Haha. Read first before you react, will ya??! Pfft.

This jobstreet ad has been going around for a while, and as always, I lag behind again. Equally-popular Google-competitor Yahoo! is looking for an Online Community Manager who will be the face of the company in the local scene, both online and offline.

Truth be told, the job opening sounded somewhere within the vicinity of “dreamy” to me. Interesting, indeed. And Ely’s probably right when he said that the job sounds much like what Miss Aileen Apolo is doing as the Official Google Country Consultant here. With Yahoo’s ongoing initiatives to localize its network to various markets across the globe, getting into the online and offline scene in the SouthEastAsia is, no doubt, the inevitable first step to take.

And then there came a lightbulb above my head. *Ting!*

(Okay, more like a thought bubble, fine.) Ano kaya? Pede kaya..? Too ambitious, I know, but something suddenly awakened that little dreamer inside of me, making me want to imagine the unimaginable. What can I say, can I help it if the job description sounded, for me, like The Ultimate Dream Job?

Online Community Manager, Philippines
Yahoo, Singapore

Online Community Management

You will lead the on-going management of our online communities. You will drive the engagement and growth of community-based services like Yahoo! Answers, Flickr and Yahoo! Groups. You will encourage our users to build relationships with each other and to share their knowledge, photos, videos and passions in a meaningful and responsible way. You will do this by communicating with the community through product blogs, message boards, emails and instant messaging.

Offline Community Management

You will engage our community face-to-face via meet-ups, road shows, workshops, seminars and other public events. You will be the face of Yahoo! and an evangelist of our products, teaching users how to maximize their online experience with our products.

Product Marketing

You will help the product managers and marketing team identify, evaluate and drive opportunities to increase market share and usage of our products. Based on your experience with the users, you will help marketing work out their strategy for our community products.

Product Maintenance and Development

Based on your interaction with users, you will provide user feedback to the development team as they upgrade and design new features. You will also work with customer care on how to handle abuse and service violations so as to maintain product quality.

And the job is based in Singapore too. If you’re my friend and you’ve known me a long time, you know in my heart of hearts how much I considered taking my chance in Singapore. Sheesh! It’s fate! I’m perfect for the job! The job is perfect for me! (Ha!!)

LOL.

But of course, that’s just me, playing around.

So no, I’m not stoopid enough to apply for the job and waste my time. Not confident enough to say I have what it takes (coz I don’t haha). And inasmuch as it’s good for daydreaming purposes, I didn’t apply for the position because:

1. I don’t have 2-5 years of product management / community administration experience. I have a little over 2 years worth of working experience, and barely one year as an SEO Project Manager. What do I know about being The representative of a very popular online brand??!
2. I talk a lot, I know, and I can talk a handful in front of my friends if I’m in the mood. But to talk in front of an entire community and educate them of Yahoo’s products and services? Gaah. The SEMCON alone is freaking me out, what more, this?? LOL.
3. I have a lot to learn. And for the meantime, I don’t want to grow up that fast just yet. Besides, I still have dreams of owning lots of pink gadgets to reach, I have no time for BIGGER dreams such as this. Hehe.

I think, however, that a woman will be perfect for this job, and I’m saying this not because of personal biases. I guess all I’m saying is, whoever’s going to fill this position up is someone to watch out for. For sure, just like Aileen, we’ll be seeing a lot of this person too.

Anyone in the local blogosphere who’s perfect for this job that you can think of?

As for me, if the position becomes available again about three years from now, I’ll probably take my chance.

Or, if I suddenly matured within the next three months (application period for the job will be closed in December), then, ehem-ehem, say hello to the first ever Yahoo! Philippines Online Community Manager: ME.

LOL.

Dream on, Riz. Dream on. Haha.

Meanwhile, please be nice come judgment day, okay? *puppy-eyed*

Ha! See ya there!

If I wasn’t aware of the effects of linkbuilding, Google bombing, and SEO in Google’s search results pages for the keyword “Filipina“, I still would have joined this advocacy. How much more that I have a clear grasp of how powerful links and viral marketing can be in changing the image and reputation of a certain concept that has been widely misconstrued online. Hence, consider myself counted. This is Pinkseo, joining the flock. Filipina SEO represent!

Let me just say that I’ve lost count of the number of times I said in this site that I’m an advocate of women empowerment — of females being exceptional at what they do, excelling in their own fields and in their own rights. Precisely why this site came to be in the first place: my way, as a bewildered female newbie (and a proud Filipina at that) to make my voice heard in a man’s world such as this industry that I’m in.

Having said this (over again), you can tell that I share Miss Noemi and Miss Dine’s dismay on the misconstrued reputation of Filipino women online, as shown in the Google SERPs (search engine results pages) everytime one queries the keyword “Filipina”. True enough, to associate Filipino women with made-to-order brides and sluts is disturbing and unacceptable, when we can proudly say that our country is blessed with Filipino women who are loving moms and wives, world-class writers, bloggers, and webmasters, and successful professionals in their own fields.

So the goal is simple. To reshape the Filipina image online by making a specific website, Filipina Women’s Network (which defines the true image of a Filipina), overtake those sites that defines Filipina as anything less. But aside from our positioning in the SERPs, what’s equally important is to have as many Filipinas make their stand and have their voices be heard on their blogs. One blog post and one link speaks in gazillion decibels. Filipinas Unite!

Joining the campaign can be done in three easy steps. With initiatives by outstanding Filipina moms, Noemi Dado and Dine Racoma, here’s how to make yourself counted:

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Okay, she’s not so little anymore. But still.

I thought of adding this one to my “is a woman” series of posts but “Junior Problogger is a Woman” just doesn’t sound right. Anyway.

13 year old Sarabeth Jasmine of Junior Pro Blogger Dot Com earns from Adsense, offers Ad space, features fellow teen-er’s blogs with her very own “Site of the Month” project, and blogs about stuff that are foreign even to us older bloggers (such as pixeled art and vector graphics). Really now. I remember playing Barbie dolls and rollerblades when I was thirteen. Sarabeth is surely doing something productive out of her time.

Take a look at her prettyful site that’s screaming girl power:

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To become a Wordpress theme contributor is among my greatest frustrations. While I’ve always wanted to be able to come up with and distribute my own wordpress themes, my inability and my lack of spare time to sit down and work on developing killer PHP/CSS skills, get in the way of that pursuit. I still want to think that it’s still not too late, hehe, hence I still find ways to learn, and be inspired. But well, the time is NOT yet now.

On another note, I’ve got some “is a woman” thing going on in this blog without really intentionally doing so (and just now I decided that it’s a good idea to continue doing more “is a woman” posts). First there’s “HP’s In-House SEO is a Woman” and just yesterday, “American Idol Winner 2007 is a Woman“. So just for trips, I googled the phrase “is a woman” and, lo and behold, came face to face with some interesting finds, write ups and sites that speak a lot of women concerns and thoughts that resemble mine. Interesting, really.

And then I landed on this blog post entitled “If Linux is a Woman..” and found this lengthy comment by Jennifer Hodgdon about her thoughts on being “a woman in a male-dominated field”. She said, and I quote:

“First, it’s always tough to be a woman in a male-dominated field, but after enough years of it, you get used to ignoring the sexism and locker-room atmosphere that often prevails. Younger women may have less experience doing that, and therefore may be put off by the tone of discussions on many tech mailing lists and forums; even I (not in the category of “younger”) have been known to sever all ties to particularly hostile development communities. “

And then she spoke about her experience being a Wordpress contributor:

“I should mention that I found the WordPress community to be much more welcoming and less hostile than others I have been a part of or considered joining, which is why I contribute my time to WordPress and not any of the other open-source software I use on a regular basis.

Another thought is that to contribute to a project like WordPress, you have to (a) have spare time, (b) have expertise (probably), and (c) want to spend your spare time doing something in your area of expertise. I think all three of these lower the number of women participating. For (b), clearly the number of women software developers is much lower than the number of men. For (a), even today, I think women tend to have more home responsibilities and less spare time. As for (c), perhaps most women developers are less likely than their male counterparts to want to do any extra development work after hours? Who knows… but these three factors together could account for the low representation women have among open-source projects.” (Emphases mine)

What’s evident is that, distributing wordpress themes, plugins, and other open-source stuff for Wordpress use is no joke. It takes time, mad skillz, and artistry. That’s why it amazes me that some Filipinas stand out in this particular area, and I happen to know some Filipina Wordpress Theme designers who are silently making a difference in the Wordpress Community by sprinkling some wptheme love around the world. (And, apparently, if you’ll scan through Ratified.Org, you’ll find out that these Filipina Wordpress Theme contributors are at the top of the rank, surpassing even the likes of Macalua.com and well, Yugatech. :P)

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I’m not really a feminist or anything like that. But like I once said, I’m simply an advocate of girl power — of women excelling in what they do, wherever they are. So imagine my delight when I heard (just heard, that’s right, ‘coz I’m in the office when all of this is happening) that Jordin Sparks won in the recently concluded American Idol 2007 over Blake Lewis.

When I first heard her song over at Gann’s, I knew right then that she got the coveted title in the bag. I felt the same feeling when Yeng Constantino won Pinoy Dream Academy, but yeah, okay, that’s a different story. This is American Idol we’re talking about now. And Jordin is like, 17 years old! Way to go girl!

Thanks to the ever-reliable Youtube, I was able to watch Jordin Sparks‘ winning song over there. Watching her made me feel the same feeling I had watching Fantasia Barino sing I Believe back in American Idol 2004. Fantasia cried, singing that song. And I did too. Seriously. Haha. Go mush. So yes, that’s how I felt too, watching Jordin sing “This is My Now“. I was teary-eyed. She sang it beautifully, and with so much heart and soul. It’s if she’s one with the song.

“This is my Now”, apparently is a song that bested over “25,000 submissions” received through a song writing competition, and voted over by 500,000 fans. And the song, apprently, is written by an accomplished songwriter, and a pastor.

According to Fox, Krippayne is already an “accomplished” singer-songwriter who “aspires to write songs that reflect life, resonate with people and touch the heart.” In addition to serving as Krippayne’s songwriting partner, Peabody is also an advertising consultant, graphic designer and full-time pastor.

(Which gave the song a whole new meaning to me.)

Hat’s off to Jordin Sparks for raising yet again another pink flag high up in the air. Go girl!

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