Team Philippines
One of the occasional perks of working in I.T. is being in the path of generous suppliers.
Last Friday the latest give-aways from Microsoft Philippines were distributed among us employees at the office. Training jackets proclaiming the Pinoy Olympian spirit, red white and blue and the yellow sun of our flag, resplendent in shining spandex, as modeled by our ever dependable tech team below.
But as this calls to mind our country’s poor performance at the Olympics for the third time in a row, one can’t help but decry either the system or the corruption (now why does that not surprise any of us), and the athletes themselves. Juan Miguel Luz’s commentary “Olympic gold not built on prayer” gets into the heart of the matter.
Maybe we should get rid of the presidential appointees that lead Philippine sports and replace them with Manny Pacquiao, Freddie Roach, Paeng Nepomuceno, Efren “Bata” Reyes, Django Bustamante and our other world-class billiards players. They understand that it takes a system of training to win in any sport.
I took my jacket home and snapped a couple of photos of it, as I was sure at one point that Kuya Maui (Is there a cap that goes with that?) would take it off my hands lickety-split. I was wrong in that regard. He said:
“I’m not exactly sure about jackets which make nationalistic statements in front and advertise ‘foreign devils’ at the back.”
Good point.
DIY Branding can be Fun!
One of the most difficult aspects of marketing your business is branding. Some startup companies do it the simple (read: cheap) way with a word processor and built in graphics. But logo design is not just jazzing up a wingding on a photo editing program. Designing companies know this, and will charge you an arm and a leg for designing your corporate identity.
Not anymore.
You can design your own logo and branding on Logoyes.com. It takes less than five minutes to come up with a business card design on Logoyes, what will probably take time is going throught the vast number of choices available for your logo, colors, typography and layout.
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Google Toolbar Page Rank Broken?
Startling event of the day. No, not me losing 5 pounds according to the bathroom scale, although I wish it were true. A quick glance at my Google Toolbar turned into an icy stare.
My Google Page Rank (PR) has disappeared.
At first I thought my Google Toolbar was broken. But a quick check of other sites proved that it still worked. El Nido Resorts, one of our clients at work, is still ranked at PR5; Militaryplaques.com is still at PR3. But my PR3 had disappeared, and so has Sam’s PR4, according to the Google toolbar. The widgets that I had installed from Rankwidget and MyPageRank.net still state our PR’s as we know them, as does Lazarus over at Left Over Thoughts, who uses PRChecker.info
This raises a bit of concern for me, as I have become a member of a few blog for pay sites, acceptance to which sometimes requires a Page Rank of at least 1.
I do hope that it’s just the Toolbar that’s malfunctioning, and if so what is causing it to do so. A bit of investigatory work has revealed that Google has been, for one reason or another, dealing out penalties to some websites. Visit Dustin Brewer’s site for his article about this. Another site points out that Yahoo Shows Why Google PageRank is Broken, citing Bill Slawski’s post Yahoo Replaces PageRank Assumptions with User Data.
If Google is handing out penalties again because of paid blogging that augurs a bleak future for bloggers like me who have only recently discovered a decent way to make money on the Internet. I’m not giving up my day job yet.
(edit: Feb 23 9:38pm)
It IS broken.
http://www.google.com/support/toolbar/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=4457
As if to tell me that Google PR is not the be-all/end-all of maintaining a blog, I ran into the Google Page Rank Victims Anonymous page. It has brought me back to reality. I like the third button from the top.
Related links:
Google PageRank update soon
First Google smacks down PayPerPost and now comes the FTC
Googlespank Part 2
Aesthetic Google PageRank Update in Google Toolbars Worldwide!!!
In a world without walls…
who needs Windows?
Maia on her father’s office issue MacBook, beside my battered but still reliable Toshiba on Kubuntu Feisty.
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