The Filipino Blogger and Domain

The J Spot author J. Angelo Racoma, problogger, forevergeek.com contributor blogged about our ccTLD dot PH. He presents some of the hows and whys Filipino bloggers opt to be in a free blogging service and on a TLD (.com, .org, .net) rather than getting or using our very own .ph domain. It's no surprise that the main reason for opting to get a TLD - rather than our .ph domain - is the cost.

A year ago, I initiated a project to put up a comprehensive portal for my city. The initial plan was to get a .ph to simply say to the world that "hey! this site is by a Filipino, for the Filipinos" but after days of price and feature comparison we simply have to go with a simple TLD. The DOTPH administrators according to several forums and articles online (I'm not going to name them, you can do your own research) were simply overpricing and hogging a precious country resource and further talks about this warrants another blog entry and risks unearthing a possibly forgotten issue, so, no more about that.

I think it would be a great idea to start banking on popularizing com.ph or even .ph domains among the Philippine blogging community. I mean, majority of Pinoy bloggers are likely on blogspot.com, or even friendster.com. A small minority is on i.PH—a .PH domain, but not necessarily a “free” domain (as in free speech, not as in free beer), since it’s attached to a hosted blogging solution. ... Won’t you readers think a yourname.com.ph blog domain would be cool? And what if transfer were to be painless and hassle-free?

Of course this comes with cost considerations, but I think if the price is right (especially if it’s free or near-free), then Filipino bloggers would catch on to the idea well.

Indeed it would be! but beyond this initial set-up of owning and setting up a personal domain and blog comes a responsibility, maintenance, longevity and "persistency" issues that perhaps most Filipino bloggers are just not up to or into it and it is possible that most will never be. Why such doubt? Think of it this way, what happens afterwards? now that they have a .ph blog, will it guarantee good posts, will it guarantee contents that we as "collective" Filipino be proud of? Come to think it, what if some no-brainer Filipino/Filipina decides to add more disgrace the keyword Filipina by selling her/his morale by putting a webby on a .ph presenting themselves as camwhores. There are a lot more what of if's that might already be a reality, but then again it could just be my frame of thinking that is blocking me from seeing more advantages.

That's only a few of the considerations. I'm considering starting a series of blog of the pro's and con's of free blogs And owning and setting up your managed blog - hopefully, I can find time. And yes, the idea will definitely catch on... but only if it's free.

And if it's free, heck, I'm jumping aboard.

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• http://racoma.net/archives/comph-why-not/

Tags:

• .com.ph
• .ph
• cctld
• tld
• namespace
• filipino