WordPress 2.3 at last! I’m talking about ALL my blogs running on WordPress — the 4 blogs that I personally author, my father’s Gospel Reflections, the blog aggregator, and several others that I maintain for other folks. Whew! But it really wasn’t all that painful. It took me just under an hour (including snacks & bathroom breaks) to upgrade all of those blogs to the latest version of this awesome blogging platform.
Ah, there’s one blog that I haven’t yet upgraded: MindanaoBloggers. The reason being, I’m not quite sure yet if the plugin that runs the Mindanao Blog Directory will function well in the WP2.3 environment. I have yet to do some test runs on that. ••• Read on»
Tagged: blog maintenance, WordPress
Two weeks ago, WordPress 2.3 was released, and now I’m contemplating on upgrading my blogs from their current WP2.2.2 version. Based on what I’ve read so far, WP2.3 promises to be an exciting development from previous releases — native support for tagging (for better SEO!), plugin ugrade alerts, and much more.
Matt, the founder of WordPress, held an upgrade party the day after they released the new version. For us WP die-hards and geeks, that sure sounds like a darned good excuse to get together and have a few brews! ••• Read on»
Tagged: Automattic, blog maintenance, WordPress
Davao’s Food Huntress, My Davao City, Dbaa’s Clutter — these are a sampling of blogs whose owners write about dining experiences in Davao. I’m sure there are more out there, though. So, I’m planning a seminar on how to write well about food, with a possible side topic on food photography. (My friends Tope & Christian, in their sometimes unfathomable brand of humor, call this “food porn“.)
No, I’m not going to conduct this seminar myself. I do try to write about restaurants, coffee shops, etc. @ Ang Dabawenyo, but I’m no expert at all. Far from it. That’s why I thought of coming up with this food-blogging seminar in the first place! I really want to learn how to write effectively about cuisine. My dream is to someday blog about food and get people’s mouths watering just by reading my blog. 
On a more serious note, if you also want to be able to do food critiquing, I guess this seminar’s a good way to start!
Hopefully, the good people over at the Center for Asian Culinary Studies (Holiday Spa compound, F. Torres st.) will agree to provide us with resource speakers for this. I’ve already informally spoken to Chefs Toto and Jenny of CACS-Davao about my plan, so the ball is rolling…
Now who’s interested to join this gastronomic, educational adventure? Just leave a comment here, or drop me a line. If everything falls in place, we just might be able to do this this month. And if we can get sponsors for the venue and the food, then we won’t have to pay for participation. 
Tagged: bloggers, food and drink, trainings and seminars
Is online poker, blackjack, roulette or other popular online casino games your thing? Check out this Web portal for a few good ideas: Online Casino Bluebook. It’s a resource site that shows a list of the top 10 online casinos, among other things. ••• Read on»
For the benefit of Dabawenyos who’d like to start blogging pronto, I’ll be coming up with a series of seminar-workshops that will cover all the fundamentals, as well as blog maintenance and promotion. The money-earning aspect of blogging will also be introduced. Individuals who’d like to get themselves published, and companies who plan to get their product information publicized, will be the target participants of this series of blogging seminar-workshops.
Each one will be a whole-day session with lectures and hands-on training, for a minimal fee to cover the cost of venue rental, materials and lunch. The series is set to start in the second week of October 2007. ••• Read on»
Tagged: trainings and seminars
Another new blog-centric service has recently emerged, called BlogRush. I guess it’s still pretty new, judging by the look and feel of their website — plus the fact that there are still a few “Under Construction” pages in there. It looks promising, though.
What BlogRush does is to provide bloggers with a way to get their content displayed in other blogs of similar topic. The whole thing works in a I’ll-show-yours-if-you-show-mine kind of system. Basically what happens is, blog feeds (post titles and blog names only) appear in a widget that you display on your sidebar. Five feeds to be exact, and each is clickable to the actual blog post. ••• Read on»
From 7 July to 1 September, this poll on popular blog platforms got 45 total votes — honestly, I would’ve wanted it a bit higher than that number… oh well. Anyway, although I myself currently author / administer 7 sites using WordPress, I was actually expecting Blogspot (Blogger.com) to lead this survey. The reason I say this is, in the two blog directories that I maintain (Davao Blogs Directory & Mindanao Blog Directory), majority of the listed blogs are on Google’s Blogspot service. ••• Read on»
Tagged: BlogSpot, WordPress
This isn’t new — in fact, I’ve known about this since high school when I attended a journalism workshop. I’m talking about the fundamental guidelines on writing critiques or reviews: “K-K-K”. Or, kick-kiss-kick kiss-kick-kiss. In other words, something positive, then negative, then positive again.
Let’s suppose you’re blogging about another blog. Start off with what you think is pleasing about that site. Highlight the good stuff: What makes it an enjoyable experience reading its posts? Is the design a delight to look at? Is the sidebar (or sidebars, as the case may be) organized cleanly? Does the blog make a whole lot of sense?
Then proceed to what, in your opinion, is that blog’s weak points. What do you think is wrong with it? Perhaps it’s replete with misspellings? It’s confusing to navigate? Whatever it is, be constructive, not derogatory. It’s rarely ever a good idea to be excessively critical of anything. After all, there is always room for change, don’t you think? ••• Read on»
Tagged: blog promotions, Mindanao Bloggers Summit, writing reviews
Well of course I’m joining the MBS1 — I’m with the organizing team! We call ourselves The Usual Suspects: Andrew, Dom, Jun, Marc, Migs, Ria & yours truly. And the Summit’s chairman and initiator is Hon. Peter T. Laviña.
I’d like to take this chance to thank the sponsors, without whom we wouldn’t go very far organizing this exciting event:
Would you like to be a sponsor? We’d certainly appreciate your support! Please click here to view our sponsorship packages. ••• Read on»
Tagged: blog promotions, Mindanao Bloggers Summit
Janette Toral has embarked on yet another writing project that is worthy of lengthier attention spans. Right after the successful conduct of the Top 10 Emerging Influential Blogs project, now comes the “Filipina” Writing Project.
This time, bloggers are not only going to compete literarily, but also in terms of search-engine ranking. This points to the real purpose behind this endeavor: to encourage more people to write about Filipino women and their virtues, strengths, contributions… And thus, at the conclusion of this project, bloggers will have generated content that will hopefully debunk the unsavory image in which Filipinas — our mothers, grandmothers, sisters, cousins, wives, colleagues, friends — have been portrayed online.
This is a laudable effort by Janette, who also authors a blog called Women on the Web, Wireless, and Outsourcing. I’d like to encourage all who read this to participate — not just for the prizes, but for the contribution that you will be able to put into realizing the project’s noble objectives.
Tagged: blog awards, DigitalFilipino, Filipina, responsible blogging
