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Philippines, Technology News & Reviews

Archive for July, 2005

Dynamics of Blog Traffic in Top Pinoy Blogs

Published by: yuga under: Blogosphere. 17 replies

posted: July 31st, 2005 (Visited 3616 times)

While re-evaluating the ranking scheme for Pinoy Top Blogs, I realized that some prevalent factors on blog traffic statistics are not a guaranteed measure to determine who should be on top and who’s not.

Two of the better metrics used here are the Unique Hits and the Total Hits. Unique Hits refer to an inbound traffic of a unique IP (supplemented by cookie tracking) to a specific blog. Total Hits refer to the cummulative number of page requests for the entire blog.

Many would argue that Total Hits can be easily rigged as the individual or group may be the only ones contributing to the traffic artificially. This is usually done by regular refresh of the pages or using a time-bound feature of certain browsers to automate the page reloads. However, using a cookie that only expires after 24 hours can prevent this from happening (unless of course they manually delete the cookie every page load or completely blocked by the browser altogether).

Using Unique Hits holds much promise in the sense that it only counts the unique IPs in the traffic. However, this method can inadvertently exclude a lot of legitimate stats like corporate/university networks which only uses one single public IP. Likewise, those with dynamic IPs gain an edge in contributing to the stats, an issue raised here. On the same thought, unique hits coming from search engines are one time visitors and does not necessarily (or significantly) contribute to the overall standing of a blog in the rankings.

A lot of toher questions have been raised as well. “Does a blog with 10 visitors contributing 100 pageviews (10 repeat visits) a more popular blog than a blog with 100 visitors contributing 100 pageviews (no repeat visits)?

With these considerations in mind, I am tempted to formulate a hybrid computation to equalize traffic stats. As to how the formula would look like, I still have to figure it out.

Linking Posts

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Advertising via AdWords

Published by: yuga under: Adwords. 5 replies

posted: July 31st, 2005 (Visited 4228 times)

A few weeks after using my $35 free Google AdWord credits to promote some of my other projects and business, I realized I could also use it to promote my blog as well. Hmm, why haven’t I thought of that earlier?

Blog Herald summarizes several ways of advertising your blog, the paid way. Though my blog has been very doing quite fine with dozens of keywords, bringing in tons of search engine traffic, I thought I might spend some time targetting other keywords as well.

A quick glance at my internal stats showed some very good results on the ff. keywords:

Top 10 Keyword Hits (via search engines)

  • hello garci - 6,567 hits
  • gloriagate - 1,262 hits
  • button maker - 791 hits
  • smart wifi - 372 hits
  • gonuts donuts - 216 hits
  • starbucks franchise - 212 hits
  • image hack - 210 hits
  • edsa mail - 58 hits
  • chicken inasal - 44 hits
  • paypal philippines - 35 hits

There’s an idea I was experimenting on with AdWords and AdSense. I target relevant keywords using AdWords to direct searchers looking for it to a page about the keyword with an AdSense ad. I wait and hope that they click on a related ad and earn from it. My hypothesis is this — “Is it possible to earn higher revenue from AdSense using AdWords directed pages?” What I did was bid very low ona keyword ($0.05) and hopefully earn more than that from the possible clicks on the ads. Theoretically it is possible, but my little experiment could not verify that to a 100% certainty.

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RoboSapien is in the House!

Published by: yuga under: Tech Toys & Gadgets. 8 replies

posted: July 29th, 2005 (Visited 2205 times)

One of our boss here brought his toy robot and I was surprised it was the RoboSapien. I quickly borrowed it and played with the remote. Of course, the obligatory shot from my N6230 is here:

The robot really looks more plastic than advertised but it’s expected. The remote is big which is good but hard to use at first — only the forward, back, left and right commands are obvious — one needs to read the manual first before making it go into action. The floor was a little slippery so walking was a bit clumsy (or difficult) for the RoboSapien.

The manufacturer claims it has up to 84 functions but it would seem like just a dozen. I tried making it pick up my cellphone on the floor but it could not reach it. Looks like the only thing it can really pick us is another cup. It’s feels a little clumsy to use at first but maybe I am the one who needs more practice.

After 5 minutes of playing, I’m still convinced it stays on my Digital Wish List.

Robosapien Robot Robosapien Robot is available for sale at Amazon.com for only $89.99 (inlcuding the 10% discount) and with the mini which is only $9.99. Usually ships within 24 hours from Toys”R”Us. Manufactured and distributed by Wow Wee International Ltd.

Features:
* Designed by NASA scientists
* Multi-speed walking, running and turning
* Fast, full-function arms with grippers
* 67 pre-programmed functions
* Up to 84 programmable steps

Batteries: 3 AAA batteries required.

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WP Plugin: AdSense-Deluxe

Published by: yuga under: Wordpress. 0 reply

posted: July 29th, 2005 (Visited 3259 times)

If you have AdSense as your source of revenue, the WordPress plugin AdSense Deluxe might be the best ever WP plugin ever made.

It easily allows you to insert multiple ads inside each of your blog posts using pre-defined formats. Here’s the feature summary:

  • Use simple HTML comments for embedding AdSense ads in a WordPress post
  • Choose from any number of ad styles and format on a post-by-post basis
  • Globally change ad styles
  • Selectively disable display of individual ad styles or all ads
  • Integrated AdSense Preview tool (a sandbox) for seeing what ads will appear on a given page. (Stand-alone AdSense SandBox Tool also available)
  • All settings configured through WordPress Options interface (no knowledge of plugins or PHP required)
  • Easily test different ad formats and color styles across (all, or) a range of blog posts.

    • One can only imagine the potential use of this plugin it terms of monetizing your blog and analyzing/optimizing clickthrough traffic. It will allow you to systematically study which ad format, ad unit, ad placement and even color schemes are most favorable to clicks.

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    Group Blog Project

    Published by: yuga under: Site Updates. 19 replies

    posted: July 29th, 2005 (Visited 2587 times)

    I have drafted a summary of the proposed Tech Focus Blog. Those who have initially hinted their interest in joining us can leave a comment so I can send you the link (which is password protected). Don’t forget to leave me your email.

    Here are the basic qualifications:

    • By invitation.
    • Must be a Pinoy blogger.
    • Established bloggers. Been blogging at least 6 months with a blog (channel) related to technology. We can request a sample tech entry for review if the interested bloggers don’t qualify with the initial requirement.
    • Regularly blogging and locally available. (With some exceptions .)

    I already emailed some of you about this.

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    The PWA should have a Blog Category.

    Published by: yuga under: The Internet. 26 replies

    posted: July 27th, 2005 (Visited 4510 times)

    A couple of days more and the nominations for the 8th Philippine Web Awards will be closed. yet, I wonder why there hasn’t been any really noise about it recently. Besides the fact that they have already started charging nominees for entry fees, everything else seems to be the same albeit bland and uneventfull.

    I scoured their web site once more for any news but nada, and I wondered why they have not by any chance contemplated on putting up a seperate Award Category for Blogs. Well, why not? I believe blog is something totally seperable from a personal website although in their definition of a personal blog, they included it as “sites that center on one person or one group, such as family and friends, focusing on background and interests, i.e. personal homepages, personal blogs, barkada sites”. Aren’t blogs supposed to be personal?

    It was just a thought. I reckon, this year, blogging has become one of the major movers and shakers of the Philippine Internet Industry and what better way to fully recognize it than by adding it (as a separate category) in the Philippine Web Awards.

    On second thought, why not have our own separate Blog Awards?

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    New iBook G4 released.

    Published by: yuga under: Apples and iPods. 7 replies

    posted: July 26th, 2005 (Visited 3391 times)

    It’s better, badder and with more juice. The new Apple iBook has been souped up while prices remain on a stand-still.

    1.33GHz PowerPC G4
    512K L2 cache @1.33GHz
    512MB memory (DDR333 SDRAM)
    12.1-inch TFT Display, 1024×768 resolution
    ATI Mobility Radeon 9550 32MB DDR video memory
    40GB Ultra ATA hard drive
    Combo Drive (DVD-ROM/CD-RW)
    Built-in AirPort Extreme, Built-in Bluetooth 2.0+EDR
    Scrolling Trackpad, Sudden Motion Sensor

    SRP: $999 or roughly Php55,000

    Is Apple trying to get rid of its PowerPC processors this fast? I read somewhere they’re selling cheap at Overstocks.com.

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    What Constitutes a Blog?

    Published by: yuga under: Site Updates. 33 replies

    posted: July 24th, 2005 (Visited 8175 times)

    While reviewing entries on the Pinoy Top Blogs, I noticed that some of them might seem like a plain web site rather than a blog. The question still remains, what constitutes a blog?

    In my presentation during the iBlog Summit last May, I referred to a blog as:

    A weblog, web log or simply a blog, is a web application which contains periodic time-stamped posts on a common webpage.

    These posts are often but not necessarily in reverse chronological order. Such a website would typically be accessible to any Internet user. The format of weblogs varies, from simple bullet lists of hyperlinks, to article summaries with user-provided comments and ratings.

    Individual weblog entries are almost always date and time-stamped, with the newest post at the top of the page, and reader comments often appearing below it.

    Because links are so important to weblogs, most blogs have a way of archiving older entries and generating a static address for individual entries; this static link is referred to as a permalink.

    A weblog is edited, organized and published often through a content management system or CMS.

    A blog is a personal diary. A daily pulpit. A collaborative space. A political soapbox. A breaking-news outlet. A collection of links. Your own private thoughts. Your blog is whatever you want it to be. There are millions of them, in all shapes and sizes, and there are no real rules.

    Source: Wikipedia / Blogger.com

    Sean emailed me this:

    That would raise an interesting question, actually. What constitutes a blog, and what doesn’t constitute a blog?

    Take Citizen Watch, for example. Is this a blog? At first glance, this seems to be a journalistic blog that’s much like the Inside PCIJ site - only that it contains news and updates regarding the Arroyo political debacle. A closer look, however, notes that the articles on the site are apparently submitted by independent users to an editorial board before being published online. “Citizen Watch”, with its “Sun.Star” affiliation, feels more like an online newspaper than a blog to begin with.

    Or, for that matter, how is an online newspaper NOT a blog? It clearly reflects the opinions of multiple people on a single site.

    Check his blog later for a more indepth discussion.

    The C at replied back with this:

    Good, you brought that up.

    ENCANTADIA is not a pinoyblog. it is a blog for channel 7 shows. Citizenwatch is a Sunstar newspaper. The pinoy blog is being used for their adverstisement.

    Now there’s another thought. Does motive count when considering if a site is a blog or not?

    Although I believe I have the last say on Pinoy Top Blogs, I’d really appreciate it if the Pinoy Blogging Community do a self-check.

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    ECS G320: Cheapest Laptop ever?

    Published by: yuga under: Personal Computing. 33 replies

    posted: July 23rd, 2005 (Visited 20283 times)


    Look at this ECS G320 laptop. Got this from PC Buyers guide last week. Could this be the cheapest locally distributed laptop ever?

    ECS Laptop

    Runs on a VIA C3 (Nehemiah) 1GHz, 128MB DDR SODIMM, 14.1″ XGA TFT LCD, built-in graphics with up to 64MB shared memory, 40GB HDD, built-in speakers, modem and LAN, 4 USB 2.0, 1 VGA out, 4-cell Li-Ion pack battery.

    SRP: Php29,995

    Looks affordable enough, except you’d wish it comes with 256 MB ram and WiFi enabled. I wonder how the VIA C3 1GHz performs?

    [tags]cheapest laptops, review, ecs laptop, portable, mobile pc[/tags]

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    Topics for Focus Blogs

    Published by: yuga under: Netrepreneur. 11 replies

    posted: July 22nd, 2005 (Visited 2502 times)

    Had a chat with Manolo this afternoon about launching several focus blogs. This could be the start in our journey to become ProBloggers in the near future. :D

    The main consideration we had was about “blog topics”. We had a couple of topics in mind but we need to consider some factors as well such as its viability, availability of resources, our grasp of the topic to blog, and target audience. I think we’re on the right track here and we hope to get it kicking within the month.

    Later in the afternoon, I checked some RSS feeds and found out Darren posted about Principles of Choosing a Profitable Blog Topic. And since our target revenue stream would still primarily be AdSense (and maybe YPN later), the entry becomes a timely and relevant read.

    I’m also contemplating on a group blog actually but that requires long term commitment from co-bloggers. Maybe I could ask around if someone’s interested.

    I have also noticed that in the recent months, mainstream media have been vigorously referencing and featuring bloggers and the local “blogging phenomenon”. Is this a sign of a formal acceptance of the general public for blogs as an alternative source of news and information? If you read from new reports, some journalist would merely quote from blogs left and right since it’s much easier than actually interviewing resource people.

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    What if you earn $14,436.45 a month for blogging?

    Published by: yuga under: Blogosphere. 27 replies

    posted: July 21st, 2005 (Visited 10054 times)

    Sounds incredulous but it’s very well true. Darren of ProBlogger.net just got his biggest monthly cheque from Google at the amount of $14,436.45. That’s more than Php800,000 at the current peso exchange rate. And he got all that just for the month of May.

    This got everybody talking about him even before he got Slashdotted a couple of days ago.

    Even if you only get 10% of that a month around here, it’s still big bucks. And all I get is a measly hundred bucks each month. Mr. ProBlogger has already even bought a house from his previous earnings.

    Darren’s blogs (all 20 of them) are a living proof that one can really make it full-time just blogging. Well, he spends 8 to 12 hours a day reading and writing blogs but, he’s getting hits even while flying to some conference or seminar. And he’s been at it for years now.

    In the local scene, I only know of a handful (2 or 3 other people) Pinoy bloggers who are able to get past the $100-barrier each month. There are still others though who run online directories, link farms and content factories (re-publishing lifted text) to earn the clicks.

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    Busy days are here again.

    Published by: yuga under: Site Updates. 13 replies

    posted: July 20th, 2005 (Visited 2493 times)

    I’m swamped. I’m not sure if I can maintain my one-post-a-day around here anymore. Reminds me of the dreaded “hell week” back in college.

    And then there’s one design project for a local bar and a custom WordPress theme for PinayExpat.

    Been tweaking around with “my.cnf” of several very busy servers. :D mySQL optimization is kinda fun and tiring. :D

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    Pinoy Top Blogs explained.

    Published by: yuga under: Orphaned. 4 replies

    posted: July 19th, 2005 (Visited 2887 times)

    Due to the number of inquiries and emails I get about the Pinoy Top Blogs project, I did a quick break from regular work and setup an adhoc page for it here.

    I hope that I may have answered the more urgent and hanging questions to all those who have joined the PTB system.

    Why still in beta?
    As of today (just 5 days old), the project is still in beta. Beta in the sense that I am still considering a lot of factors for this to really push thru publicly:

    • Acceptability. Do I have enough credibility (to bloggers) to put up and maintain such system?
    • Scalability. Will the server I am hosting this system be able to handle all the page requests (Apache connections) and mySQL queries. Tracking 5 very popular blogs could even stress a server more than hosting 200 regular blogs.
    • Standards. I am still working reconsidering on the standards or metrics to use in ranking. So far, the one in place seems fine. I coudl tweak and do a hybrid rating later on, if possible.
    • The system that I use now is also in beta.
    • Time constraints. I’m already lagged on several personal and commissioned projects.

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    You like Jap food?

    Published by: yuga under: Food & Resto. 18 replies

    posted: July 18th, 2005 (Visited 3979 times)

    Went to host a party last week-end at the Valle Verde for our company mid-year celebration. Most of the food served were Japanese cuisine (read: raw). Good thing I was able to grab dinner before hitting the party. I took solace in taking them pictures though:


    sushi


    meat

    Looks like I’m becoming the team’s official photographer. Taken using my Canon Ixus 30 (3.2MP). More pictures.

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    The Book Baton

    Published by: yuga under: Daily Dose. 4 replies

    posted: July 18th, 2005 (Visited 2023 times)

    Looks like all I lack now is a getting tagged for the musical baton.

    Kates just passed me the Book Baton and I guess it’s good timing since I just got myself a few more books recently:D :

    Number of books on my shelf :
    Those that I owned/bought: 2o tops

    Last book bought:
    Digital Fortress by Dan Brown

    Book I read now:
    Five People You Meet in Heaven by Mitch Albom

    Last 5 books read:

    • 2004 Guinness Book of World Records
    • The New New Thing: A Silicon Valley Story by Michael Lewis
    • Angels & Demons Code by Dan Brown
    • Deception Point by Dan Brown
    • The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown

    Books I’ll cherish:

    Passing the Baton to:

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    Acknowledging Blog Critics

    Published by: yuga under: Daily Dose. 7 replies

    posted: July 17th, 2005 (Visited 2553 times)

    Darren of proBlogger asks “So how do you respond to criticism? What advice would you give?” and shares a rather lengthy piece about he responds to blogging criticisms.

    I have had my fair share of blog critics both via the comments section, sms and mostly private (and sometimes anonymous) email. Most of them comments are thoughtful, constructive, encouraging and inspiring. And I can never thank them enough.

    Then, there are the rest. Through the years, I have learned quite a lot from them to be frank and have formulated my own steps in responding to them.

    • Consider each feedback or critique to be in good faith, even if reads a little bitter at first glance. Draw conclusions later as to the motive and nature of the comment.
    • Take the critic’s side first before defending yours. You could be reading them the other way. How the feedback was delivered can also be a measure of the critic’s sincerity. Most feedback can be sent via blog comments while others opt to send it over email. Then, there are those who blog about it for their readers before even telling you.
    • Don’t answer back right away. The worst timing to respond to a feedback is when you are busy. Read it again when you have nothing else to do, that way, you are focused and relaxed.
    • Always thank them first, even just for the effort of making the critique whether it be constructive or desctructive. It means that even if don’t like you or your blog, they consider it worth their while to read your blog and even write to you.
    • Be professional when you write back. You don’t want to go down to their level if their are insinuating or hypocritical.
    • Your first response is your only and last response. Don’t feed their ego too much.

    How about you? Care to share any tips? ;)

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    Consider Junking phpBB

    Published by: yuga under: Freewares. 8 replies

    posted: July 16th, 2005 (Visited 10021 times)

    Among the free message board softwares available to the public, phpBB seems to the one of the most favorite of the lot.

    Frankly, I have not extensively used, styled nor administered a forum running on phpBB. For about four years now, I have had considerable experience styling & hacking InvisionBoard and vBulletin for my own sites and a few others for foreign clients. Not once I have been commissioned to do one using phpBB.

    My gut tells me to gravitate away from phpBB and if you are running multiple servers with hundreds of domains and where about 2 dozens of each have installed phpBB, you’ll know what I’m getting at. It’s a nightmare to keep track of all of them, much more if there are serious security risks and all installations that need to be patched at the soonest possible time. Did I also forgot to mention that phpBB security alerts come out almost every other month or so?

    If you read some local IT news in the recent months, you would have at least heard of government sites and even the one ran by domains.ph being hacked (by script kiddies) because of unpatched phpBB vulnerabilities.

    Posed with that predicament, one would really consider junking phpBB altogether.

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    The Pinoy Top Blogs Project

    Published by: yuga under: Blogosphere. 31 replies

    posted: July 15th, 2005 (Visited 6975 times)

    Taking a hint from BlogTopSites, I reckon it would be wise to have a localized version of a blog ranking system for Pinoy blogs.

    I spared no time to implement a beta site for this, and called the project Pinoy Top Blogs. Basically, what it does is monitor the traffic of an individual blog thru its unique visitors and hits. That way, one can identify how many unique readers and unique visits a blog gets on an average month which is used as a basis for ranking. The stats are then re-freshed at the end of the month to give way to potentially popular new blog members.

    To add your blog to the tracking system, you will need to register as a member, enter as many as 10 blogs sites, generate the button codes to copy and paste into all pages of your blog. Only blog pages which the button appears will be tracked. Current rankings are also displayed on the tracking button.

    Using the same system, I am hoping to add as many features and functionalities to the project in order to generate a statistically verifiable profile of the Filipino Blogging Community. It is still on beta though.

    Check it out and add your blogs now.

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