Since last year, the Mindanao Bloggers (MB) group has been getting more and more attention as a direct result of our various activities. We’ve been conducting seminars on blogging, running food tours, and organizing events such as the Mindanao Bloggers Summit and the recent bloggers party.
Today, Goodyear Philippines had a media roundtable where bloggers in particular were invited. I wasn’t able to attend this morning, but was fortunately able to sit down with their PR people. It was very fulfilling to know that they appreciate what the bloggers here in Davao can do for their company in terms of advertising mileage and product awareness.
Another development is MB’s participation in Media Nation 5.2, which was supposed to be held this June. The event is an annual conference of journalists and communications specialists, and I assume it is where they discuss current trends and issues in their field. For this year, they have invited me to be a “thought leader” for the topic, “New technologies: threat or opportunity?“. They are also making it an objective to tackle the problem of Mindanao’s lack of exposure in traditional media.
(Thing is, the organizers have suddenly postponed the conference to August! The reasons given were the abduction of Ces Drilon & party, and the upcoming ARMM elections. Totally unacceptable, if you ask me. The conference is going to be held in Cebu, so I don’t see why the much-hyped kidnapping has to impinge upon the conference schedule.)
We have more or less achieved MB’s objective of promoting better and truer content emanating from grassroots Mindanao. Now the group is moving towards other objectives, and yes, that includes making it possible for Mindanao’s bloggers to earn from their blogs.
Expect more developments and more activities from the MB group this year and in the years to come!
7:37 pm on 23 Jun 2008
Hi Blogie,
It’s really great to get the recognition that you deserve and to be connected to people and other groups. Anyway, I write to request for a partnership with you and your group. I am heading a Cebu City based NGO which has been existing for a few years now. It’s called WINPHIL - Workcamps international Philippines. We host 2-week activities called workcamps for the environment (tree and mangroves planting and sea clean-up) involving 10-20 local and international volunteers. So far, we had international volunteers coming from Taiwan, Korea, Japan, Germany, France, Italy, U.S.A. and Russia. But we only have local volunteers from Cebu City. It would be nice to have local volunteers from Mindanao. There is no participation fee, and the food and accommodation is provided for. Please check the website for further info: http://www.winphil.wetpaint.com. And please feel free to tell me what you think. Thanks.
7:39 pm on 23 Jun 2008
Please Email me at benhurjun@yahoo.com.
Thanks.
7:41 pm on 23 Jun 2008
Hi Benhur! I’m going to be in Cebu from 27 to 30 June. On the 29th, I’m going to meet up with Cebu-based bloggers (see this post). I’m interested to know more about your NGO. I’ll email you!
7:49 pm on 23 Jun 2008
Wow. Thanks for the quick reply!
Then I will meet you here.