That was the title of a column of mine, but it applies as well to an ongoing debate in the blogosphere (well, in our neck of the woods, anyway).
If you recall, Asiapundit had a mass layoff (I was one of the ones fired). One reason was the lack of rallying round the blog when time came to put up a good fight. The result, apparently, was that the intelligent blogs once more by Xiaxue, which wiped the floor the with the other bloggers Check out an entry in theory is the reason which dissects the showing of blogs nominated for best Asian blogs (Aiyee defends Xiaxue). Xiaxue doesn’t bother to defend herself: she proclaims her superiority, end of story. Then, go back to Myrick’s post in Asiapundit, and read the comments, which explains the problem with the Asian blog awards category as it stands (funniest part: Myrick feigning ignorance as to why his Chinese friends object to his idea of establish a Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere webring).
Mercifully, the Filipino blogosphere doesn’t seem as obsessed with rankings and popularity as a measure of quality: or even fought among themselves over what they write or don’t choose to write. The bloggers jockeying for Best Asian Blog apparently campaigned intensively for the honor (flagrant harbor’s post shows campaigning, in reality anti-campaigning -“anyone but Xiaxue!- at it’s humorous best: “For crying out loud, she has her hair color sponsored!”); to her credit, the lone Filipino in consideration, Sassy Lawyer, didn’t lift a pinkie to do so. The most we wonder about is why certain topics are more popular than others, or why blogs covering certain things seem less read than newer blogs covering other things. I stubbornly insist our readership hasn’t decreased, and in fact, can only go up, with regards to political and news blogs. But we have to admit that the increasing diversity of our blogosphere means we will be, online, what we are, in the “real world” -interesting only to a minority.
Still, we all follow our traffic with varying obsessiveness and try to understand whatever the indicators –Technorati, Pinoy Top Blogs, Top Blog Sites, Site Meter, the TTLB Ecosystem and even Google– might have to say about us and our readers. We’re puzzled, at times dazed and confused, when our rankings climb, or when they dip, when people link to us or stop linking to us, and so on.
The ranking going into the voting, from this page, via this entry.
Technorati Tags: Blogging, Google, googling, media, Philippines
I think the reason that Miss Xiaxue is winning is that more younger people blog, and more young people actually think it’s worth their time to vote for people who blog.
(Oh, I need statistics for this.)
(Googling isn’t helping me one bit.)
Anyway, assuming that my first statement was correct…
I do have faith on my second reason for Miss Xiaxue’s winning, however. Young people care more about popularity and stuff, so would invest more time in voting for people they think ought to be noticed (not that Miss Xiaxue isn’t being noticed already). And then we get to that part about how young people think. Truth to tell, young people aren’t very interested in the news. We know the vague details, like there’s a war in Iraq, Saddam has been captured. But beyond that, only a few young people could be able to keep up with news for so long.
I shall have to admit that while reading your blog, Mr. Quezon, I have to constantly try to rouse myself from a stupor caused by a litany of names that’s supposed to mean something, but doesn’t. Sorry. When I get older I promise I’ll catch up.
The point is, the young people, those who vote more (and those who WILL vote more than once, even if they had to do it everyda), can relate to Miss Xiaxue. Or at least, can relate more to Xiaxue, than they can relate to, say, the Sassy Lawyer. I at least know what make up means. I have no idea what a bill of attainder is, but did find out, thanks to the Sassy Lawyer.
As a reader I don’t read the blogs in one sitting…I go back and if archived I googe search instaed of pressing archives I noticed that not all are archived…
Concerning us Filipinos don’t you know that the number one visited site per Elly Soriano is
ANG DATING DAAN
mahipap man daw at mayaman dyan pumupunta
bakit? para manood ng debate sa INC?????
I would want to dispute that
http://www.angdatingdaan.tv
http://www.angdatingdaan.org/main.php
can be a match to quezon.ph/blog
Its quality not quantity of visitors!
tomoe, i don’t think it has anything to do with age, it has something to do with interests, when i was young, i was already interested in these things; now that i’m older, i’m still interested in them and people my age who were never into this stuff, have never gotten into this stuff.
I don’t understand why popularity is such a big thing.
I blog because I enjoy it. It’s fun. That should really be the only reason anyone blogs. If you have to force yourself to write something, then it will show, and what you write probably will be dull and lackluster.
eli, some people blog to make money, others, to communicate, but i guess part of the whole hubbub is that some put a lot of effort and hard work into something and are upset when it isn’t recognized. on the whole though, i agree with you. you blog, because you want to blog, and as long as you like blogging, that’s all that matters.
To be honest I write blogs every now and then and was a one time link in one of the blogs
That link to nmy blog smile google loves you…
I was so superficial and mababaw but as long as I enjoy that is all that matters…
To Mr. Quezon: Point made. So I guess all I have to say now is more people are interested in make-up than the bill of attainder.
As for popularity, I did notice that we Filipinos aren’t that interested in blogging popularity contests. I know a lot of people who never tell the people they know that they blog.
I blog because I want to. And because it’s addictive. Haha.
tomoe, true, true!
Its like popular movies. The highest grossing films don’t necessarily mean they are intelligent, well-meaning films. For example, Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith will probably end up as the highest grossing film of 2005, but can it be considered an intelligent piece of art? Don’t think so.
I browsed through Xiaxue’s blog and it simply is empty-headed rambling. Waste of time if you ask me.