Come 16 December 2011, 500 bloggers from around the Asia-Pacific region will flock to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia for the Nuffnang Asia-Pacific Blog Awards 2011 in Putrajaya Marriott. The Awards aims to not only honour the region’s best bloggers, but also to bring together blogger communities from across Asia-Pacific. The Nuffnang Asia-Pacific Blog Awards is brought to you by Volkswagen Malaysia and Putrajaya Marriott.

If I remember it correctly, I also joined this contest wherein you can win a blogger invite to the event. Unfortunately, I wasn’t lucky that time so I wasn’t able to win the invite. I’m trying my luck again. Hopefully this time, Nuffnang will select my entry and grant me the exclusive invite to attend the blog awards ceremony on December 16, 2011 in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. I want to attend the said event and I could name three reasons why.

Top 3 Reasons Why I want to Attend the Nuffnang Asia-Pacific Blog Awards 2011.

1.) I’ve been a blogger for several years now, in fact I can’t remember anymore when I started blogging. Right now I own several blog catering to different niches. There’s my running blog, my travel blog, my food blog, my kindle blog, my Android blog, and of course this tech blog which also happens to be the oldest among my blogs.

2.) I want to meet my fellow Asian bloggers. Learn from their experiences, meet new friends, and broaden my blogging horizons. The end goal being to help myself become a better blogger with voice and advocacy.

3.) I used to run Nuffnang ads on this blog and on my travel blog as well. In fact, I’ve earned a couple of hundreds from those blogs which I never get to withdraw because the revenue didn’t meet the withdrawal threshold by Nuffnang. That’s when I decided to pull out the ads. So, Nuffnang, you owe and you can repay by giving me the invite. .

There you go. The top 3 reasons why I want to attend the Nuffnang Asia-Pacific Blog Awards. Hopefully, the Nuffnang people will be kind enough to grant me much the coveted invite.

This post was inspired by a similar post made by Calvin Lo of Calvin’s Hub. We are not paid or whatsoever to make this blog post. Personally, I just want to highlight the fact that if there’s one Filipino who should be called Tech Junkie, it has got to be the main main himself Abe Olandres of Yugatech.

This brings me to the point of this post. Yes, I’m paying homage to the guy who got me into blogging. Abe has been a good friend of mine since the days of online forums, such as Yehey.com, Manila Tonite, Pinoy Exchange, and of course Rebelde where I met Abe aka Yuga.

So, allow me to tell you a bit about how I got into blogging.

I was maintaning a Livejournal account then which was mainly for personal journaling. Then I stumbled upon Blogger.com or Blogspot. I got the idea to open a new blog using Blogger from a fellow librarian, Von Totanes. My housemate then was also into Blogger. So I created a new blog called Psychedelic Chuva. I was beginning to cover about non-personal topics back then, mostly movies, games, and gadgets.

I was not aware that Abe was also into blogging and that his Yugatech blog is gaining major traction. To make a long story short, I contacted Abe. Got some pointers on how to push my personal blogging “hobby” into mainstream and offered me a blogging post at PinoyTravelBlog.com. He didn’t pay me anything to write about my travel experience. He promised to but up to now I still haven’t received any payment in cash or in kind. But I really don’t mind. What he gave me in return for blogging at PTrB was a domain hosting account on his web site hosting company.

In short, the domain aczafra.com was created. By that time, I was getting curious about SEO and blog optimization. I even joined an SEO contest and created a new blog called – Our Paradise Philippines. Unfortunately, I was not too successful with SEO. So, I concentrate on blogging per se.

The rest as they say is history. I’ve been a tech blogger for several years now and I still see myself blogging until my retirement years. For as long as there are new gadgets to write about, I will always be around to write about them.

Being a blogger on the side did not earn me millions, but rather made me part of a worldwide community where I can freely express myself. Blogging gave me another life aside from my corporate, daytime life.

Everything that I’ve accomplished as a blogger, I owe it all to one person I consider my tech blogging guru – Abe Olandres aka Yuga of Yugatech.

To return the favor, I will like to ask every Filipino who might stumble upon this post to please help me in putting Abe to the Pedestal. Vote for him on the Globe Tatt Awards. He is nominated under two categories. You may vote for him in both, but please make sure to vote for him in the Tech Junkie category because no one else deserve it that him.

I’m writing this post using my Galaxy Tab 10.1. The image was taken from the tab’s internal storage. This is one thing that you can’t do using an iPad because there’s simply no way for any app to read the iPad’s storage device. This simply means that the Galaxy Tab can now be a good mobile blogging device that will free you of added weight when travelling especially if you bring along a laptop or netbook. For simple blogging chores, the Galaxy Tab 10.1 is a viable device.

My wife and I  just finished the Unilab Run United 2011 and I can’t help but be amazed by how the organizers fully utilized technology in delivering not only a well organized run but a pretty cool one as well – in terms of delivering race results promptly. I just checked out my Facebook account, and guess what, our race results were already posted on my Facebook Wall! Coolness, right?

Aside from that, there’s also a link that will direct you to the Run’s Online Results Board where you can already the full results for all the categories. Of course including your full results. Complete with your ranking based on – overall, men’s category, and age category. More coolness right?

The online race results will still be updated later on to include photos and videos. Of course, we can’t expect the photographers to upload their photos as soon as the race finished. That will be asking too much.

Anyway, kudos to the race organizers – Unilab and RunRio (?) and of course BazuSports for a very good online system. I love it! Now, I can’t wait for the 2nd leg of the Unilab Run United in the coming months.

Guess what is the fastest rising search term on Google Zeitgeist for the Philippine market? JEJEMON! What a shocker, right? Why are we so engrossed with “Jejemon” anyways? Interestingly, the second fastest rising query was “iPad.” I guess many are searching Google to find out when the iPad will be released locally.

Here’s the rest of the fastest rising query on Google Philippines in 2010:

1. jejemon
2. ipad
3. pyramid
4. lyrics
5. facebook
6. emoticons
7. justin bieber
8. plants vs zombies
9. glee
10. tumblr
11. crossfire
12. google chrome download

The rest of the Google Zeitgeist 2010 for the Philippines can be found here. You’ll be surprised!

If you’re like me who “lives on the internet,” so to speak – you’ve got to watch this video put up by Google.  It’s the annual Google Zeitgeist, and for 2010 Google decided to create a Zeitgeist year-end video. It’s cool and if you’ve been living on the web for the past year, you’d feel kind of nostalgic while watching this as i did. Hit that read more link before you can watch the Google Zeitgeist video.

MSI-ECS and Dell earlier announced their partnership as MSI-ECS officially joins Dell’s PartnerDirect program. MSI-ECS will be distributing Dell’s SMB product line in the Philippines. By way of this program MSI-ECS gets to enjoy advantage of access to Dell demonstration units, field-based account management, and a range of  financing options, deal registration and support.MSI-ECS President Mr. Jimmy Go has this to say about the partnership:

“We believe that this partnership with Dell will support our goal to always be at the forefront of innovation.  We want our customers to be informed with the latest solutions, and educated in utilizing these various technologies.  We are confident that our relationship with Dell will also equip our people in using the various technologies available in the market,” MSI-ECS president and CEO Jimmy Go said.

While Catherine Lian, Dell Regional Director for South Asia said:

“Today’s announcement of Dell and MSI-ECS partnership marks the beginning of Dell’s bigger picture as we are making long term commitment to grow our business in the Philippines,” said Catherine Lian, Dell Regional Director for South Asia.  “We have expanded our business footprint in the channel business and we are continuously penetrating into new market segments.  The recent announcement of the Dell and MSI-ECS partnership is one such example and we are now looking to drive this business into the next level.”

In addition, MSI-ECS, like other Certified Dell Partner in Asia will enjoy the following:

• Access to a dedicated partner Web site at www.dell.com/partner;
• Partner logos and guidelines for certain marketing activities;
• 100-percent dedicated sales and customer care;
• Certification paths and training;
• Range of financing options; and,
• Deal registration serviced by SalesForce.com’s partner relationship management tool.

MSI-ECS and Microsoft Philippines are sponsoring this Christmas photo contest where you can win up to Php15,000 worth of prices. What do you need to do? Just buy any Microsoft Hardware products from participating stores, take a photo of an individual or group in Christmas costume together with the Microsoft Hardware product you purchased. Then that’s it. Read the press release after the jump to know the full mechanics of the contest. Good luck!

Get a chance to win up to P15, 000 with every purchase of Microsoft Hardware products!

Leading IT distributor MSI-ECS rolls out a photo contest this Christmas season. Get an entry form for every purchase of Microsoft Hardware products (mouse, keyboard, webcams, etc.) from any of the following participating resellers: Octagon (SM Megamall, SM North EDSA, Festival Mall, Park Square, SM MOA, Alabang Town Center, Cebu branches), and Silicon Valley / Digital Alley (SM Megamall, SM North EDSA, Digital Alley Greenbelt).

Then take a photo of any person or group of people in Christmas costume and theme featuring the Microsoft hardware you just bought and send it along with the form. Photo entries can be emailed to asingzon@msi-ecs.com.ph anytime from November 19 to December 31, 2010.

Prizes include cash prizes amounting to P5,000, P10,000 and P15,000 (tax excluded). For the complete promo mechanics, please see flyers in the participating stores or call 688-3716 and look for Jennie Simbulan.

MSI-ECS is the country’s exclusive distributor of Microsoft Hardware products which include the famed BlueTrack Technology products, Arc mouse and keyboard, and LifeCams.

I was invited to the Manila launch of Office for Mac 2011 earlier today. Representatives from Microsoft Singapore did a product demo, highlighting the “cool” features of Microsoft Office for Mac. Since I didn’t have the 2008 version of this office suite, I really have no idea how the software goes on a Mac.

Surprisingly there are several cool features of Office for Mac 2011 which even its Windows counterpart don’t have. One of these is interactive layering which allows you to manipulate images on a slide in a nice interactive fashion.

During the launch, all the attendees were given sample copy of the software. I immediately install it on my MBP and I was surprised how sleek-looking Word, PowerPoint and Excel are on a Mac screen. The interface is very different from the Windows version.

Anyway, will try to put it into a test later on before I come up with a review.

In the meantime, if you’re a Mac user and you have Office for Mac 2008 installed, you might want to consider upgrading to 2011. Unfortunately, there’s no official price yet. But the official distributor MSI-ECS promises to announce pricing and release date this week. So, check out this post later during the week to get first dibs on the market price of Office for Mac 2011.

I’m attending the SEMCON 2010 at Intercontinental Hotel on October 7-8, 2010. This is my second time to attend SEMCON, both of them won from the contest sponsored by Yugatech.com.  There are few seats left, grab your tickets now and see you all there!