The other day, I did a quiz on how addicted to the internet I am and I received 77% out of 100%. Like I said, I spend so much time online, I thought I would score above 90%.

A friend of mine saw me on my messenger and said that he has not seen me online for so long and asked if it was possible for me to be offline for such a long time. Little did he know that I was online all these while, except that he could not see me because I was on invisible mode or did not log in to my messenger at all.

Oh yeah, what my friend does not know is that I am now online on the cell phone as well. So you see, every one knows that I am totally living online. For the past year, I have been writing on so many blogs that I wonder if I am addicted to blogging.

There’s this quiz that I came across that tells me how addicted I am to blogging and interestingly, I am ALSO 77% addicted to blogging. What I deduce is that yht total time I spent online is ALSO spent on blogging. If I do not blog, I don’t really have to BE online 24/7 except to check my email.

How addicted to blogging are YOU?

I was told of this bloggers gathering last night by my friend, a prominent Malaysian blogger. Well, I am so lazy to keep tabs of the local blogging scene by blog hopping, especially to blogs of socio-politics, but thankfully I could get my information on demand. I just have to send an SMS message to my friend, “Eh, tomorrow got any bloggers event ah?”

He told me about the Bangsa Malaysia Merdeka Get-together that is held in conjunction with Malaysia’s 50th Independence Day anniversary.

Event : Bangsa Malaysia Merdeka Get-together
Date : 25th August, 2007
Time : 8.30pm
Venue : Blog House (home of Malaysian All Blogs) No.66, Lorong Setiabistari, Damansara Heights, KL.
Admission: Free, by invitation only.
Light refreshment will be served.

There will be a forum entitled ‘Bangsa Malaysia : The Way Forward’ at 5pm at the same place and time.

Speakers on the forum are :

1. Dato Zaid Ibrahim
2. Zorro Unmasked
3. Jayanath Appudurai
4. Rocky’s Bru
5. Malik Imtiaz Sarwar
6. Azmi Sharom

If you would like to attend, then I am sorry that they do not accept new participants anymore due to overwhelming response. However, I believe that if you know of someone who has an extra pass or go as his guest then maybe you could just worm your way in.

The organisers propose to sing the National anthem as well. I asked my friend, will they be singing Namewee‘s version? My friend said no, because they would then need someone to supply a pile of shit. If you watched Namewee’s video on YouTube, only would you understand this joke.

By the way, I don’t think that Namewee’s song is particularly offensive. I think that the media has blown it out of proportion.

For more information on this event, do check out this post on The People’s Parliament.

The other day, I was thinking of setting up a new blog to be hosted by Blogger because I was getting quite sick of WordPress, frankly. A reader saw my post and told me about a blogging community at http://www.thoughts.com/

He told me that I could set up my blog easily PLUS have a ready readership because members of the community are very supportive of each other by reading blogs and leaving relevant comment. Also, members could rate each post we published and the good ones will generate a high rating and in return bring in more traffic.

The only thing that has stopped me from setting up a new blog is the networking that comes with it. Writing is fine but networking, building readership and Page Rank could be rather tedious. So I was thinking that with a Free Blog at a community blog host like Thoughts.com, perhaps I could concentrate better on blogging and and network among members.

Thoughts.com has provided Cloud tags on the homepage so we can easily read the thoughts of other members who are writing on the same topic. This could forge a close bond between members. Moreover, I think that some bloggers would be more motivated to write better and update the blog more regularly knowing that there is a group of people waiting to read each other’s blogs.

Although Thoughts.com is still in beta, members can also enjoy podcasting, sharing of photos and videos all under one website. I am sure you will appreciate how convenient it is to be able to share all these with just one web address.

I think it is going to be fun joining a blogging community where every member shares the joy of writing and sharing!

Four months ago, I wrote a post, Are You Kidding Me?, about getting a counter offer for a 200-word review post for $2.60, which I declined.

A few days ago, I came to know that advertisers in this particular marketplace have been getting ridiculous. A fellow blog for pay blogger received a counter offer for $3 for a $10 bid, which means a nett payment of $1.90 to her, after deducting 35% service charge.

While I personally have been more successful with this particular marketplace in the past month, I feel that advertisers here do not know, or do not care that we are paying 35% to the host of the marketplace out of the payment we receive.

If we were getting a nett payment of $3, there would still be takers are long as advertisers are reasonable in their requirement and not asking for a 300 – 400 word post, three links, images and videos.

I am not sure if this lady is going to accept or decline this opportunity but I think it surely will take someone who is really desperate to accept it.

There’s this trend now that I noticed from all my blog hopping activities that I find rather funny. We used to DISCLOSE when we are compensated for the post in cash or kind but now that most active blog for pay bloggers have half the blog with sponsored posts, a quarter with link-free original posts and the rest of the posts with a link or two, bloggers now see the need to DISCLOSE when there is a non-compensated free link.

What a joke it has become.

Well, there wasn’t such a need in the first place if we were not getting so many misunderstandings about getting compensated or not. But then I guess now bloggers see the need to be safe than sorry and getting sponsored posts rejected, so they DISCLOSE first, but in the reverse order.

But then you can’t blame bloggers when linking is second nature, paid or not!!

This morning while blog hopping, I chanced upon a blog that is dedicated to all things hair transplant. I have been blogging for a long time and have read quite a number of blogs, private and commercial, but this is the first time reading one that is solely on hair transplant issues.

This is an open blog where readers have the chance to ask expert personnel anything pertaining to hair transplant and restoration. Contributing editors of the blog are all people expert in this field.

Besides asking questions, readers could also share their stories on hair transplant. I am sure other readers would be interested to hear a first person account.

My friend, Paul, told me that Malaysian men all keep long hair because they do not know how to groom themselves. Well, he did not notice that there are just as many people suffering from hair loss. For people who would like to arrest their hair loss problem once and for all, with this new Hair transplant Adviser blog, now is the time to seek the answers and clear all doubts on hair transplant and restoration.

Recently, there’s no more joy in PPP for me. Don’t get me, wrong, I still love the company and will never talk bad about it despite what went on at BlogHer. Who cares what the others have said and are saying? Many people have had internal conflicts with themselves and also with their blog readers for placing sponsored posts on their blogs. For me, I never had such issues.

I have been a Postie for slightly more than nine months and every day, I have looked forward to “reporting to work” at PPP. However, since late last month, the joy has left me because I have been shown the ugly side of human beings.

I love the company, but I can’t say the same for all the other posties. Sure, I have made friends with some of them and a common love for PPP has strengthen our bonds but there are many more who are out to stab other people’s back, conspiring with each other to bring some of us down and kick us out of the system. Did I mention that the private forum is a bad idea?

I should be so honoured that there are people who actually took the trouble to set up a blog just to expose my misdeeds. Well, if they did have numerous screenshots of other people, then why was it that after three weeks, I was the only one on the blog?

Like I mentioned, I too read many Posties’ blogs daily and I see many people committing the same violation and then some, yet, I let them slide. Why? Because I never will jeopardise the income of another person.

PPP has accorded the opportunity to me which I and my family cherish very much. With the money I earned from PPP, I managed to meet the three debt repayment schedules every month plus support and upkeep the household.

I also will forever be grateful to PPP because it was with the money earned through PPP that I was able to afford to provide the best veterinary care to my pet. It was with this money that saved my little monkey from parasite fever that nearly cost his life and would have if we were unable to afford the medical bills. It’s with money from PPP that I finally took him for a bladder stone surgery that dragged on for sixteen long months because I could not save money quick enough.

You may wonder why I say my earnings are all from PPP. While I may have joined other similar services, the bulk of my blogging income is from PPP. I did not maximize on the opportunities of other services because I did not want to bombard too many irrelevant sponsored posts on my blogs.

Therefore, PPP has helped my family and I and we appreciate it very much. However, I hope that the jealousy will die down because it simply overwhelms. One thing that would help is to do away with the leader board so that nobody will know who earns how much. For every one who congratulates me for reaching the top spot on the daily or monthly leader board, there are ten who are looking for a chance to get me down.

Do not be mistaken that I am the only one feeling so, that I am being paranoid. You can ask any top earner who is of the wrong skin color and he/she will concur.

That being said, I hope to have the the chance and the strength to continue as a Postie despite all these challenges.