Showing posts with label PHAIL. Show all posts

Dear Globe,

WTF. I was saving up to get a Sun Cellular broadband modem because it has unlimited one day internet for P50. With that, at least, I wouldn't worry so much over dropped signals and having to pay P5 each time I connected even if the connection sucked. With you I was paying P5 each time I connected whether or not I spent the full 15 minutes or the signal dropped and disconnected me after one minute. Do you know how much that adds up when you have something to do on the internet and your connection sucks?

Let me get one thing straight. I am not endorsing any candidates.

I just noticed that the adsense ads on my blog are showing ads for Manny Villar and Loren Legarda. I am not endorsing any of those candidates, or any candidates for that matter, and most certainly NOT those two. Although I haven't yet settled on a president, those two are out of the running as far as I'm concerned. I have now blocked political ads in my Adsense. /looks annoyed/

I saw a picture that had been making the rounds lately... a rumored Filipino adaptation (and we've been getting a lot of those lately) this time of Meteor Garden. Remember it? San Cai and the four boys of F4, which spawned such F4 mania that my mom still has F4 placemats and coasters to this very day. As we all know, Meteor Garden was but one of the small-screen adaptations of a popular manga... the other adaptations include Hanayori Dango and Boys over Flowers. I admit to being one of those who watched Meteor Garden off and on during the height of the F4 fever just to find out what the fuss was all about. While I did appreciate the charms of the four guys that made up F4, I couldn't help but think that it was the very foreign-ness of the series that made its quirks palatable to Pinoy audiences. I mean, really, what self-respecting Pinoy 'kada, in view of the "macho" Pinoy culture, would call itself the "Flower Four?"

On the heels of the rumored Meteor Garden adaptation comes the rumors of yet another adaptation of a foreign TV series, this time a personal favorite: Shining Inheritance, which had only concluded its Philippine run early this January. I don't think you'll find a fan of that drama in these islands more devoted than I am, but all I could think upon hearing the rumor was : Oh, shoot no, you'll ruin it for me! I had been thinking recently, what if Shining Inheritance had a sequel, since I hated that it had to end. But then I thought... nah, it's best that way, to leave it as it is. It's the chemistry between the characters of Hwan and Eun Sung that made it so great to watch, and Lee Seung Gi and Han Hyo Joo played them well. I don't want them to be superseded by another Juan and Inna. For that matter, I watched the series in both the original Korean with subtitles on the internet and the Tagalog dub on TV, and was annoyed with some of the changes in the dialogue, as sometimes perhaps the original words did not fit with the character's lip movements when translated, or perhaps the dubbers thought that the Filipino audience would not understand references to Korean culture, I don't know. For me, since the series was after all Korean, the references to Korean culture was part of the whole parcel and I was glad to learn something new.

Let's face it, local TV nowadays is full of derivative shows, either sequels to old shows, remakes of old movies or soaps, or local adaptations of foreign series. Everything is something old made over. It gives new meaning to the old adage that "Filipinos are great imitators," doesn't it? We've got the local versions of Deal or No Deal, Who Wants to be a Millionaire, Survivor, even Pinoy Idol. We have the Pinoy versions of Marimar, Ugly Betty, and now Full House... coming soon, Endless Love. Goddammit, can't you even give us something new to watch? What is this rut you guys are in? What's next, a local version of CSI or 24? Why can't you put on a series on Lapu-lapu, Bantugan, or Mga Ibong Mandaragit? Our school children know who Jumong and Jang Geum and Seon Deok are, but do they know who Maria Makiling and Bernardo Carpio are? They could probably name the hierarchies of old Korean nobility, but couldn't probably name all ten Bornean datus from the Maragtas (Datus Puti, Bangkaya, Lumbay, Balinsuna, Paiburong, Dumalogdog, Dumangsol, Padohinog, Sumakwel, Dumangsil.) They could learn Japanese or Chinese or Korean, but not Ilocano or Cebuano or Bikolano if those are not their native tongues.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that we should not learn something about other places. I'm just saying that it's just plain wrong that we don't pay as much attention to the richness of our own history and culture as we do to that of other places. Why does everything have to be an imitation of what's elsewhere? Why can't we create something that's uniquely Filipino? And don't give me any of that crap about it "not selling," about it being "not interesting enough." If you couldn't make the old stories, or stories about our own culture, interesting enough to sell, then you probably aren't good enough writers. And you have a captive audience, for goodness' sake. Look at the crap they swallow right now because there isn't anything better. I guess though, that it is easy for just any paid hack to churn out reams of derivative junk on formula. As long as it sells, it doesn't matter if it's junk, right? As long as the advertisers keep paying for ads, and people go on watching because there isn't anything better. If the Koreans could turn out beautiful versions of their own epics and capture a global audience, why can't we? Let's leave the foreign-made originals as they are, perfectly good originals that we all fell in love with, and create some good originals of our own.

Among the books I read in my early childhood were Nancy Drews and Hardy Boys. I was inspired to create something like that on my own, drawing characters from the people around me. The only problem was that they all ended up with American names, and I had written about twenty pages before it dawned on me that characters with American names do not live in a small barrio in the Philippines. I was about nine or ten years old, and the problem was that the American small town and its culture was more familiar territory to me in books than were the Philippine barrio and town. I would only learn much much later that it is always best to write about what you know, that no matter how fictitious your stories are, they should always be
rooted in something that is real to you in order for you to do justice to them. I ripped up what I had written and resolved from then on that I would always try to write about what I knew, with characters that were like the people around me, that I would try my best to come up with original stories and not derivations of those I read. From then on, I paid more attention to what was around me so that I could infuse local color into what I write. My recent NaNoWriMo effort, "The Secret of the Cottage," hearkens back to those stories I once wrote for fun when I was younger; the characters, Kat and her brothers Ian and Andy and her friends Pie and Michael and Eddie and Toffee could be any one of the people around me when I was growing up.

For God's sake, stop with these derivative things already and give us something new for a change.

Dear Congress and Malacanang,

Do you know the meaning of the word "oxymoron"? No, it's not a moron with too much oxygen in his brain.

Please stop designating "special working holidays."

A holiday is a day on which one is exempted from work. If we have to go to work on that day, then please don't call it a holiday at all, as you are only needlessly raising our expectations. Why don't you just call it a "special day" or "commemorative day" or something?

Kthxbai.

In short, sorry for the hiatus, people. There were a lot of posts that never made it to this blog in that period of time I wasn't posting in it. For example, I was planning on my 30th birthday "midlife crisis" post which never materialized, lol. IDK... a natural reservation against baring all? A lot of other things have happened in the meantime, especially on the political scene, which I never got around to formulating concrete commentary over. Anyway, I'm back... I hope. LOL. *sticks charger in socket and zaps self*

A certain photograph has been making the rounds of the internet recently. I'm not going to post it here to gratify the sordid appetites of Internet weirdos, though. Suffice it to say that it is said to have originated on Facebook, and depicts what looks like four female high school students in a school comfort room. All four are wearing their high school uniforms, but have pushed their blouses up and their skirts down to reveal their underwear; one of them is even wearing a thong. There is a logo on the t-shirt worn by one of them; another is wearing a school ID; the school uniform is your standard white blouse and checkered skirt with a tie. The skirt and tie are a particular shade of neon-blue-green.

Men and even teenage boys have been commenting on this photograph and passing it around on social networks and other places on the Internet since last week. Many of them express titillation and appreciation of the photograph; one said that he wanted them for his birthday, and another said that he didn't care whose children they were, since they'd posted the photo in public, they were fair game. It's none of your business what I think or do with the photo, he said. I don't have any sisters anyway.

It's appalling what minors like these do nowadays, and that people who know better would even condone and appreciate such behavior. Shall we blame media? TV? Movies? The prevalence of the Internet? Where are the parents of these children? Where are the teachers and the school administrators of the school where this photograph was taken? Why haven't they taken any action on the matter?

Perhaps these children did it for a lark, as children do who climb trees while wearing skirts. Perhaps they thought it would be fun to be "daring," the way they see others do on TV or the movies or the internet. Perhaps in the ways of teenagers, they thought it would be exciting to do something they shouldn't be doing. What harm could there be in a photograph? Indeed, what harm could there be in having your face and body become notorious across the Internet... after all, they can only look and not touch? They fail to realize that if the Internet can be anywhere, it could be in the places where they live, and could be seen by people who would recognize them. Could be seen, perhaps, by men who don't care whose children they are, or that they are in fact children, who would think that since their photograph was on the internet after all, they were fair game, and who wouldn't take no for an answer. They failed to realize that one photograph, after all, could ruin their lives, and that of their families, for good.

I wonder what the parents of these children would think if they saw their daughters' photographs? Would they be angry? Would they be sad? Or, most appalling of all, would they sit back and laugh and applaud?

Dear Philippines,
You just suffered another major fail today, amidst all the major fails that have been going on in you anyway. Today your Commission on Elections has refused the petition of a gay organization to be included in the party lists that will be voted upon to represent your people in congress in the coming May 2010 elections.

The Comelec's reason: Being gay is offensive to religious morals and therefore cannot be allowed a voice in Congress. Yet, it said, it is "not condemning the LGBT, but we cannot compromise the well-being of the greater number of our people, especially the youth." Double-talk, much?
Bullshit.
This after this country and this administration has been touting that it is well ahead of other countries when it comes to gender sensitivity. Isn't it ironic? But what do you expect of a culture of pakitang-tao (surface appearances)?
Ang Ladlad is offensive to public morals, it seems, but Jovito Palparan in Congress isn't, despite the public clamor to have him removed.
Oh, well. We have already known for a long time how hypocritical this government is, anyway.

I hereby declare this day to be International Troll Day on Plurk!

There must be something about the autumn equinox (also today) that makes the trolls all come out to play.

Last night, someone posted on three otherwise relatively innocent threads on Plurk where there were lively conversations ongoing. However, when he was engaged in the discussion by the others on the thread, he began to hog it, throwing out as many as five to six posts each time in a seeming effort to prove that he was erudite. In the end, he ended up hijacking two of the threads (it seems he lost interest in one of them). Subtle hints got nowhere as he threw out half-baked dictionary definitions, highfalutin theories, and refused to accept any point of view not his own. For everything said to him, he came back with a "yes but" answer. Even an outright statement that he was hijacking the thread earned the poster a reply several posts long, defining the term "hijack" and outlining the reasons and technicalities proving he was not "hijacking" the thread. In the end, the people who originally posted the plurks got fed up and blocked him.

Did this stop this person? No, sirree. He then made a plurk thread of his own, expressing his anger and frustration at the people who blocked him from their threads and intimating that they were closed-minded persons who denied him his freedom of expression by their actions. "But they are public plurks and anyone may post in them!" he pointed out. When people explained to him, tactfully at first, that his attitude may have turned people off, he began justifying his actions in verbose detail. No one else was correct but him. He was the only right person in the world and everybody else was wrong, yet, he insisted, he was keeping an open mind.

Finally, people stopped taking his arguments seriously and went to his thread to poke fun at him instead because his antics were now verging so much on the ridiculous they were absolutely hysterical if they weren't frustrating.

Poor person. He seems to have been infected with troll-itis, as he is exhibiting unmistakable troll-like symptoms. Rather pitiable, really. All that he could see was this perfect image of himself in the mirror, unable to break away from the prison of his own reflection, not knowing that he was only looking into the Mirror of Erised and not a true mirror.

The funny thing is that, even as by his acts he seemed to long for validation of his perception that he was wise, knowledgeable, and erudite, he ended up looking like an imbecilic robot in the eyes of all else around him. One plurker whom he had alienated described him as "a sentient bot with no common sense" in frustration. He was like something with an output port but no input port... many things came out, but nothing could go in.

Poor thing. In real life he wouldn't have any friends, as he would alienate them all. But then who said trolls had any friends anyway? They are sufficient unto their own existence and need no one but themselves.

In the end, there is only one way to deal with a troll: to fall back upon the tried-and-tested Internet adage "Do not feed the trolls."

With the 2010 elections coming up, I was happy to see the beginnings of intelligent political discourse by Filipinos on the Internet, aside from the ones I overheard at the sari-sari store at the corner, at the jeepney terminal, and between even my neighbors across the street as they did their laundry by our front steps.

On Plurk, plurksters engaged in lively political debate the likes of which you rarely see outside the academe or even in the hallowed (or hollowed) halls of the legislature nowadays. From debates on Noynoy Aquino's fitness for the presidency, to whether or not he is just riding the media hype, to approbation of Winnie Monsod's grilling of Mikey Arroyo on TV, to reactions to Ping Lacson's exposes, I was beginning to think that yes, perhaps Filipinos are truly waking up to their obligations and responsibilities as citizens.

Then recently someone threw a spanner into the works. To a thread discussing why Noynoy Aquino is being grilled over Hacienda Luisita while Villar is not being asked about the C-5 "insertions," this 17-year-old girl who called herself "Iena" retorted,

"ang pnakamagandang tanung e!!bkt kau namr0mr0bLEma niAn???di nga namr0bLema ung g0byern0 e!!"

For literate persons, what she said was, "The best question is!! Why are you people worrying over that? The government isn't even worried!"

EPIC FAIL.

Today, in the midst of a discussion of Ping Lacson's exposes, this 21-year-old female who called herself, aptly enough, "karenderia," (I am reminded of Vilma Santos's immortal "Para kang karenderyang bukas sa lahat ng gustong kumain (You are like a cheap diner that is open to all who want to eat)!") interjected,

"ang dami niong alam.. dami niong galit sa mga pulitiko wala ka namang naambag sa pilipinas"

Again, for literate people, she said, "You people know too much.. You are so angry at politicians when you haven't contributed anything to the Philippines."

Asked if she had contributed anything, she confidently answered that she had. Asked to enumerate her contributions, she retorted that there were too many to fit in the thread. And expressed joy at having "stolen the scene (agaw eksena)" in the thread. Although she seemed to have raised a point at first, her answers became more and more jeering and sarcastic, so that people on the thread chose to treat her as a troll and ignore her.

Perhaps I am only exhibiting what one of my Law professors once called "intellectual arrogance." Perhaps I am only being arrogant and blind because of who and what I perceive myself to be. But it is frustrating to engage people in serious discussion if they choose to ridicule the process. Frustrating and sad to see that there are people so caught up in their own images in the mirror that everything else without them in the center is a subject to be ridiculed. That there are people like those who suddenly enter and disrupt a discussion, no matter how serious, just to attract attention to themselves, without anything intelligent to contribute to the discourse. Suddenly I fear for the future generation, a generation that can't even spell and seems not to know proper grammar. Will they all grow up to be as shallow and silly and egocentric, caring for nothing else but their clothes and their gadgets and the pettiness of their lives? Will they be sheep, complacent in their silly, shallow lives, not knowing or caring what happens around them until the holocaust sweeps them away without warning?

I know I could look at them as objects of ridicule, of contempt. I could laugh at the silly, ignorant, unwitting sheep. But I want to cry instead.

When the news broke over the weekend about the dinner at Le Cirque that our esteemed public officials had partaken of before flying home "to catch Cory Aquino's funeral," I was struck by the sheer effrontery of it. It was like dancing on Cory's grave, I thought. When someone dies, especially someone as beloved by many as the former president was, you respect the grief of the bereaved, even if you aren't part of the family. It's the proper thing to do.

Then I thought, holy cow... 20 thousand US dollars? That's... about a million pesos!


Article 25 of the Civil Code, I recall, lets the courts enjoin "thoughtless extravagance in expenses for pleasure or display during a period of acute public want or emergency" "at the instance of any government or private charitable institution."

If the ostentatious consumption of a very expensive dinner by public officials on an official visit in another country during a time when majority of people in the country can't even get three square meals a day isn't thoughtless extravagance during a period of acute public want, then I don't know what is.

Then I learned that before that same dinner, our most esteemed public officials had, the night before, consumed a dinner worth 15 thousand US dollars at Bobby Van's Steakhouse. A source also tells me that those weren't the only expensive meals they had partaken, although details of those are unknown as of this time.

So how much was the total amount they spent? The first two bills alone are said to add up to nearly 2 million pesos. Much more than most Filipinos could ever hope to see in a lifetime.

How callous can you be?

Public officials are supposed to act with decorum. I will reiterate what I always say: you guys are not landed nobility, nor are you wealthy royalty. You are elected public officials; your salaries and most of the money you spend on things that have been colored by your public duties even only a little, are paid by the people you swore to serve faithfully when you came into your offices. Your first concern should be the people who elected you, your constituents. Your recent acts are tantamount to Marie Antoinette dismissively saying "let them eat cake."

Do you people even know what it's like to be hungry?

As a college student, I was fortunate in two things: being accepted into a state university, and having parents who could afford to give me a steady and ample allowance every week. I shared a dorm room with five other girls, most of whom could not even afford to eat two full meals a day because all that their parents could give them was 200 pesos a week and two kilos of rice. In the end, I felt ashamed to eat even a simple student meal, worth at that time 25 pesos, in our room. My roommates would go to their morning classes hungry, without breakfast. Instead of lunch, they would return to our room and try to sleep away their hunger for the noon hour. They would eat only in the evening, after their last class, when they would pool their rice and each contribute about 3 pesos each to be able to buy vegetables and dried fish from the local market. I spent 25 to 30 pesos on one meal. My five roommates collectively spent 20 pesos for their communal meal. Oftentimes, when money was really tight, they would ask to borrow 20 pesos from me, but I never asked them to repay the money. I ended up contributing my 25 pesos to augment their meal and eat with them, because it would be the height of callousness for me to fill myself to bursting while they starved. Even if I was perfectly within my rights to do so.

How did they spend the 20 pesos, the way prices were in the late 1990s?

Assorted vegetables - 10 pesos
Bouillon cube - 5 pesos
Three pcs of dried fish - 5 pesos

They would cook the vegetables with the dried fish and add the bouillon for flavoring; the broth would help stretch the dish so all five of them could eat it.

I can't help but compare those meals, worth 20 pesos for five to six people then. to the meals costing 20 thousand US dollars for 20 people enjoyed by our esteemed public officials who don't seem to care what the rest of the Filipinos think or feel about it.

On my way to work everyday, I often catch a cab, or if I'm early, perhaps a jeepney, at the corner of Araneta Avenue and Aurora Boulevard, kitty-corner from SM Centerpoint. Recently, there have been boys in blue, I am not sure if they are traffic police, stationed at this crossroads, usually hanging out beneath the pedestrian overpass, in front of Greenwich Pizza. Sometimes they direct traffic, most of the time they just seem to hang out and watch everybody else go by. Whereas a block or so away, at the corner of V.Mapa, there is this old guy in dark gray who aside from directing traffic often ends up stomping over to the sidewalk to lay down the law to loitering jeepneys and gets heckled by the drivers and conductors.


Oh well, the last time I saw a guy in blue try to direct traffic at Aurora-Araneta, a few weeks ago, he finally had to jump aside and cuss fervently when drivers ignored him. But then the traffic lights seemed to be working just fine, and when he just kept waving one side on through three changes of the lights while holding back the other three, the moment he dropped his arm, drivers gunned their motors and barrelled on through, including the driver of the jeepney I was riding at the moment.

Anyway, at this corner of Araneta and Aurora, one could always be sure of catching a tricyle at a pinch. I used to get annoyed the first few weeks I started catching a ride there, because I was always besieged by tricycle drivers trying to convince me to give up waiting for a cab and take their tricycles instead. Instead of arguing with them while empty cabs passed me by, I finally ended up giving them the cold shoulder and the occasional intentionally unintentional whacks with my tote bag.

A couple of weeks or so ago, somebody put up this huge sign: Unauthorized tricycle terminals are forbidden. The penalty is clearly delineated; at the bottom of the sign are numbers people can call to report any such unauthorized terminals. The first day the sign was up: no tricycles in sight. A day or so later, they would come drifting by oh-so-casually, oh-so-slowly, trolling for passengers. Two or three days ago, they again started parking at the corner in a long line... right underneath the "Tricycle terminal forbidden" sign. And just across Aurora, the boys in blue stand casually, never seeming to notice. If I had a better camera, I'd take a lovely caption-able photo.

Oh, my Philippines.

I was gearing up to blog about my reactions to the recently concluded SONA when something happened that made me want to stand in the middle of EDSA and scream a la Edvard Munch painting.


CARLO J. CAPARAS??? A NATIONAL ARTIST?!?!?!

Granted, he gave us Panday and Bakekang.

But what about Tony Velasquez, "the father of Philippine komiks," who gave us Kenkoy? What about Mars Ravelo, arguably "the greatest Filipino komiks writer of all time," who gave us Darna, Kapten Barbell, Bondying, Dyesebel, and a host of other unforgettable characters and stories? What about Larry Alcala, lauded for "his lifetime dedication to the art of capturing humor in the character and everyday life in the Philippines?"

What about, especially, Francisco V. Coching, considered "the Philippines' greatest illustrator"? Coching who shaped the Filipino style of komiks illustration, who many, if not most, of the Philippines' great komiks creators credit with being a great influence and inspiration? Prolific Coching, of whose 61 komiks-novels, all but 10 were translated into film? Coching, who has already been twice nominated for the honor of becoming the first National Artist for Visual Arts for his role in pioneering and elevating the art of komiks illustration in the country, yet who was always turned down because the popular art of komiks illustration was not of the same gravity and importance as the "high arts" of painting and sculpture?

Upon receiving the news, komiks illustrator and industry advocate Gerry Alanguilan tweeted:

"This is the day that the National Artists Award lost all its credibility. As an artist, I am deeply saddened, offended, and disgusted.

I feel insulted and offended for Francisco V. Coching. This is absolutely shameful."


I agree with Mr. Alanguilan. That award should be Coching's by right, is his by right. For the true pioneers of an art form to be passed over in favor of someone who, even in the eyes of many of his peers, sucks, is unjust and insulting. Coching, Velasquez, Ravelo, Alcala and the rest, must be turning over in their graves.

The following are some of Coching's komiks-novels which he wrote and illustrated, from Gerry Alanguilan's Komiks museum:

I couldn't believe my eyes.

And me an avid reader of Inquirer, too. Which is to say I buy the newspaper 8 times out of 10, except if I need classified ads (I go to the Bulletin for that). Online, I also go to the website a lot.

And then to have my eyes confronted with THIS. The worst part is that it doesn't seem to be satirical at all. Which brings me to the question: How the hell did this ever get published, and in INQUIRER for good measure?

(click pics to enlarge)



A friend of mine commented on the blog post. Twice. Her comments are still "awaiting moderation" (see below). She got peeved because her comments never got published in spite of the fact that incendiary comments were being published right and left and people were mudslinging like crazy down the center, which is how I got to know about the article. Oh, is it because the propriety of publishing the article was called into question?

And they say we bloggers are irresponsible journalists. Oh wait. The person who wrote that "blog post" is a blogger too, right? Which makes me ask, again, where the Inquirer gets off in publishing what he wrote. If I wrote like that I wouldn't even make it within a shadow of Youngblood.



Yeah, right. Editorial policy, prerogative to choose and all that. Legitimate opinion? A blog post that vulgar belongs in FHM. Or Playboy. Not in a national daily. I hope his mother, sisters and aunts read what he wrote. "Honesty" lording it over "hypocrisy", yet. Personally, I view it as the triumph of vulgarity over good breeding, if he had any in the first place.

I have already expressed my opinion of Hayden Kho and of the disproportionate response to the situation in previous posts, and go on record as commending Kat for her strength.

Sorry, Inquirer. My good opinion of you just slipped 25% lower.

Wow. I'd already been getting really peeved with the Facebook ads appearing on my profile and in my apps. Then I read this:

Change Your Facebook Settings Or Else
Posted using ShareThis

Imagine your husband is on his Facebook profile one day, and he spots this ad for "hot singles in your area."

Now imagine that the face in the ad is your face.

PHAIL.


Don't get me wrong, I love Facebook. Once you get the hang of it, it's really quite ingenious, and addicting. Except for those ads.

My original peeve was with those ads I keep seeing all the time, every time I use a Facebook app. They look like inboxes with notifications, saying "You have (5) unread messages." Or, worse, they would flash urgently saying "Inbox full! You have (7) unread messages." Then a little pop-up would say "5 of your friends in (my location) think you're cute."



Thinking it was a notification from an app that I had forgotten about, I initially clicked on it and was surprised when it took me off the site instead, to the registration page for what looked like the game Travian, although it was not in English.

Since I cannot appreciate Travian and have no time for prolonged online gaming now, I closed that tab.

The ad, though, kept showing up. And flashing. The next week it said "3 of your friends in (my location) are secretly in love with you!" I didn't bite.

Then it began to pile on the negativity.

"5 of your friends secretly think you're dumb!" "3 of your friends think you're stupid!" "2 of your friends think you're lazy!"

The effect was akin to having a troll live in my Facebook account and taunt me everytime I moved around the site.

So I e-mailed Facebook to ask them to remove it.

"To whom it may concern:

I am always seeing a certain Facebook ad whenever I use apps. At first it was saying "Two of your friends in (my location) think you are nice. Click here to find out!" I was curious so I clicked it, thinking it was a Facebook app of some kind. However, it led me to a certain site that was not in English, although it looked like that game Travian. I was not interested, so I closed the tab.

The ad, however, still kept on showing up, at the right side of the apps or games when I'm using them. The text changed to "(A number) of your friends in (my location) are secretly in love with you." Later, it became "(A number) of your friends in (my location) think you're stupid." Today, just before I wrote this email, I saw it and it said "(A number) of your friends in (my location) think you're dumb."

This ad is not only misleading, it is offensive. First of all, it links to something that is totally unrelated to what it says.Secondly, it seems to promote a stalker mentality and feeds on people's paranoias, in that it assumes there will be someone who is all too glad to know what negative things other people are saying about them. And thirdly, it is becoming insulting. Each time I see it, and the more I don't click on it, the more it seems to be taunting the person seeing it that they may be "stupid" or "dumb" if they don't click on it.

For the reasons mentioned above, please remove and BAN this ad. It is getting to be very irritating. Thank you."

I was instead directed to the on-site forms for reporting ads.

So I filled out a form.

After a week, I received a polite e-mail saying that the ad in question was in the applications I used.

"Thanks for reporting this ad. It sounds like the ad you're describing was served through a Facebook application, and not through Facebook itself. Because of this, Facebook isn't able to further investigate or take action on this particular ad. You can report concerns you have about the content or behavior of any Facebook application directly to the developer of that application by going to the application's About page and clicking "Report Application" at the bottom of the page, or by clicking "Report" at the bottom of any canvas page within the application.

You may also want to view or adjust your application privacy settings at http://www.facebook.com/privacy/?view=platform&tab=other. Unless an application has been authorized by you or your friends, Facebook allows it to access only the information that is available in your public search listing (your name, networks, profile picture, and friend list). To control how the above information is distributed to Applications, please visit the Search Privacy page at http://www.facebook.com/privacy/?view=search.

Please let us know if you have additional questions or concerns.

Thanks for contacting Facebook,

Ian
Online Sales Operations
Facebook"




Excuse me, guys, but isn't that akin to telling me I will now have to report every single Facebook app I use that carries the ad? Because I see it in almost all of them. I can just see every other user of that app getting mad at me for interrupting their gameplay.

And I really couldn't see the relevance of the second paragraph until I read Cheryl Smith's post. You know the feeling of suddenly having been whupped in the face with something that suddenly came out of nowhere?

It was like, holy guacamole... how many Facebook ads with my face in it have people probably been seeing?

Holy hell, people who don't even know me might be seeing my face in there and later come across my profile and somehow think that I was looking for something that I wasn't.

Facebook, I love you, but this sneaky, underhanded sort of advertising simply must stop, for the reasons already mentioned above. You are abusing the trust of your users by using their faces and personal information for your ads without their knowledge and consent. Even if you might cover your asses by pointing out that we could stop ourselves appearing in these ads by changing our Facebook settings, well, I didn't even know that I could be appearing in those ads, so I would not know of the need to change those settings.

Moreover, there's this little thing called truth in advertising, right? And you're putting words in people's mouths that many of them might not have said, had they been asked about it. Heck, you're even putting people in this ads who would not have consented had they known they were to be in them.

Those little irritating ads in the apps are also very misleading. They make us think they're other than what they seem. And they play on people's paranoia by somehow telling them that their friends are really dissing them behind their backs. I don't believe them because I know what they really are, but as I said, they're like trolls. And should therefore be banned.

They're misleading because they make people think they are notifications, but lead people to other sites instead. I didn't even know it was an ad for Travian until I found myself on the site. Another version of that I clicked even brought me to an online gambling site. Again, the operative word is MISLEADING. Truth in advertising, right?

Facebook, I'm talking to you.

Latest Internet buzz: another scandal involving Dr. Hayden Kho. No wait, drop that "doctor" from his name, or the rest of the medical practitioners in the Philippines will react violently. Hayden Kho. (The ladies on Plurk have a discussion going here.)

After featuring prominently in a love triangle with the eminent Dr. Vicky Belo and the luscious Katrina Halili and attempting suicide, scandal continues stalking him, it seems. Not only was a video of him and Katrina getting, um, intimate, posted on YouTube, but this time, buzz has it that he is in another scandalous video with ANOTHER girl. Okay, that makes me wonder whether the first instance was really, well, tsamba.

There's talk of getting him disciplined by the professional associations he belongs to (I heard interviews on the radio earlier today).

But really, guys. What is this thing about sex videos? Why do people have to go and take videos of themselves during such private moments? For what? Personal gratification? To share with the whole world?

Why?

It's no concern of ours who you men (and I use the plural, this is not directed at any specific person) sleep with, as long as you are both consenting adults who will not be hurting anyone else by your actions (i.e., unmarried or uncommitted). That is an intimate, private act between two individuals. At the very least, a sense of decency should stop you from talking, or even boasting, about it to your friends, or to anyone, much more from taking videos of the act, and worse, showing them off to the rest of the world. If it doesn't, if you don't have even a scrap of that sense of decency, then you are a jerk. There are worse things to call you, but jerk is the only thing that comes to mind at present.

Some men would say that chivalry is dead, that there are no gentlemen left. How low could you sink? That's not even an excuse to treat women with disrespect. A woman getting intimate with you, sleeping with you, doesn't immediately convert her from angel to whore. (And even sex workers have rights, don't forget that.) It is not an excuse for you to treat her as if she is not entitled to feel shame or embarrassment anymore. Women have feelings. They have senses. Same as you.

I hate to have to say this, but we Filipinos know "mabilis ang karma (karma works fast)." You may be men, but you have mothers, grandmothers, aunts, sisters, even nieces, daughters and granddaughters. What you do to a woman may not rebound on you or affect you directly, but it might just happen to one of the women in your life. Perhaps, in several years more, you would be watching a scandalous sex video but this time with tears and anger, for the girl or woman in the video is a member of your family. Hypocritical tears and anger, for after all, did you not do the same thing yourself in the past? How does the shoe fit, in that instance?

Or wait. Maybe you just wouldn't care. But then, would you still be worthy to be called a human being?

I learned something at iBlog5 last Saturday, 9 May 2009.

I learned that no matter what our politicians do, even if they plaster their names and faces across the whole country right now, the COMELEC cannot do anything about it.

PHAIL.

Apparently, it's that little thing called jurisdiction.

A COMELEC rep was at iBlog5 talking about election automation and the COMELEC going online and stuff. So someone asked what the commission is doing about all those irritating TV and radio ads and the posters and signs featuring larger-than-life mugs of politikos plastered all over the land.

The answer: as long as the politiko has not yet filed a certificate of candidacy, the COMELEC has no jurisdiction over him/her. He is not yet considered a candidate, and no matter if he plugs his ugly phiz all over the airwaves and the motorways, it is, apparently, NOT considered campaigning.

Apparently, even if the politiko is using public funds... refer to rule number one: He is NOT a candidate. Presumably then he can spend on campaigning all he likes because as long as he has not filed that all-important certificate of candidacy, again: He is NOT a candidate.

Splitting hairs, are we. But then, bear in mind, who makes the laws anyway?

Need we wonder anymore why all our politikos declare their candidacy on the very last day of filing?

I bet that's one little loophole that isn't gonna be plugged anytime soon. Why put an end to all that unsanctionable campaigning?

For some reason I keep imagining those politikos telling us "Nye nye nye nye nye..." everytime they air their ads or put up their posters.

Hey wait... if they're not candidates yet, then pulling down those posters will not be considered defacement of election materials, right?

That's a thought.

I wonder if I can get them for "public nuisance" on those ads.