HERE’S the list of Philippine Blog Awards winners in the major award categories:
Podcast
Tech — Kilat: The Cybercafe Experiments
And the special category awards winners are:
Blogger’s Choice Award winner: Market Manila
SOCIAL Media shifts the power to produce content and develop ideas away from the established mainstream, and towards the individual. In the past, information available online on the World Wide Web was static, and this was controlled by the few who had access to equipment, bandwidth and content. Content was highly filtered, being controlled by the newspapers, magazines, companies with big marketing budgets, and a few really smart people who could write copy and code HTML very well. Even when blogs started to surface, these were relegated to being personal diaries and nothing more.
That bit of thought comes from J. Angelo Racoma, a professional Filipino blogger. Reading his post brought back memories of arguments we had in my graduate class. Yes, blogs and other Internet innovations such as podcasting, have allowed YOU to participate in what we now call “citizen journalism.” That term is actually a misnomer because journalists are citizens too. But I digress.
Social media is a broad term that describes participatory journalism. Blogs have indeed become one way for YOU to contribute to discussions and sometimes to journalism.
Angelo writes, “[B]logs have grown to be popular sources of online commentary, opinion, and even journalistic reportage. Blogs are crossing over to the mainstream. Moreover, other more media-rich content have started to become popular. Video sharing sites have become popular channels for grassroots moviemaking. Podcasts—audio programs distributed over the Internet—are becoming good alternatives to talk radio.”
He continues:
Social Media, therefore has changed who decides and how these decisions are brought about. Before, editors and publishers decided the news headlines. Before, editors and publishers decide which story goes to which section of the newspaper. Today, it’s you, the user, who has control.
The most obvious advantage of social media is that users are now empowered to determine what the Web contains and how these are presented and shared. The Internet inherits the social aspect of humanity. However, this is only one of many benefits.
For some journalists, allowing YOU to decide what makes headline story tomorrow is sacrilege. Many traditional journalists will cringe at the thought. The concept of social media is not new. It is the very essence of journalism,which is really about YOU, the public. Blogs have allowed YOU to put in your two cents’ worth of ideas. And that makes for good conversation and journalism in cyberspace. It adds more depth to stories.
But the reality is, YOU will still need editors, publishers, and reporters to provide YOU the news. In turn, YOU can now use technology such as blogs to offer them different perspectives or information. With that, we will end up with better, and well-digested stories.
To end, here’s interesting thought from a Slashdot interview with Jay Rosen of PressThink:
Sometimes the network will be the knowledge producer, the journalist the enabler. Other times the journalist will be the producer, and the network the enabler. Pro-am journalism is not inherently better than am-pro. Amateur users could in some cases do it all themselves, with editors watching and giving the green light in stages. Different combinations beg to be tried. It’s unwise to say in advance that we know how it will work, or that it can’t.
MEET our Blog Addict of the Week, Jayme of Heavensent Angel.
Could you tell us something about yourself? How old are you and what are you currently doing? When and why did you start blogging and who got you hooked?
I am 25. I am currently trying to balance being an associate producer of a children’s show, a loving and devoted wife and a soon-to-be mom to our baby daughter.
“FIND your carnival, and get your blog.” This one-liner comes from a service called, er, Blog Carnival. Simply put, a blog carnival is a collection of top blog postings on different topics. A blog called “All My Eye” also provides this definition:
Blog Carnivals attempt to provide a weekly or monthly summary of key postings in a particular blogging community or topic. The source media is different (blogs versus mailing lists) but the editorial process and end results are essentially the same: a regular digest of important scholarly or technical discussions. Carole Anne Meyer has described Blog Carnivals as secondary publishing reinvented.
Topics can vary. All My Eye found scholarly blog carnivals, which focused on the science community, for instance.
A blog carnival is a blog community or network with a twist. This new “approach” hopes to help you find more relevant information from the virtual haystack we call the blogosphere. But from time to time, you will still find some blogs regurgitating second-hand information. So be careful.
Blog on!
I LOVE “Heroes,” so much that we actually spoofed it in Episode 7 of hackenslash: the podcast, with more “Hero Sandwich” episodes to come.
Yeah, I know they’ve only recently started airing the series on Philippine TV, but, ahem, I found ways of getting my “Heroes” fix months ago, so I won’t spoil the surprise for those who are just discovering this amazing series.
If you don’t mind spoilers, however, one of the blogs I started frequenting when I got hooked on “Heroes” is HeroestheSeries.com. Another interesting blog is Heroes Revealed.
JUST call me the wifi bandit.
My blogging addiction has taken me on all kinds of adventures — from almost missing a flight because I was too busy posting at the Hong Kong airport to being kicked out of an Internet cafe by a Middle Eastern family in a quiet street in Dusseldorf, Germany.
But this is the closest I have come to actually committing a crime because of my addiction.
My friend Tina lent me her new apartment during my recent trip to Singapore. A trip which only had one purpose: to stalk the beautiful Rachael Yamagata.
A SINGAPOREAN agency announced Monday it was looking into extending regulation to new media, which includes websites and blogs, Agence-France Presse reports.
It says the Media Development Authority (MDA) of Singapore is currently seeking public reaction to its Media Market Conduct Code. Implemented in 2003, the Code regulates the print and broadcast media, including the newspapers and television. But with the emergence of new media, the agency feels it is time to revisit the Code.
Excerpt:
“The media landscape has changed since 2003, and a good example is the adoption of different business models by traditional and new media players,” said Ling Pek Ling, director for media policy at MDA.
“With the emergence of new media markets and the introduction of HDTV and IPTV services, it is timely for us to look at how we can update our code to meet the needs of the media industry,” she said.
The story notes that the MDA is “responsible for the country’s censor board.”
It ends:
In a country where all local broadcasting outlets are government-owned and newspapers are expected to be “partners” with the government, many people have turned to websites and blogs for alternative views of the city-state’s political and social issues.
YOU’VE probably asked this question many times: How personal should your blog get? Well, I found this interesting blog that suggested several things to consider.
Excerpt:
As a blogger, you may have asked yourself just how personal you want to get when it comes to your blog. Do you want people to know a little or a lot about you? Do you want to disclose personal information to the readers who visit your blog?
All of these questions are important to ask if you are a blog owner; in determining just how personal you want to get on your blog, consider two critical points.
To summarize the blog’s points, you should keep the following tips in mind:
SAY hello to our Blog Addict of the Week, Marge Mateo of Fish Tank.
Could you tell us something about yourself? How old are you and what are you currently doing? When and why did you start blogging and who got you hooked?
I am Anne Margaux Mateo, Marge is what I want people to call me. I’m 22 years old, and I am at present studying. I started blogging back in 2004 after I read my friends’ blog. I got hooked and was thinking that this is my online portfolio, so I wrote a lot at that time, not thinking who — or if ever there was — was the audience that I have at that time.
SHOULD mainstream media trust blogs as sources of information? A Malaysian minister doesn’t think so.
Here’s an excerpt from an Agence France-Presse wire story.
KUALA LUMPUR–A Malaysian minister has told domestic newspapers not to quote from Internet blogs or use them as sources of information, accusing the websites of spreading rumors, reports said Wednesday.
