Thanks For 2009! My 10-Minute Blogging Resolution For 2010

Set countdown timer to 10 minutes. Timer starts now.

First of all, I want to thank all my readers, friends, and partners (yes partners!) for the super great things that happened to my blogging and to my beloved Better Blogging For Bloggers during 2009. It was a blast. I had a lot of fun... and most of all, it was a year that made me all the more a better blogger.

<--- that's a photo of me spending my Christmas on the white sand beaches of Boracay :)

A lot of great things happened. I launched a number of services, some of which was discontinued because of the super crazy schedule I had (talk about being a college freshman)... but at least, I'm happy that the blog critiquing that I launched was successful and now evolved into a blog mentoring program. I owe it to you guys. Thanks for the amazing support!

Pause. Time check... 7 minutes and 45 seconds.

Okay, go again!

How Crazy Great was 2009?

I don't have perfect memory. But I do recall that this is the year where I've met a lot of great people especially my co-young-bloggers like Carl Ocab (make money online genius who happened to be the same nationality as I am), Alex Frasier (blogging tips expert and a super promising web designer), Seth Waite (senior editor of Alex's blogussion and almost with the same credentials as Alex as well).

Now, of course I can't name drop everyone. Gah. I only have 10 minutes for this post. So to be short, to all those wonderful people that I've met, you know who you are. Thank you so much!

Pause. Time check... 4 minutes and 53 seconds. Now press continue.

What In The World Will Happen In 2010?

Things to look forward to. First, I want to write about a special report. I'm not yet sure what exactly the topic will be though I have a few ideas. I promised to finish the report before 2009 ends but I just got buried into a lot of stuffs.

Hey, perhaps you want to suggest a topic to me? I'd love to hear your ideas!

Also, I plan to revamp Better Blogging For Bloggers by optimizing the theme (for the nth time) or by purchasing a new theme altogether. Look out for me Headway theme! Or I might buy Thesis too. Depends. I'll get to that later on.

Time check: 2 minutes 24 seconds.

Uh-oh. Better get this thing done fast.

My Exciting 2010 Blogging Resolution

Is too launch a special ebook that me and my 'partners' are working on (well as of now we're on hiatus but we'll get to it soon). We still haven't declared anything official as the work is still 'in progress'. But the project is pretty much scheduled to be out by January (if plans go well).

A few people already knew about this but until we get things ready, we still will be keeping it hush hush for now ;)

Keep Close To Better Blogging For Bloggers

There'll be a lot of great blogging projects coming up and things will get pretty exciting here by January. I'm working on creating more great contents to kickstart 2010 and I'm pretty sure you'll want to be updated as much as possible.

If you still don't receive my free updates, then be sure to subscribe now.

Of course the most convenient way to stalk this blog (and me) is to follow me in Twitter. So go ahead, follow me in Twitter here so you'll instantly know what I'm up to. :)

Pause. Time check: 1 minute and 8 seconds. Whew. This is hard. Okay. Go again.

How About You? What's Going To Happen In 2010?

New year means a new and better you. I challenge you to set your resolutions as well. It's fun and it really does keep things interesting. What's more important actually is for you to set your goals.

Example, try aiming for a 50% increase in revenue (that's what I'm aiming. haha). It isn't impossible and it makes you dig for more out-of-the-box ideas... which is a good thing.

A few friends from Twitter also shares their 2010 blogging resolution.

Jordan Cooper (@notaproblog) from Not A Pro Blog:
"Create unique interesting content so good it can't be ignored & put myself in the position for opportunities to succeed..."

Brandon Walker (@foxmarketer) from Foxmarketer:
"My 2010 goal is to more RSS subscribers on my blog and boost my readership..."

Time check: woah. My phone's buzzing. Time's up! Anyway, hope you don't mind me sneaking a few more lines.

Thanks For 2009! Happy New Year!

And may our blog's survive up to 2011... and counting. Speaking of which, I'm turning 18 this 2010. Uh-oh. Does that mean bye bye young bloggers league? Hope not. lol.

Cheers everyone,

Liane

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Mash-up: Selling the BloggingTips Blog and Stealing Shoemoney's Brand

What's a mash-up? "A mash-up is when you put to songs together to make them richer". And I take that from coach Will Schuster of Glee (yes, I'm such a Gleek).

I decided to put my own touch into it by incorporating it into my blog writing. So guys, this is going to be a mash-up post of two of the hottest blogosphere news circulating on the web (as of the moment).

Right now, I'm still in complete shock upon hearing the news that the BloggingTips blog is for sale. You heard that right. For Sale. I just checked the auction site of BloggingTips at Flippa and...

...it's positive. We are now facing the end of Kevin Muldoon's ownership on his legendary blog. And I reckon this shouldn't go unnoticed. That's why I'm making a noise right now.

The Big Question is, Why?

A short visit to BloggingTips Dot Com would tell you that nothing's been formally announced, declared or notified in there whatsoever. If Kevin what's the transition to be quiet, it's futile since I know many more bloggers have already kept their eyes on this issue.

I mean, c'mon. This is the BloggingTips Blog (and I lost count how many times I repeated that).

Kevin's (the owner) is a great guy- though I still haven't had the opportunity to be personally close to him. Whatever the reason maybe, I trust that Kevin knows what's best for him and for the entirety of the BloggingTips community.

But I'm pretty sure many will be waiting for his statement.

The Bigger Question is What's Next?

Thanks to Rob Benwell (author of Blogging to The Bank), selling blogs seems to have grown in popularity these days.

I'm not brewing a suspicion that that must've been the plan all along (since of course BloggingTips is such a huge brand to casually consider selling out as an exit). And it's not as if it's easy to part with something that took 3 years to build... talk about all the accomplishments and credentials it has achieved.

The thing I'm most worried about is what comes next after it had been formally sold. From the Flippa site, Kevin mentioned that he's willing to settle for at least 60K and I do think many would be ready to offer that kind of amount.

But really, we've seen a lot of blogs being sold and there sure is a big tendency for it to lose it's original luster. I'm such a big fan of the BloggingTips blog and I don't want it to have that kind of fate.

No. It's to great to suffer.

On Stealing the Shoemoney Brand

If you still haven't received Jeremy's newsletter, I'm pretty sure you'd get your chance to read it on John Chow's Stealing Trust post (which contains the very newsletter that Jeremy sent out).

A bit of a nasty stuff really.

I know it's common practice for scruffy marketeers out there to steal brands, tamper identities and especially use fake testimonials and comments just to drive in more customers and sales.

It's a really nasty event in the world of the booming online market. And it's no wonder that Jeremy Shoemakey a.k.a Shoemoney is a favorite victim.

Who Stole the Shoemoney Brand?

A certain David Sullivan stole Jeremy's face and copyright photograph for promoting a fake news site (see it here) that tells a supposedly 'success' story of how a married woman, after being laid off, made tons of money certain "Online Cash Success Kit"... which of course is a big scam.

This Tells You Two Things

First, just because you see a logo of a news network (or if the site looks like a news website) doesn't mean that you can automatically trust it. Crazy marketers are doing more crazy illegal stuff nowadays... which extends to faking news websites as well as stories, testimonials and comments.

Second, that the bigger you become, the more prone you are to being victimized by copyright infringement, as what happened to Jeremy.

Yes, some people do hate Jeremy for what he is while some people idolize Jeremy for the success he's bought to a lot of lives... but let's put aside those reasons for a while.

Right now I just want to see justice well served.

And Jeremy rightfully deserves justice.

[photo copyright by Jeremy and Kevin of course]

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Why Copywriters Are The Kings of Blogging (and their trade secrets that you should know)

You have to give it to copywriters. They can survive with or without a blog- and still perform extremely well.

Without a blog, they have their freelance copywriting to busy themselves (where they can earn thousands of dollars from just a single copywriting project). With a blog, they dominate their niche and get more attention than the usual ‘bloggers’ do. Why? Because they hold the secret weapon.

That secret weapon is the mastery of content creation.

So what if they’re masters of weaving content after great content? Well dear blogger, haven’t you heard that content is king? And if you don’t believe that, you might as well say that Brian and Sonia of Copyblogger doesn’t exist. Oh, of course that’s not the case isn’t it?

The Pitfall of Every Blogger is The Edge of Every Copywriter

Most bloggers assume that they can get away with mediocre content if they focus into marketing, or promoting their blog, or optimizing their brand – which is true based on many testimonials.

But here enters the smart copywriter. He knows marketing too, and promotion, and branding. On top of that, he knows how to make a good content. And so, this is where many bloggers fall short.

You Should Unleash Your Inner Copywriter

The reason why copywriters are the kings of bloggers is because they hold an essential skill that every blogger should have.

The skill of content.

It’s the skill of capturing every reader, of making enticing headlines and pruning out the weeds (useless words) in a content. It also covers the skill of persuasion , of being able to reel in your readers and make them take action (click that link, follow this advice, subscribe to my blog).

Smart Bloggers Learn Copywriting

Let’s face it- everyone can be a blogger. But it takes someone who can write a good blog that has the edge over the thousands in his niche. Imagine you having that edge? It could do a lot.

Because it’s a skill more than- and even beyond- blogging.

Where Do Bloggers & Copywriters Meet?

Imagine this. A copywriter without a blog would only need to get clients and produce copy after copy not minding about generating the audience that'll read it (because his job is to only create). A blogger on the other hand not only produces content after content, but also (at the same time), needs to reel in an audience - readers or followers as we call them- for the blog.

And as we know, the first step in gathering a crowd to your blog means doing search engine optimization - the building block of every online content.

And the big news is, there's a new branch of copywriting called SEO copywriting. And it doesn't take a genius to figure out what it's all about right?

Their Trade Secert: SEO Copywriting

SEO Copywriting is the center of a Venn diagram between blogging and copywriting. Take the genuis wordcrafting skill of a copywriter and integrate it to the seo needs of every blogger. What do we end up with? A trade secret that will increase your blog's conversion rates in no time.

But Isn't SEO and Copywriting... a Bit... Hard???

Wait till you find out the bigger trade secret. It's easy. If you know the right persion to ask.

The man behind, Divine Write who created and studied the science of SEO copywriting- a copywriting genius as far as I'm concerned formulated the guide to mastering this neat branch- the Practical SEO Copywritng Book (aff). It's a 63-page read of how Divine Write concocts his own copywriting specialty that enabled him to land no. 1 on highly competitive 'copywriting' keywords.

What Is Practical SEO Copywriting All About?

If you know how to write. Good. If you know how to optimize your content for humans. Better. If you know how to make a content that both humans and search engine crawlers will enjoy. Great! And that's precisely what SEO copywriting tells you.

At first, I thought a 63-page ebook is... well... a bit too short and I was skeptical if it would cover all the essentials at such a length. But it didn't dissapoint. At the end, the 63-pages seemed too much trade secret for Divine Write to share that I think every page is worth re-reading all over again.

What I Learned From Practical SEO Copywriting

First. That it's unbelievable easy.

It was refreshing too since you get to know the myths in SEO and discover what should and shouldn't be the process in content creation. SEO afterall doesn't mean a 'dumb' copy or a too boring text.

What I like most about it is that it reinforces the fact that the more you optimize for humans, the less search engine optimizing you'll be needing (as we know it). Write for humans first, search engines follow. But of course, there's a really in-depth discussion in this- something that you have to find out. Wait till you learn the 'signals'. It's a cool trade secret you shouldn't dare miss.

Learn Practical SEO Copywriting From Master Copywriter - Divine Write
(yup. that's one long aff link that's gonna keep my coffee supply running. haha)

Why Copywriters-Turned-Bloggers are Awesome

For one reason - you just can't resist reading their content. And that's why i'm really determined to knowtheir copywriting trade secrets for me to leverage my blog not only to humans alone- but to search engines as well.

Since content is our best and most-treasured resource (as bloggers), we should keep finding ways on how to make the most out of it and to improve from just the usual poorly-optimized content. We should train to be good copywriters.

We must. See Divine Write's Practical SEO Copywriting Book...

[beautiful photo by xjyxjy]

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There’s A Place In Twitter Where You Can Go Beyond 140 Characters

The catch is it’s NOT tweeting.

If you think Twitter is just about…well… tweeting, and sharing links, and rounding up thousands of followers… then think again. Because if you actually go to the root principle, you have only one job in Twitter – to get yourself known and to do it fast.

What’s the point? The point of this story is that I’m going to share to you one of the greatest overlooked and under-estimated Twitter tactic that could boost your image (literally and figuratively) and popularity at record speed.

I’ve just implemented this tactic a day or two ago and I’ve been seeing quick positive results. My new followers easily recognizing and remember me within seconds (yup. Not minute, or hours, or days or months). Seconds!

So here’s my Twitter tactic, hope you can pick up a thing or two.

It Is Having A Strategic, Social Media Targetive, Twitter Profile

One day, I was just staring at my Twitter account wondering what else to do so that I could maximize the benefits that I could get from it. As usual, I’d usually be visiting profiles to profiles of my bloggers friends to just check out tweets that I might have missed.

Right there, I’ve began to realize something.

The Power Of A Twitter Profile Page

Our twitter profiles are actually powerful pages that we have almost full control over. It’s simple, it displays our recent statuses, it almost works like a business card… and best of all… it’s highly visited. Just imagine if you get at least 10 new followers everyday- that means 10 people looking at your “twitter profile” everyday (and the rate of visits could be exponential after then).

The beauty of it is that you don’t do anything (or maybe just a “follow me in twitter here”) to drive traffic to your profile. It’s a self-sustaining page regardless of whether or not you draw attention to it. That might as well be one of the greatest powers of social media.

What To Do To Optimize Your Twitter Profile Page

It’s not a secret – the tactic is to use every little space you can. Of course your name, location and short bio is displayed, but let’s be realistic. Those things wouldn’t really be the first information that can draw people’s eyes. You need to go a little creative. Have your own customized twitter background page.

And if you’re in doubt- here are the following reasons:
• There’s a wide, promising space around your twitter profile
• This space can catch the eye’s attention easily
• Attention means fast retention (of your name, blog and brand)
• Be a professional by looking like one


The Story Of My New Twitter Background



{here’s a screenshot of what my twitter page looks like- and i just love it!}

With my trusty photoshop and some *promising* graphic designing skills, I created my new and improved Twitter background. I love the new look! Don’t you?

GO SEE ME MY TWITTER PROFILE PAGE IN LIVE ACTION

I already had a custom design before, but it wasn’t as appealing and as striking as the new one (since I just created the old background using twitter backgrounds generator and the result looked just okay).

Now I’m more than happy with my Twitter page… especially with the results that it brings.


How You Too Can Create A Strategic Twitter Profile Page

I’ve studied a few customized Twitter backgrounds and the common mistake is that many of them where sloppily done (no matter how professional the creator claims to be). I don’t claim to be a professional designer as well but I guess I know enough blogging and social media to determine which kind is strategic or not.

The first step you have to do is to identify your basic color. It would be the ‘canvass’ of your background. After which, you can apply a few lighting techniques to make it more attractive. If you know how to use gradients, the all the better.

The second step is just a bunch of adding stuffs. You have to lay-out where exactly do you want to place your brand image, logo, picture (if you want to) and more details that you want to be included.


Here’s A Zoom Of The Left Portion



Three essential elements. Notice how I placed my (1)@username, my (2) blog’s name (brand) and (3)a photo of myself. My username @HeyLiane is incorporated directly at the top-left portion (isn’t it cool that it’s beside the twitter logo?). I think it’s important to make your username memorable from the get-go. That’s the reason why I placed it directly on top.

Our eyes are trained to read from left to right. Therefore, if you want for a piece of information to be easily absorbed, place it on the left.

The face and the brand. Two things when combined can do a lot of remarkably branding. If there’s one thing people can’t resist, it’s being talked to in the most humanistic of all approaches. I recommend you too to really place a good photo beside your brand. Works like magic all the time.


Here’s A Zoom Of The Right Portion



Going to the right portion, you can see that the technique I used is to incorporate the sub-information that I want people to know. The magic in this technique is that the moment that the left portion have already caught their eye, the right portion follows.

So by the time you’ve successfully captured your page visitor’s attention, he’ll be interested to know more. Thus, he goes to the right portion (and this is where we work more magic tricks).

There, I placed a more appealing bio (plus the larger version of my Twitter picture). To make it more strategic, I also included the name (again) and the url of my blog as well as my mentoring program. Of course, no information is complete without the contact details isn’t it?


There You Have It

I’ve been talking about ‘techniques’ and ‘magic tricks’ in this post but really… the mechanisms at play here is just to catch a person’s attention which can hopefully turn out to produce a stronger following.


Hope You Can Design Though – Even The Basics

You need not go for really awe-inspiring looks. The content of the design is the thing that matters most. But I do hope you know your way around Photoshop (even the basic’s will do!) or have a trusty tech savvy friend around.

Say you can’t? If not, just reach me and I’ll be happy to do it for you (yay for my new found designing hobby!). Don’t worry about the cost. Let’s just say I love doing it that I charge 70% off what TwitterBackgrounds charge you. Do the math. You'll be happily surprised at my rate. Cool huh?


In Conclusion

I just want to brag around my Twitter background work. Haha. Kidding.

In conclusion really, you can do a lot more in Twitter than you think you can. All it needs is a little creativity and some good foundation of being a social media savvy blogger.

Creating your own professional twitter backgrounds might not mean much too you (in fact, you could’ve taken it for granted!). But if you did took a step, you’ll be pleasantly surprised what great things that small simple action can do for you and your blog.

Plus the fact that you’re not being limited by Twitter into a mere 140 characters to tell people about what you can do. I know, right?

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Updated: I recently changed my twitter username from @webloggr to @HeyLiane. I like the more personal username now :)

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Adapt Your Blog Branding... or Get Annihilated

There have been big major shifts in blog branding. From static, traditional designs and default styles and fonts, blog branding has now evolved (thanks to designers got sick of web 1.0's limitation). For bloggers like you and I, this only means one thing – it’s time for adaptation or… annihilation.

Being onboard the blogosphere for two years doesn’t mean much, but when it comes to having an enough of a comparison basis to observe the trends – two years could already be a lot.

Here’s the tools that the new generation of (successful) bloggers use to build an effective brand recognizable all over the web and is the key to… you bet… amassing an army of followers and readers everyday. Because as the mantra of the web goes… branding could be everything.

The Before Of Blog Branding

The era of web limitations.

We see blogs that tries to work around what the web could serve at the mean time. And so, instead of working beyond the norms, it worked within the norms. The most notable feature being just the manipulation of designs and the process of turning it into a crowded, compact web page. Of course if the blogger can't do that (or can't afford for the pay), the result would most likely by default looking brands from those using texts up to poorly manipulated designs.

That said. It would be a time of complexities, or of the ironic defaults and stale concepts.

The Today Of Blog Branding

With the advent of theme production companies and a rising league of designers and developers, the blog branding of today has shifted greatly to beyond the norms and a no-limits approach. Something to be celebrated for.

We see blogs now heavily using typography designs and stand-out graphics. Rules are being broken too when it comes to the different sections of blogs (from header to post section and even to sidebars).

Not only that, we see too blog branding reaching out further to any element that ties back to the blog. Social media have greatly contributed to this with the example of customizing one’s twitter page background.

Here’s the Branding That Works Now

The keyword to create the perfect blog brand is the one that Brian "Copyblogger" Clark uses to describe his site design – iconic.

Dull designs, complex designs… those days are almost over.

Say hello now to minimalistic, clean lay-outs with very fast loading time, easy navigation and one that features a good reader experience.

Typography is the new in. Because blogging is content, the sure fire way to boost your brand is to brand the font that can stand on it’s own. Chris Pearson (Thesis developer) is the guy that started this revolution with his signature and iconic design of Copyblogger.

Typography represents the fresh, the new and the utterly stand-out-ish concepts of today's branding. The cleanliness and the simplicity of it had made the entire revolution possible- and of course, it all the more empowed the design and marketing industry.



{here's a screenshot of the famous "i love typography" blog}

Signature colors are timeless still. Own your brand. Get the colors that works. While choosing signature colors were tips 'older than branding'- it's still something we can't get away from. Just a heads-up, seems like red is the favorite color of notable known blogs. It’s visually attracting, it commands attention, it makes the eyes stop and look. It’s a warning sign… hopefully good for a good brand.

Less is more. If there's the biggest portion of the shift, it would have to be the new 'clean' standard approach of today's blog brands. Gone where the days of loaded images, sections and gadgets all stacked on top of another.

The great contributing factor is the heavy 'ad-blindness' of many readers (or ad distaste) which in turn have made advertising almost pointless and futile for many. This in turn led the way for the scrap-your-ads movement (bloggers who erase ad spots in turn for in content advertising). This surely had been brewing steadily among bloggers for quite some time now.

The person is the brand. Even when the best designs and logos have been made, the single most powerful branding tool is still the face. Because after all, what's a blog without a blogger?

The Dawn Of No-Limits Theme Designers

Before, it was just a company whom you buy your theme. Now, innovative and out-of-the-box designers are getting a hold of the best blog design projects. Hunt for a designer who knows typography and all the colors of the rainbow- you’ll surely have one amazing brand coming up.

Just see Alex Fraiser, the 16-year-old Thesis customization extraordinaire of Kolakube(with his signature work being his own blog - Blogussion) as the good example. Of course, Chris Pearson would be the God when it comes to these things.



{here's a screenshot of Chris Pearson's blog aptly named "Pearsonified"}



{here's a screenshot of Alex Fraiser's Thesis Customization service known as "Kolakube"}

Adaptation Or Annihilation

While it could be dangerous staying behind the old branding schemes - the good news is that there's actually more reason to adapt than too get left behind (hence, it's just insane not to bank on the new rules of branding). With the new freedom and flexibility (as well as the intense creative process involved), who wouldn't want to get this the bandwagon?

The annihilation is for those who chooses to turn a blind eye to these great shifts. Adaptation is simply a must. Just take it from Brian Clark's and to the icon that Copyblogger had become.

[Beautiful photos by kevindooley, kaare and tankgrrl]

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The Simplified Content Writing Cycle

Can you imagine yourself writing consistently for one month? No? Probably yes. How about 5 months (here you answer of course). So I challenge you to a year. You replied “well I’m dedicated”. Then comes the last time question. A decade? Now you’re thinking if your blog is still alive.

To cut that Q&A portion short, here’s one simple question: can you write consistently? If you’re answer is yes BUT find the commitment problematic, good thing I have answers. Memorize this writing cycle by heart and in less than a minute you’re good to blog for a decade… and counting.

How It Works: The cycle represents a continues, never-ending process. There are five main stages to content writing. You can go further by dividing this into three if you want (Topic and Idea as brainstorming, Rough Draft and Check & Polish as writing and finally Publish).

For the cycle to begin, you have to start at the topic and continue the engagement.

Here’s the Simplified Content Writing Cycle

Topic – select or identify the topic/category that you want to focus on. Having a clear niche makes that step relatively simple (and the reason why it could be harder to blog on a topic that says everything-under-the-sun).

Idea – is where you zoom in from your selected topic. You have to pinpoint the definite idea that you want to talk about. Topics are still broad in general so picking up the main idea is definitely the next step. You can also call this the “narrow-down” step.

Rough Draft – this is the initial stage of your writing. To make it easier, always identify your main key points and elaborate further. Make it as concise and easily-digestible as possible. Rough drafts needn’t be that perfect… that’s why we move on to…

Check & Polish – the quality control portion of the cycle. It’s always crucial to proofread the content and minimize (if not completely erase) the errors. This also requires you to eliminate redundant sentences or words. Having a hawk’s eye view is a plus. Of course, a lot of writers tends to skip this process but it’s always a gain if you do. After you’re done with that… time to…

Publish – hold on a sec. This is not just about copy-pasting to your post creator and hitting the publish button. This is for you to optimize your posts like adding images, charts, and other interactive materials (like videos if applicable). It’s also about proper post formatting where you get to tweak around the font styles especially those of the title and subtitles. After you’re done with that… hit publish!

Then, you’re back again at topic step. Rinse & repeat. Now you can blog for a decade… and counting.

[Beautiful photo by sassyradish]

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Sorry Mom, Dad, I Don't Want To End Up Working For A Boss

It's motivating re-reading Simon's (Teenius) post about the problems face by young entrepreneurs online (especially on the comments section) plus Jordan's rant of 'do kids have to wait until they grow up?' Somehow, it's good to feel a grown-up believes in us young bloggers too.We can do it - and probably even teenie-bit better than our older counterparts.

Wait. This is not a post bragging about kids-who-might-be-better-than-you. Nope. This is a my way of expressing my opinions about the new generation. Because young (and young-at-heart) peeps, this might be our chance to get out of the societal stereotype of finishing an education and landing on that thing called adults call a 'job'.

The Young Bloggers' Creed:
"Sorry Mom, Dad, I Don't Want To Work For A Boss"

I don't want to spend almost 15-20 years of education just so
I can make someone's coffee and do robotic paperwork...
I don't want to wake up at 7 in the morning (oh no traffic! make that 6)
and get stuck in traffic then eventually be late and have my head bitten off....
I don't want to follow someone around like a puppy all day...
I don't want to be the subject of orders, yellings and deadly deadlines...
I don't want to work until I drop and just wait for that easily-exhaustible payday money...
I don't want to get caught up in a stressful, unfulfilling environment...
I don't want to do something because I have to...
I want to do it because I want to...

I Still Believe In Education and In Youth Responsibility

I'm an honor student in grade school and high school, I made it into our country's premiere university. I'm currently studying political science and have just been a new member of a debating society. I believe in education and I greatly value the concept of learning- and responsibility.

But I do think the young ones have had enough of societal pressures. Elders keep on telling 'finish school so that you can be someone'. That's not true at all. Think of people who have only finished grade school and became billionaires. Or drop-outs like Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg dropping out of Harvard (he did what?!?) to pursue his dreams- he by the way is now one of the wealthiest self-made man in the US. There are also those who get it all, private education, tutors, top-notch schools- but in the end- losers?

Because I believe in the power of pursuing the dream.

Why is it so bad to dream of having a life doing the things you love? It could be blogging,it could be being an ice cream taster, it could be testing out video games for all we care. Why does it have to be a straight-jacket job?

We Should Prepare For A Bright Future- Not For Boss Slavery

I want to be a lawyer. A corporate lawyer even (and a cool problogger too!). Therefore, I will study until my brains fry themselves, I'll do my homework, be active in school, explore other areas of knowledge and do everything I can to achieve my dream. No, I don't dream to be under a boss. Who wants to dream to be under boss slavery?

Young Ones Are Lucky - We Now Dare To Be Different

We could be blogging tips experts, or make money online bloggers, or fanfiction writers. We could be, and should be, what we wanted to be. That's what a lot of people missed out on the past. Because everyone just get so caught up in having a job. And I want to tell each and every young one (and young-ones-at-heart) out there. Do your life a favor. Be what your dreams says you to be.

Or Am I Just Overly Optimistic?

Who knows? Ten years from now you can probably catch a picture of me slaving under a boss (and post it on TwitPic for my humiliation). That I don't know. What I do know is that I'm trying my best right now, to be what I want to be- and it's high time you should too. If there's a time you should act for your own sake- the time is now.

Who knows, maybe this is the generation that will lead us to a happy future. Then again, I must be dreaming again.

But to my mom and dad, this could be better news right?

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A One Sentence Answer To The Question "How Do You See Your Blog?"

We all have different reasons why we're doing this. Different methods, different styles, different techniques. Like the human self, no two blogs is ever the same (well unless you want to be sarcastic about it and create two replicate blogs). Enough of the differences. Right now, I simply want to focus on reflection. When asked a very simple question: give me one sentence to describe "how do you see your blog?"

Perhaps it might be easy to ask this question to those who have personal blogs. For us bloggers yielding to the more serious, professional topics, it might be even harder to define what our blogs really mean to us.

Of course it could be ironic too. Like personal bloggers being too much deep into it and our kind being more like... blogging is a sort of business or something along the lines.

Because What Really Is The Point Of This?

I kept asking myself that question for quite some time. Did I just enjoy this? Or had fun? Or really got the hang of it as what i would usually say? It might be a combination of the three. The thing is I just wasn't sure.

Unless YOU Find Out...

This is not one of those psycho test or something. Think of it as just a form of assessment. Don't you think it's a good idea to just pause every once in a while and reevaluate about what you think? Like reflecting on where you stand now and on how do you plan to proceed.

Because everyone seems to be caught up in this whirlwind of blogging chaos. People continously race to the top but yet the gravest mistake is when they actually just keep on running and doesn't even know where they stand.

So in order to reflect the meaning of what I'm doing, I tried to figure out what I really thought about my blog.

Here's My Own Answer

I see my blog as... an extension of myself. That's why i call this blog as my hub. That's it. Makes sense because i see myself as a person that doesn't easily give up. I don't like quitting at something that I have started and enjoyed doing. I don't just do it for myself, it's because I feel good at making others do good. It's both a chore and a personal reward. To see yourself grow and learn, then at the same time extend that similar experience too by sharing knowledge. It's quite simplistic if you think about it. But that's how I view my blog.

Well Now, How About You?

It's not as much as just thinking of a simple sentence (though I bet a lot would just do that), it's more of really figuring a real sense of meaning into your whole effort. It's something that you should be able to do if you really think you want to make it into the long haul of blogging. Go figure. Trust me, this helps.

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