This blog is 10 years old, with 946 posts published over the past 10 years, and only 51 over the last 5. I have obviously not been blogging much recently, but I suppose it's still worth celebrating this milestone because I still get encouraged to "revive" this blog by librarians (as recently as yesterday) and non-librarians (i.e., a journalist, a few weeks ago). And so, yes, I've decided to blog more actively. I plan to blog every Sunday, starting this coming Sunday.
For now, let me just review what this blog is about, and where it has taken me, by quoting a few sentences from my first-ever post 10 years ago, as well as the succeeding anniversary posts. Comments are welcome on my Facebook account =)
Mabuhay! — 2005
This blog is for all Filipino librarians--whether working in the Philippines or elsewhere.
I am not really a blogger but I thought of setting up this blog as a way of establishing a presence for Filipino librarians on the Internet.
This blog will not be about me. Initially, I see it as a means to share information that I think will benefit Filipino librarians. And once I gain enough blogging experience, maybe we (yes, you and I) can think of other things that we can do with this blog.
Finally, just to make things clear, I do not claim to be the Filipino Librarian.
1st anniversary — 2006
One of the most amazing things that has happened over the past year is that this blog, which some would probably deem "boring" just by looking at its name, is now among the top 30 Pinoy Top Blogs. It's also in the top 40 of Technorati’s Philippine Top 100 Blogs. And then there's the fact that even Spanish and German blogs have linked to this blog. What this means is that it's not just Filipinos or librarians who are reading this blog. ... In any case, I guess this blog's initial objective of "establishing a presence for Filipino librarians on the Internet" has been achieved.
2nd anniversary — 2007
Popular pages: Undoubtedly, the Talumpati posts, followed by the ones about—sshhh—"Sex in the Library," which is not really about sex. The average number of visitors, not to mention pageloads, doubled from June to August 2006 after I began translating speeches into Tagalog. Sex doesn't really get mentioned on this blog very often, but the few posts that do usually get a lot of visits. Knowing that most of this blog's traffic comes from students doing "research," and perverts looking for I-don't-know-what, should I just take the easy way out and cater to their "needs"? =)
3rd anniversary — 2008
Three years ago, I wrote that, "I am not really a blogger..." Well, I've since become a real blogger (one symptom: feeling guilty if I don't blog) that now I always identify myself as the owner of the blog Filipino Librarian whenever I am asked for a short bio—in addition to saying that I am a Filipino librarian.
During past anniversaries, I have reviewed the "accomplishments" of this blog, but this time I will just take comfort in the fact that many more librarians and libraries are blogging than when I first started...
4th anniversary — 2009
The most remarkable thing about having blogged for so long is that sometimes Googling a keyword takes me to my own blog and I don't even recall anymore that I had actually written the post.
5th anniversary — 2010
After five years of blogging about my profession, I am not entirely sure that there is really much that has changed. It seems to me that there is more that can be done in terms of leadership training, marketing libraries and promoting the profession. But frankly, if it's not obvious yet from the way my posts on this blog have dwindled over the past years, I'm getting a little tired of pushing things that I'm not really sure anyone else cares about. So thanks for visiting on my blog's fifth anniversary—and reading all the way to the end—but to be perfectly honest, I don't know if there's going to be a sixth anniversary. Ciao!
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