Tag: Blogging

Has Akismet Really Been Smart?

I don’t know about you but at least in the last six months I received comments obviously are spam past through Akismet anti-spam filters. Even the akismet stats, I don’t think they’re telling the truth about how many spam they missed –the ones I manually marked as spam. The numbers are just definitely way off the count that I everyday mark as spam.

The missed spam –these are comments that all have to only say, “they liked my website”, “I have the best website”, “they’ve subscribed to my RSS feeds”, and sometimes asking “they can’t understand how to subscribe to my rss feeds”, without adding any single value whatsoever to what my post was about to which they are commenting. They are usually coupled with strange names and url’s or domain names that looked really bogus (e.g. insurance, some medical drugs, etc.).

I love your website.

So do I, now what? Do you want me to visit yours? No way!

I enjoyed your website.

Really? I hope you enjoy more!

Or maybe, the reason these comments go past the Akismet filters is because other people just simply approve them for their own blogs without second thoughts. And Akismet is left confused, don’t know what to do with the same ip address, name, email address, and website url.

Yeah, I’ve seen some comments like these published in other blogs.

Maybe the blogosphere has become too crowded that rendered anti-spam filters like Akismet ineffective.

Bullet Points: Island Reef Job, White Whining, Email Encryption, Youtube and PS3, Air Travel Tip

The Best Job In The World

An Australian state is offering internationally what it calls “the best job in the world” — earning a top salary for lazing around a beautiful tropical island for six months.

The job pays 150,000 Australian dollars (105,000 US dollars) and includes free airfares from the winner’s home country to Hamilton Island on the Great Barrier Reef, Queensland’s state government announced.

Applications are open until February 22. Eleven shortlisted candidates will be flown to Hamilton Island in early May for the final selection process and the six month contract will commence on July 1.

Read more in the Island Reef Job website.

Continue reading Bullet Points: Island Reef Job, White Whining, Email Encryption, Youtube and PS3, Air Travel Tip

Creating and Maintaining a Personal Website

As a response to Suon Dondi‘s query here:

Personal Websites and Blogs

Most people maintain personal websites through blogs. A blog is what makes a personal website pertinent by posting updates every now and then.

When it comes to blogs, the first thing that should come to mind is WordPress. This is so far, in my opinion (and I’m sure a lot of bloggers will share my opinion), the best blogging platform.

A .com, .net, or .org domain name usually costs around $10 per year. That’s around P470 a year — cheap!:D

Blogger/blogspot actually permits mapping of domain names into your blogger blog. Say, you have a domain name at example.com, you can make it map to your existing blog at blogger.com so all your posts will appear within your domain name (example.com) and all your former permalinks (e.g., example.blogspot.com) will automatically redirect to your new domain name. This service is called Custom Domains. Refer to this documentation to set-up a custom domain at blogger.com.

But blogger.com alone does not offer that much flexibility as compared to when you host your own website. Hosting puts you in total control of your website. But hosting entails additional cost on top of what you paid for the domain name.
Continue reading Creating and Maintaining a Personal Website

Friendster Introduces a New Blogging Platform

Hello deuts,

We’d like to introduce you to your new blog on Friendster! We’ve been very busy building out Friendster Blogs 2.0 and your blog has been moved to the new blogging platform. It’s ready for you to customize, edit, and add even more content to it!

Some things you should know about your new blog:

  • Your blog has been moved to the new platform.
  • It is likely that your blog layout or colors may not appear exactly as they were on your old blog, you can edit or add new customizations to your blog by clicking the ‘Design’ tab or ‘Change Theme’ button when you access your blog from your home page.
  • All of the photos you’ve uploaded to your old blog will soon be moved to your new blog. When they are moved, they will be in your Blogs Media Library (Manage –> Media Library). Don’t worry, we’ll move all your photos for you! We plan to have this complete by September 17th.
  • If you experience any inconsistencies with your blog during the next few weeks, please bear with us and please do let us know what you find so we can build a better product!

To get started with your new blog, please go to:

http://jotuvillo.blog.friendster.com/

We look forward to your participation and your feedback on our new blogs property. We value our global community and members like you who make Friendster the success that it is!

If you have questions or need additional assistance, please contact Customer Support by clicking “Send us a Question” from our Help page.

Thanks!
The Friendster Blogs Team

The message from my inbox the other day. After some time, Friendster eventually migrated the blogs it used to offer from Typepad to WordPress Mu. Could it be another proof that WordPress is winning the blogging platform market against its closest rival, Movable Type?

Continue reading Friendster Introduces a New Blogging Platform

Awaiting WordPress 2.5

This site is proudly powered by WordPress (WP).

Wordpress LogoWith lots of updates going on into the core of wordpress install, particularly with the upcoming WordPress 2.5, a lot of features are being introduced. I’m afraid there will come a time that WordPress would not be as lightweight but functional as it used to be. WordPress users are asking for features left and right specific to their needs. The WordPress team, it appears to me, are moving towards satisfying all those requests by the various users in one package, that is WordPress.

Continue reading Awaiting WordPress 2.5

Of Jollibee, of McDo

Many of you might have already seen the youtube video regarding Jolibee mascots doing naugthy things in front of a camera. I don’t want to post the video here anymore. Enough for that crap. You can search it though if you want.

Such video circulated through emails, and especially blogs. Jollibee Food Corp. (JFC), on the other hand, made a response through email:

Dear Parents,

We regret to inform you that a video depicting our well-loved Jollibee mascots in a distasteful situation is now circulating online. The material is obviously no more than someone’s idea of a senseless amusement. Yet we cannot ignore the equally obvious risk of its effect on our children.

Jollibee created the mascot for kids, their wholesome fun and carefree innocence. We’ve worked hard and unceasingly for the mascot to earn your kids’ trust and love. It would be so sad to have all this swept away by one mindless prank.

We will not let this pass, neither will we let it happen again. Be assured we are taking all necessary steps to bring the culprits into account. One thing we know we can count on is your support in countering this threat.

Continue reading Of Jollibee, of McDo

Look, Who’s Blogging!

Randel used to say,

I hate blogs! I’m not interested in reading other people’s diaries.

Well, blogs in the earlier years were associated with online diaries, yes. Blog was a compression of the words ‘web log’, thus blog. In the early days of the internet, they were put up to create online diaries, especially for those who are fond of writing.

However, blogs and blogging evolved to provide not only personal journals or records of individual experiences. It involved commentaries on political issues, news, and technological developments. Some used blogging as media to showcase one’s passion for photography (photoblogs), painting, etc.

In the Philippine blogosphere alone, Bong Austero, the author of the celebrated “Open Letter to Our Leaders” last February made his way to being a columnist in Manila Standard Today through blogging.

Bloggers in the international arena who especially captured a niche in the technology world are earning five or maybe even six digits US dollars a month (e.g., problogger.net) through google adsense and other various ads.

And of course, there are the celebrities who are also into blogging. KC Conception blogs her way through Paris. Jim Paredes of the Apo Hiking Society talks about life and his music.

Continue reading Look, Who’s Blogging!

Deuts.net No. 100

It must have been awhile, and now, I’m on my 100th entry on this site. It’s amazing looking at how this thing has even started.

The Start

It was around last year when I was looking for a way by which I can save my bookmarks (or favorites in internet explorer) so that I can access them in whichever machine I’m working on. I had my computer reformatted that time, and I had to add the websites that I frequented for quick access.

I was thinking if I could have a customized website where all my bookmarks, shortcuts to my favorite sites (e.g., email, personal internet banking, chessworld.net, etc.) are immediately available, it would definitely help speed up my online browsing. I googled “free website”, and it led me to the best user-friendly, free webhost so far then — Yahoo! Geocities. (Unfortunately, I didn’t happen to stumble upon the various bookmarking tools like Delicious, not even the much simpler ones like My Yahoo!, Personalized Google Homepage, etc.)

What made geocities most viable is the handiness of the site builder. At least, I didn’t need to have knowledge of html encoding (although eventually, I decided I needed at least the basic commands so I tried studying them, I even bought a book for html that I didn’t finish reading at all).

So what have I got back then? Presenting…. the J.O. TUVILLO & CO. website.

jotuvilloco.jpg
Continue reading Deuts.net No. 100