Trending and Philippine Airport Fees

During our vacation, I was asking my partner what trending meant and all that hashtag (#) hallubaloo on Twitter. Well he patiently explained it to me and thank you for that explanation. When I got the hang of it, the trending topics on various threads were uhmmm, sad to say, pathetic.

And while technology has caught up with the Pinoys (or for the people on Earth for that matter), the local "Tweets" that were being followed were obscurely for the most inconsequential topics. Yes, technology has changed the face of the world - sadly, it has increased the IQs of most of the people who use technology for better use.

Let's use the Philippine Airport Fees as an issue. I'm not the only one that complains about the airport taxes. Most of my friends have the same complaint - "why inconvenience the riding public by collecting Airport Fees at the airport?" It's actually a simple solution - "integrate it to our airline tickets!" For God's sake, it's not even rocket science. Even if people say that the airport fees vary from Metro Manila, Cebu and Davao at P200.00 for domestic flights and Tagbilaran, Batanes, or Jolo at P20.00 for domestic flights - you can easily calculate this because you know the route the passenger takes anyway!!! And you can even standardize it - that all domestic flights to ONE destination is P100.00 or P200.00 is the same, regardless of destination! If you can afford to fly - you can afford the Airport Fee!

It has always baffled me why this issue cannot be solved. Someone told me that the reason for this is so that the local authorities can collect their share IMMEDIATELY. Which means that based on that reasoning - the problem is the government (Unless of course there is another or a more valid reason for collection ON THE SPOT). The government apparently has no system that will remit ON TIME the collections for that particular province that has an airport! That's what the national government is for - to provide solutions to its citizens.

Collecting airport taxes is NOT the issue. It's how it's done ONLY IN THE PHILIPPINES, that makes it ubiquitously odd. Where does the collection go to and is there any transparent accountability by the local government on the airport fees that are collected? None! With so many domestic airports in the Philippines, does the Commission on Audit even report on the accountability of all these collected fees? You can see how dilapidated and outdated some of the provincial airports are. And yet, they collect airport fees. For what?!?!

The power of technology (and media) has changed the landscape of how we look at issues. Unfortunately, the issues on the hotdog of Aljur Abrenica or Anabelle Rama vs. Amalia Fuentes or Charice getting a makeover or even Grace Lee dating the PNoy are not even a national one. It's just sad that in spite of the digital age, technology has not provided a means to increase the brain capacity of its people.

Obviously, this blog piece will not get a viral hit compared to even Pinoy Porn scandals. It's this kind of thought on using the power of technology through Twitter or Facebook or whatever site that makes changing the world and making it a better place and getting our message across the universe that will create an impact on issues at hand.

The Twitters

I have nothing against social networking. And while I use Facebook or Twitter, I think that some people have just taken this social networking thing to the extreme.

There is no exact defining principle on how to use social networking. You can Twit the whole day or just look at your Facebook site and keep posting non-sensical things for all I care. After all, some of your friends may be actually interested in what you're doing or what you have to say. That is, if you're really someone popular or worth "following".

I've noticed lately, how some people use their Twitter account to "update" people on each and every step of what they are doing and where they are. While Twitter encourages people or friends to "follow you", it doesn't literally mean that you're followed all the way to the bathroom or to the gas station!

I'll give you an example of a Twit for the day (this is an actual Twit timeline):

24 hrs ago - Good morning! @DeepakChopra: Encourage unity, discourage divisions
24 hrs ago - I'm at ______________________ (Araneta Center, Cubao, Quezon City)
24 hrs ago - I knew I left something! My water bottle! :-(
17 hrs ago - Hangdami lang patients today! Waaahhh
16 hrs ago - I look so haggard already. I'm wearing my best yet surmounted by the amount of patient & d'type of cases. Anobamerontoday? World Clinic Day?
14 hrs ago - Ok since a good friend tweeted about it already, let me announce that I'll be at @dj______________ podcast tonight. Stay tuned!:)
13 hrs ago - I'm at Shell (Kamias Road cor Kasing-Kasing St. Quezon City)
12 hrs ago - I'm at Starbucks (Ground Level, Easton Place, Valero St. cor VA Rufino St. Salcedo Village, Makati City)
12 hrs ago - Didn't get lost. Luckily. Thanks to those who helped me with directions stuff. :-))
11 hrs ago - I'm at Easton Place (Valero, Herrera, Makati)
11 hrs ago - So I'm here!!!! Will start in a few minute... :-)
11 hrs ago - Finally here guys! We're ready to start!
11 hrs ago - I'm at @dj_______________ podcast tonight! Love/Sex/Life probs? Call us! 659-6969
11 hrs ago - RT @mnelizedMD: Watch gwapong-gwapo Dr._____ on GTWM now!!! LOL.
10 hrs ago - We're accepting questions! Call us!
10 hrs ago - That caller sounds like Maria Ozawa. No offense. Hahaha. :))
9 hrs ago - Love/Sex/Life probs? We're accepting more calls with @dj___________ podcast tonight! Call us! 659-6969
9 hrs ago - We're giving away a cellphone! :-)
9 hrs ago - Really had fun with GTWM podcast crew! Waaah! Owell. :-) heading home now
8 hrs ago - Home! I love EDSA traffic during this time/ :-)
8 hrs ago - Oh wow. Now I believe it's really her.
8 hrs ago - Thanks to @dj__________ and @GTWMPodcast crew for the opportunity! I really had fun! TC guys! Gnyt!:)
8 hrs ago - There were a lot of unexpected things that happened today! From the _____ to podcasting...Gosh! thank good Lord for today. Gnyt tweeps!


I thought the guy was going to sleep already and was almost grateful that his narration of his life for the day was about to end....

7 hrs ago - Here's the link about tonight's show.
6 hrs ago - I can very much hear the brother @_______ in the other room listening to the podcast...He missed the show so he'll sleep late for it.

And finally, he went to bed....And I clicked on "Unfollow" because it was getting to be irritating already.

For my readers information, I actually deleted some of the tweets in between because it was getting to be a bore.

Like I said, there is nothing wrong with using social networking, but this is an example of how some tweets can get to the extreme! The interaction between the twitter tapping in wild abandon on trying to update people on where you are, what you're doing, what's going on in your life is left to the fab and famous. We cannot create what we're not. Some people just need to get a life!

And it's sad that some people are simply preoccupied with trying to look famous (image making) than to make a life.

Added to that fact is providing more information than what your followers need to know creates a scenario where you're probably looking for trouble. When parents don't know what their kids are doing or are risking themselves especially when exposing too much of themselves in an attempt of trying to create an image. Parents are the last to know when their kids get in trouble because of a senseless random act of being socially carefree.

Take home message is to use the social network responsibly. And while we are personally responsible for what goes on in our lives, we need to utilize social networking sites to promote the better good rather than the interest of one.

[My apologies to the twitter whose twits was used. For your information, it gets a bit irritating when I'm online as well and my phone just keeps alarming each time I get a Twit message that's non-informative.]

Googled

In this day and age of technology at our fingertips, finding an answer to any question is a GOOGLE away.

Which is actually not bad, considering that the trip to the library eons ago took up a lot of wasteful time in search for the answers to our questions.

But does GOOGLING a query provide the accurate answer?

Let me zero in on the perfect example.

A few days ago, a friend on Facebook had "shouted out" that her family would be traveling soon and that they would need to bring their 1 year old child. The mother was apprehensive about the travel ahead and that the child may become eventually "fuzzy" during the long haul. As in any FB "shout-outs", a comment thread follows.

And so the "friends" began providing comments: "enjoy the trip", "put a pacifier", "let her drink milk", and so on and so forth and I provided my ten cents worth of consult over FB as well - "give her 5ml of Diphenhydramine (Benadryl) since that's over the counter 30 minutes prior to the trip."

Walanghiya!!! You should read the comment thread that came after my comment from the do-gooders: "don't give benadryl and then there's suddenly a link from about.com on the cons of giving benadryl!". The trail doesn't end there. The next suggestion you read is "give ibuprofen instead. Then another link to another website about what to give your kids if you're traveling by air". Then another suggestion crops up "give acetaminophen (paracetamol) during the trip. it's not advisable to give drugs to kids as they are harmful." Then you see another link somewhere from another God-forsaken site. Finally, there's a comment that "consult your pediatrician about the Benadryl. It's not good."

I felt tempted to agitate the comment thread, but decided against it for fear of harming the ignorant few.

I believe that while technology has changed the landscape in the search for answers to queries on the information highway, it has also been abused by people who "google" and pass on the "found" answers to others as the "definite remedy to the malady". This is most commonly seen in the medical field, but encompasses all - from entertainment to fashion to gossip to politics to science. What I cannot stand actually are people who are not in any capacity authorized to provide unsolicited advise to others. For example, when someone asks you what is atopic dermatitis, if you're not a doctor, do not attempt to google atopic dermatitis and then pass on the information link and say voila - there's the answer to the question and then pat yourself on the back. You have no idea how seriously dangerous information is in the wrong hands. Unless you are licensed to give a professional opinion on something as ginormous as the life of someone, you should not be Miss Do-Good-Know-it-All answering other people's concerns. You have no business here and should try to get a life! You can experiment on your children or next of kin for all I care (and I seriously pity your whole family with having to live up with your inanities).

And for discussion sake, I will not give the pros and cons of dosing a kid with diphenhydramine on the flight, but would prefer that the 15 hour trip be a restful one for both the parents and the child. After all, it's not their friend that will be carrying the "fuzzy baby" on the lap during the whole flight!

I have a lot of patients parents that come up to me and ask me if the information that is passed on to them as a link is true or not, or that she heard a colleague telling her that my prescription may be harmful to her child, or that she read somewhere that a certain vaccine purportedly has a link to Autism, and so on and so forth. I discuss with them all the issues in a very professional manner. And no, I really do not mind discussing the concerns with them because they have the right to know. Full disclosure and a healthy professional discussion after seeing the patient (even if they have a whole folder or downloaded information) is the right of every patient to quality health care. It is the patients' rights to search and read up on their diseases and the treatment options to it. These rights should extend to the clinic office where the parents discuss these with their health care provider, with the latter providing treatment options where the benefits outweigh the risks. If you have a good doctor, he/she should be capable of answering the questions you post spontaneously at the clinic!

It is inappropriate that the discussion includes a third party who happens to have no professional training nor experience on treating patients or any other credentials to a well informed discussion except the fact that that person is keen in the art of googling. A second opinion means seeking the advice of another professional adept in that field of expertise of concern. It does not mean that you ask your hair stylist on why, for heavens sake, you should not put a steroid cream on the atopic patch of your child. Wala akong pakialam sa payo o kuro-kuro ng manicurista mo!

With that said, let me remind everyone that googling information is an FYI. It does not provide the absolute solution to the problem, especially when it comes to diagnosing or treating patients. It is infuriating that there are so many wannabes that need to realize that while they are probably techie experts in this age of information technology, they are not cerebrally fit to provide opinions that should be left alone to professional providers. And while you can pass on some information, you need to be trained to discern what is correct and what is misinformation. After all, not everything googled is correct!

If you feel you're alluded to in this blogpost and don't get the point, I think you should just roll over and die. The world would be a better place if we googled you had passed away.

Social networking and my next door neighbor

Facebook, Multiply, Twitter, Friendster, Myspace, LinkedIn - these are but a few of the social networking sites in the world.

Danah Boyd from the University of California at Berkeley and Nicole Ellison from the Department of Telecommunications, Information Studies and Media at Michigan University studied these various social networking sites and have proposed a definition for SNS.

Boyd and Ellison "define social network sites as web-based services that allow individuals to (1) construct a public or semi-public profile within a bounded system, (2) articulate a list of other users with whom they share a connection, and (3) view and traverse their list of connections and those made by others within the system. The nature and nomenclature of these connections may vary from site to site."

Over the last decade, technology has advanced in leaps and bounds.

During my growing up years, the closest I and my friends got to knowing other people were through formal affairs. Our parents grew up in the years where the closest they came to with technology was owning a pager which would holler each time someone would need them at work or at play.

Mobile phones are not what they used to be - where you could simply text or make a call in order to communicate with someone. Today's mobile phones are all adrenalized. If you had a phone that is capable of only text messages and calling, you're probably technologically deprived. The adrenalized mobile device has camera, video and internet surfing bundled into a joyous handheld device. Then comes the iPhone 4, which as advertised, has changed the era of mobile phones - it introduces FaceTime.

In 1997, social networking had its humble beginnings. Boyd and Ellison puts the timeline in this figure.



Social networking has its pros and cons.

The major purpose of SNSs is not to meet casual strangers for a tryst or a jump in the hay. Boyd and Ellison point out that "what makes social network sites unique is not that they allow individuals to meet strangers, but rather that they enable users to articulate and make visible their social networks. This can result in connections between individuals that would not otherwise be made, but that is often not the goal, and these meetings are frequently between "latent ties" (Haythornthwaite, 2005) who share some offline connection. On many of the large SNSs, participants are not necessarily "networking" or looking to meet new people; instead, they are primarily communicating with people who are already a part of their extended social network."

This being the major purpose of SNSs, there are opportunists who will turn this really cool technology into a social disaster. By allowing unknown people into your private lives is akin to allowing a thief into the night. When you're all asleep, the opportunist will take advantage of your identity and this can backfire on you eventually. But keeping to a closely knit circle isn't the major purpose of the SNSs. It hopefully intends to expand one's horizons. Getting to know your friend's friends and finding out eventually that some of us have a common denominator. Of course, that does not escape us from knowing that some of our enemies happen to be the best friend of our close friend. Which means that we either get to hate our friends or eventually love our enemies. The latter is so "sick".

For obvious reasons, the interaction is limited to those that have access to the internet or to a mobile handheld device that has internet capabilities.

Why then has SNSs become so popular from the school-age child to grandparents and great grandparents?

The study of Boyd and Ellison show that "social network sites also provide rich sources of naturalistic behavioral data." It's not a matter of being cool and hip and up-to-date with technology and with the times. It provides a source for sharing information, communication, and business arrangements to some degree. Undoubtedly, however, the privacy of our lives is intertwined in this complex technological advance which makes it sort of difficult to separate half-truths and half-lies. This becomes a major concern especially for the younger generation that tend to be carefree and careless when sharing their private lives online. There needs to be some discretion in the kind of information (private or public) that we are willing to share. We cannot all have shout-outs that expose and ruin the remaining privacy of our lives.

A friendly reminder is that SNSs are designed for a purpose. It's not the quantity of "friends" we make or "fans" we have but the quality that eventually counts. At the end of the day, they all won't be at your funeral giving your obituary.

Not all SNSs are actually a wild game hunt. There are those that are exclusive and are shared only by professionals who exchange business information with colleagues. The advantage here is that from one part of the world, we can find counterparts and business opportunities and careers in a country spaced 8000 miles apart.

I for one have been a participant and recipient of the several advantages of social networking. It has played a major role in my career and friends whom I have not seen in the longest time or have not had the chance to say hello to have suddenly popped up from somewhere so that even when distance and opportunities in a far away land has kept us far apart, the SNSs have kept us updated on their lives.

It's like living next door to them...and keeping abreast with their lives once more has somehow made the difficult times easier again.

The Social Network is the movie about the founders of Facebook. It stars Jesse Eisenberg who plays the role of Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg. Zuckerberg became one of the world's youngest billionaire at 23.

While the movie opened in the United States on October 1, 2010, it is scheduled to be shown in the Philippines on October 26.

The movie is a true-to-life story of Zuckerberg, the man who has changed the way SNSs is today.

Awesome!

[note: The photo is from the movie poster The Social Network. The figure is from Boyd and Ellison's publication.]

myparentsjoinedfacebook.com

"Therese's mom doesn't mind the things she posts on Facebook - she's cool that way. Her mom though Therese was cool about it, too, and one time she posted a reminder on her wall: 'Anak, you left your tita's pasalubong to you on the kitchen counter, 'yung mga underwear na Victoria's Secret.'"

It was time to say thank you then slap her mother.

The article last July 18, 2009 on the Super LifeStyle section of the PDI (Philippine Daily Inquirer) by Ruby de Vera was an eyeopener, if not an eye popper for the parents who are Facebook wannabees.

Alright, don't get me wrong. It's not that I never started on the wrong foot with this FB thing. I also made comments on the walls of my friends that should have been something that I should have just sent as a personal email. And twiddle-de-dee and twiddle-de-dumb, but it took a few days to maneuver my way into FB. What was once upon a time the world of the yuppies and the teens on social networking has now become passe. The "older generation" has started to blog, to use social networking sites in order to FB or Twitter, upload on MySpace, or share pics (non-adult or adult) in cyberspace.

But putting notes in cyberspace, particularly for social networking sites, requires a little tack and responsibility. As adults, and as parents in particular, you've just invaded THEIR SPACE!

As kids, there's the tendency to cringe when parents have fun at their expense. I've seen parents upload their kids singing karaoke or their kids pics in the nude when they were babies or their kids dressing funny for a party. While FB or Friendster or Twitter IS NOT the exclusive domain of the young, we have to hand it to them that when they started off this chain reaction in cyberworld, times have indeed changed. And believe me when I say that the kids agonize whether they should accept or ignore you when you request to tag yourself as their 'friends'! As de Vera puts it "Facebook is your turf, the one place in the cyberworld where you can be yourself with your select group of friends, in a setting both public and at the same time private. You really don't need your parents to see what kind of hangover you had from your friend's birthday party, as evidenced by the pictures where they tagged you."

But this social network has gone beyond just friends and a group of friends. It has spilled over to politics, particularly with the Obama presidency in the United States. In the Philippines, presidential wannabees like Chiz Escudero and Richard Gordon have put up a FB post where I believe that some techie that is paid by these politicians puts up posts to get the opinion, pulse and eventually vote of the youth. Watching the thread of opinions from these lackeys is not fun, as you can read the boot-lickers clawing their way to a pat in the head. Gimme a break, it's not even Dick Gordon or Chiz Escudero you're chatting with on FB!

But back to the topic at hand. So your kids are complaining. Their parents are on facebook and they need help! Erika Brooks Adickman and Jeanne Leitenberg have created a website http://www.myparentsjoinedfacebook.com that is interestingly funny. It allows the kids to throw the pie back at the parents in a humorous way, as in a "back in your face" where kids want their parents to simply behave like parents.

At the end of the day, you'll realize that FB is all about each others space and not for parents to be monitoring their kids activities. For both the kids and the adults, we just need to delineate that space. After all, as adults, we were once kids and enjoyed the flow of fun before life eventually caught up on us. As for the kids, well, you'll soon be adults and some will eventually end up as parents, and you'll get the drift that your parents are probably going through now.

So the next time parents get the impulse to tag their kids as "friends", talk to them first if it's okay and not just ask permission in cyberspace. There's enough space to enjoy cyberworld. One click away should not create animosity in the family.