s me, Layla. just popping in. so who were the winners? anyway, I have made myself permanent at wordpress na.

hi layla! yes, i do remember you. hows law school? o pasado na ba?

anyway, wala pang winners. the contest will conclude on August i think. ^^

Armadia reminds me of “just another person in the Filipino Smugosphere”. Smugosphere, as in bloggers who are so smug about blogging that they think they, their writing and their content, are immaculate.

I agree about the cliques part, but that’s because the project is only as good as the amount of people who would join the effort to vote. It would only be validated by the amount of participation and the quality of such. There is considerable international participation this time around compared to last year so that shakes up the demographics a bit.

I don’t think Armadia is that smug at all, Nightdreamer. He/she has a point. It’s a democratic process and all of us will get one vote. Intelligence isn’t exactly uniform across the board so you’ll get a curve ball here and there so… there.

Not all people read blogs to experience social significance or be enlightened in socio-political issues. If people want to read tech and learn how to SPAM/SEO their way to more dollars, then that’s their call.

It’s not an award for the bloggers, it’s an award for the blog. The people who are probably going to win the award this year are the brainchildren of veteran bloggers. If you read my piece on this, you’ll see that half the entries leading the pack as of now are group blogs organized by already respected and relatively “popular” writers. Most of these group blogs have old media flavor with contributions coming from newspaper and magazine columnists.

Aside from this, the bloggers from the South are showcasing the growth of their blogging scene by showing their support for their own. Again, these were not that significant last year and now, they’re poised to get 2-3 of the slots.

I know that some of last year’s winners are barely a blip now, but look at how well things turned out for more than half of them. I dare say that there were winners who really embodied the award that they won. Coy won - and a lot of the video bloggers now see him as someone who opened the door for more video bloggers to start shop.

If you felt that last year was a train wreck, I assure you, this year’s crop of winners will have a lot more cred than those guys. The list as it stands now is diverse with niches such as social commentary, personal, travel, tech, political and blogging covered.

–

Armadia is right when he/she says that it all boils down to dislike. The people vote for the blogs that they like. To a certain extent, those people were “influenced” to throw support for a certain cause.

And what do you mean OBLIGE? You want Ms Toral to say “VOTE WISELY” or just to simply tell people to stop voting for BLOG X and BLOG Y because they shouldn’t win? It doesn’t sound like a workable solution.

I personally tried to influence the minds of some voters by discouraging them to vote for the Gorell blog. If blogging were to be represented, that is the last blog that I want the non-bloggers and the outsiders to see.

when i said oblige the voters or the voters oblige ms. toral, i meant she should just name the thing “The Top Ten Popular Filipino Blogs” or something less pretentious than the current title. OR the voters should just vote real influential blogs and not just their friends’. because, admit it, last year was terrible. there was only a very small percentage which actually voted for the winners and the rest was blogs you didn’t even know existed. like i said, a lot of people seemed to treat the contest like some sort of meme. a lot of people did not take it seriously.

as for brian gorell, he is influential, even if his blog is trashy. he is the first blogger who made us all aware that there is a point where libel starts and blogging ends. he’s the first one to test the limits of blogging as a medium for self-expression. so, while i wouldn’t vote for him, he IS influential in his own way.

i do agree with you that the trend for voting now is radically different from last year. i still have mixed feelings about it, but i recognize that this is a good start.

The winners for this year will most probably be influential individuals who just happened to set up shop with a new blog in the past year.

Would you question the influence of a Blogie Robillo, a Ria Jose or the Filipino Voices juggernaut? The people leading the polls now are tried-and-tested old media/ new media-savvy individuals who could very much give the competition the credibility that it needs.

I’m looking at the list and I could only see possibly three/ four questionable entries. The rest look pretty deserving to me. Saying that they’re not is bordering on haughtiness and yes, that it is being quite smug.

Saying that most voters treat it as popularity contest is arguably a smug comment as well - in the same vein as “my taste level trumps yours so fuck democracy”.

If the project fails in anything, it’s in getting the word out. It’s a Philippine-based project led by a Filipino blogger. Naturally, the project would definitely attract a big Pinoy participation. But just the same, the project is open for everyone else in the world who would choose to participate.

I know it’s so tempting to bring down “nobodys” back to the ground after what happened last year. I hate a lot of last year’s winners but that’s democracy. But this year’s field is so different. Most of the front runners have cred that extends beyond blogging. And it would take an amazing amount of arrogance and hot air for anyone to mock the project the same way that last year’s project was.

i said, i have mixed feelings about it. you should have asked first what they are, if you’re so into democracy, before calling me smug and arrogant.

you should notice that i am not mocking the CURRENT project per se; i am pointing out the problems i see with it, but i am basing most of my criticism on last year’s turnout. also, notice that i posted this blog post the after only the first batch of people voted. the first batch. i had no way of knowing that the trend will be as it is at the moment.

ive noticed that you dislike ad hominem comments like this on your blog. i suggest you don’t do it on mine.

I don’t recall calling you smug and arrogant.

Here’s what I said:

“And it would take an amazing amount of arrogance and hot air for anyone to mock the project the same way that last year’s project was.”

I haven’t seen you do it. It was a categorical statement just in case somebody does.

And isn’t judging the intentions of a considerable amount of people equate to even just a tiny amount of arrogance? I mean, there’s nothing wrong with arrogance if you’re willing to admit it. In my opinion, and by no means do I intend to impose it on you, saying that your opinion trumps others (and we’re talking about a good number of people here) carries with it an implied superiority - a hint of arrogance if you may .

I have no idea how one could say something to that effect that “dozens of people are wrong, AND IM RIGHT!” without even coming across as being somewhat “arrogant”.

my dear. having an opinion usually construes arrogance. otherwise, it’s not an opinion, but a statement of fact or simply a lie.

so if it will make you happy, i admit i’m arrogant. however, at least i try to explain and i do not make ad hominem attacks, however “indirect” they are.

but of course that’s just an opinion.

I have no idea why you took offense at that comment THAT easily. I mean, you seem to not hesitate when you criticize the project, the voters and the winners. I’ve always believed that those who criticize should also be prepared for an appraisal of their critique. But that’s just me. Even in debate, the things that you say aren’t necessarily taken at face value.

I argued my points logically in an organized and rational manner. If that offended you then I’m very sorry. I am sincerely surprised that you took it that way. Again, accept my apologies - but I stand firm in what I said in my earlier comments.

i changed my comment about the same time i got an email saying you commented.

anyway. i don’t call an argument logical if it has the words “smug” and “arrogant” in it mainly because these words carry with them opinion—and not only that, they are antagonistic opinion. in arguing logically and rationally, i believe that there’s a rule somewhere saying that you should not include qualifiers such as this. otherwise, an argument does not become an argument but just a base personal attack.

anyway you’re right, i shouldn’t take offense easily.

apology accepted.