Kabataan Partylist national president and first nominee Raymond Palatino is making waves in the blogosphere.
By Erwin Oliva
INQUIRER.net
Last updated 00:15am (Mla time) 01/21/2007
http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/breakingnews/infotech/view_article.php?article_id=44601
ANOTHER Filipino is making waves in the blogosphere.
Mong Palatino, 27, is an activist, writer, editor, aspiring educator, and now a blogger who has been tapped by Global Voices to be the Philippines’ eyes and ears in this global network of bloggers.
Palatino started blogging in 2004 after writing a column for Tinig.com, a website run by Filipino Edric Eder.
Last June 2006, Global Voices invited him to blog about the Philippines. His profile in Global Voices identifies him as a “Filipino street parliamentarian, net activist and aspiring educator, apart from being the news editor of Yehey!, a Philippine-based web portal.”
Palatino writes about various issues including Philippine politics, education, and sports. Recently, he discussed how freedom of the press in the Philippines has been under attack and the craze over Filipino boxer Manny Pacquiao.
“I rarely include my opinions in my entries. But the way I chose stories reflect my own biases,” Palatino admitted in the interview. “Judging blog content is a contentious matter. Should we look down on bloggers just because they chose to write about entertainment, gossip and narrative of their uninteresting lives? The consensus is to respect what bloggers have decided to highlight in their blogs. That bloggers tend to upload videos, podcasts or articles about their favorite food, movies and celebrity news means that these things are important to them. Why should we deny them the right to express what they feel the world should know about their lives?” he wrote in his personal blog.
He said bloggers should be more responsible and sensitive about what they write since children can visit their sites. People should be more discerning when surfing the Internet since pornographic sites are accessible, scams proliferate and bigots roam the cyberspace.
After months of writing voluntarily for Global Voices, he saw the potential of blogging to reach a bigger audience. He was invited in India last December to join Global Voices’ annual conference, where he met other bloggers from different parts of the world.
“Every time I meet a fellow blogger in person, it validates and sustains my belief in the power of the Internet to build real relationships. Imagine the thrill I felt when I attended the Global Voices annual meeting in India two weeks ago. There I met bloggers from around the world who understand the language, potential and limits of blogging. There I learned how blogs are effectively used to advance various advocacies,” he wrote in his blog.
Currently Palatino is the only Filipino blogger writing for Global Voices. But he said there were other Filipinos involved before he came in but left.
Palatino sees himself more as a blogger than a journalist. But he also recognizes the increasing role of blogs to reach out to more people, noting that bloggers play a complementing role in citizen journalism.
“Blogging fuels citizen journalism. Oh my news project in South Korea (”Every citizen is a reporter”) is a good example on how to generate news stories submitted by ordinary people. But blogs can also distort the real situation. In Zimbabwe, most of the bloggers have anti-Mugabe sentiments but majority of Zimbabwe citizens are supportive of the leader,” Palatino continued in his blog.
But he also acknowledged that “there are real obstacles to the growth of blogging in developing countries, especially in the Philippines.”
“Blogging is seen as an elite activity. Blogging requires a literate person with access to computer and Internet connection. How can you convince the poor and hungry Filipinos that blogging can answer their problems? Was it Marx who wrote that humans needs to eat, find clothing and home first before he/she can pursue other activities? I think blogging must not be separated from the movement to end poverty, hunger and injustice. We can make blogging an added weapon to make another beautiful, kinder world,” he said.
Palatino is another example of the growing number of Filipinos getting more international recognition in the blogosphere.
Previously, professional bloggers Abe Olandres and J. Angelo Racoma surprised the local blogosphere when they announced they were taking over an internationally-recognized blog called The Blog Herald.
[...] I attended the GV summit in New Delhi in 2006. The summit was influential in broadening my appreciation for the potential of blogging to raise political awareness and improve human interactions in the world. Before the GV summit, my knowledge about the persuasive power of online media was very limited. [...]