Last month, we had some good discussions about who or what comprises the Philippine Blogosphere.
With the numerous projects (or lists) that I’ve launched and with the different entities/groups that help promote Filipino bloggers or Philippine blogs, there have been varying distinctions as to what makes a blog Pinoy.
Take for example the Philippine Blog Awards (which btw is now expired). Though the qualifications where not clear, it was mentioned to me that only Filipino citizens or those with Filipino decent are eligible. (note to self: recover the domain and re-launch the site to something worthy of its name).
When we launched The Philippines According to Blogs, Connie defined similar qualifications, i.e. (a) a Filipino citizen or (b) of Filipino ancestry irrespective of citizenship. On the other hand, my requisites for approving entries in PinoyTopBlogs extended to those blogs which covers topics about the Philippine or the Filipinos even though the authors/bloggers are foreigners.
You see, it’s really hard and tedious to individually investigate the affiliation or citizenship of a blogger just by reading his blog. What I usually do is look for identifying elements — domain whois info, use of Filipino language, profile of blogs linking in and linked out, topics or theme of subject entries, profile and language of commenters, among other things.
Anyway, Von of the Filipino Librarian suggests a good umbrella definition of a “Pinoy” blog. You can read his full entry here but I’dlike to take his definition and refine it a little bit more:
Blogs about the Philippines or the Filipinos. It doesn’t matter whether the blogs were produced in or outside the Philippines, by Filipinos or non-Filipinos, in any of the Philippine languages, or in English, as long as majority of the content is about the Philippines, its culture and its people.
I basically refined it to cover two points – (1) only English content should be considered when including foreign languages because it becomes illogical and incomprehensible to include languages that a vast majority of the Filipino audience do not understand and (2) when the author/s are not Filipinos, the majority of content of the blog must cover the Philippines, otherwise, we will see social/news blogs like Global Voices included in the list even if they only cover Philippine-related content with less than 1% of their entire blog.
The definition above is still subject to further refinements.
lucia chopra says:
Hello there, I have just started up a blog website and in the middle of creating somewhat diverse content. Would you mind if I blog about this blog? I will of course give you and this site full credit.
Mike says:
There are blogs, there are blogs that have feeds
and blogs that don’t.
Of all the Top Blog lists, not one that I’ve
seen has a corresponding RSS list or an OPML.
I look at blog lists and have no way of knowing
which blogs (short of feed discovery – a time
consuming, painstaking process or feed scraping
a time consuming, exasperating process) have
RSS feeds. What feed scrapers I’ve seen assume
an uncommon expertise with insufficient explanation or example to prove them useful.
What’s the likelihood of a SEAMLESS process which
integrates Blogs, RSS, and OPML?
If such a process exists – WHERE?
charleslemark says:
i know, im not an authority when it comes to blogging, but i justw ant to comment on the definition of the Philippine Blogosphere:
Philippine Blogosphere should have at least one of the following traits or characteristics:
1. A blog must be produced, administered or written by a Filipino, regardless of any contents or posts
2. A blog must have contents or posts about the Filipino culture, regardless of who produced, administered or wrote the blogpost
3. A blog must be of Filipino language, regardless of who produced, administered or wrote the blog or blogposts
4. A blog must be of English language, which a Filipino produced, administered or written, regardless of any contents or posts
5. A blog must be of English language, which the content talks about Filipino culture or living, regardless of who produced, administered or wrote the blog or blogposts
6. A blog must be of any Filipino dialect, which the content talks about Filipino culture or living, regardless of who produced, administered or wrote the blog or blogposts
alwell says:
Maybe your group should have award something blog site. Why not renew the site?
alwell says:
he gave up on the domain. months ago.
Abe Olandres says:
Yes, i think this is a really good topic for discussion. Haven’t heard from my friend yet but I think he just forgot to renew it.
vonjobi says:
btw, why did PBA expire? nagalit ba yung owner sa dami ng comments?
vonjobi says:
wow, i just saw this now. i agree, maybe we can have one session at the summit to discuss this. it doesn’t all have to be just one person talking like the last time…
Miguel says:
This looks like something we should discuss at the Blog Summit.