Guest blog : The Importance of GRADES !

*This is a guest blog from Gascylogs. Feel free to visit Gascylogs' site for more school tips!*

Grades are not the measure of a person nor are they even the sole measure of academic accomplishment. They are only one rather imperfect reflection of how much you have learned in your various courses.

People can learn a great deal and acquire a good education without making high grades, and some students who make straight A's may concentrate so much on getting them that they really miss their education.
But grades are one of the concrete and particular things society uses to judge what you are likely to accomplish in the future...

If you want to go on to graduate or go on to professional school, grades are even more important than you think.
The competition among applicants for law school, medical school, veterinary school, graduate business school, and most programs in graduate arts and sciences is formidable.

Your college grades will probably be the most important factor in determining whether you are admitted or not (though letters of recommendation sometimes count even more). Experienced admission officers know that grades predict success in advanced work better than do test scores.

Of course, a few people with the right connections or with a great record of achievement in extracurricular affairs will be admitted despite mediocre grades. But that happens less often than you think.

The best graduate and professional schools have two to ten times as many applicants as they have spaces. They can afford to take only the best. In many fields, no one with less than a B average is even considered, and some schools seldom admit anyone less than an A average.

So, if you plan to go on to advanced studies, you can't afford to dismiss grades as unimportant, even if you have reservations about them, as many of us do.

INCREASE YOUR POST 's POPULARITY

INCREASE YOUR POST'S/ BLOG POPULARITY

When it comes to writing about intriguing posts, posts that target large crowds (as opposed to personal, emo posts of your life's story) I would recommend Digg.

It's pretty common in the blogging world. You even see "Digg" integrated into individual posts. A basic explanation of what Digg is. Digg is kinda like Technorati in a sense.

It's a community that helps promote your blog/posts. In technorati, they use "authority" as your popularity gauge. In Digg, they use "diggs" or how many people liked your blog. Say 20 people "dugged" your recent post, it will show right next to that post and it will show in the site's list of posts getting a lot of "diggs".
The only difference this has from technorati is how Digg automatically sorts their list with posts with the highest diggs at the top. Unlike Technorati, which i think sorts their searches with the newest post rather than the most popular post.

Remember, if you will post in digg, most people would pay attention to how intriguing or how relevant it is to a larger crowd, say the current elections, or the current fad, so on and so on. IF you are more in the line of personal blogging, i would recommend you to stick to Technorati.

Now this is all based on my own experience and opinion. What is your say? Do you think this will help increase your post's popularity?
Post your comments, suggestions, or questions below.

You can visit Digg's website here :Digg

INCREASE YOUR BLOG POPULARITY

INCREASE YOUR POPULARITY

Ok, right after Mybloglog, i think I got real curious with this little green link i would see on almost everyone's blog...it either said something like "add to technorati" or "add to your favorites" or some numbers showing how popular the blog was.Interesting right? So i had to sign up in technorati.com immediately.

Firstly, I think technorati is the search engine for blogs. They rank blogs (by giving your blog "authority") as it increases in popularity. For example, a blog with 1000 authority is definitely more popular and has a larger reader population than say 2 authority. You can increase your popularity inside technorati by searching other blogs, adding them to your favorites, and integrating with other bloggers.

It would also be a good idea to get their "Add to favorites" code and paste it into your blog.

If you have any questions or suggestions to this post, you can post them by commenting here and you can visit the website : Technorati.com

VIEW YOUR BLOG STATISTICS

VIEW YOUR BLOG STATISTICS

So you've started off with your blog. You've also integrated GoogleAdsense into it.
Now you want to know how many readers view your blog and the little details like what they are clicking, where they came from (i mean from what site they came from to get to your blog, though Feedburner can tell you what country your readers come from)

well for bloggers, there are many site statistics tools you can choose from, the most popular i could think of when i started was Mybloglog and Feedburner.

I find Mybloglog.com more userfriendly for beginners. I actually started using it when mid-September 2007 when it was still an individual entity. Then a few weeks later it had merged into Yahoo, which was ok since i had been using my Yahoo id all along.

Mybloglog is pretty easy to use. You sign up for an account, you add your blog's url and you paste their statistic reader code into your blog (html) and within a few days you will see how many viewers you've been having.

You can also add their popular "widget" into your blog where pictures of your readers or community will show up in a neat little box that you can customize.

If you have any questions about Mybloglog you can post them in your comments here or you can visit the website : Mybloglog.com .

vote PINOY for the 2008 Beijing OLYMPICS

Vote
PINOY (Marco Torres) for the BEIJING 2008 OLYMPICS!

TOP PINOY WEB TRENDS

I am not very fond of Alexa.
Alexa is actually not a person na hindi ako fond of, rather it is an internet search engine (opposed to the library search engine, which is your beloved librarian hahah)
Actually i never use Alexa for my searches.
Eh for all i know Filipinos like me grew up GOOGLING their researches, games, lyrics, images, etc etc searches with the user friendly GOOGLE.

So back to Alexa.
The name sounds very weird for a search engine.
Sounds like a robot actually.But i found one thing useful from Alexa today...and that is Philippines Top 100 web searches.

NOw for a former journalist and part time blogger like me, it's very important to keep up to date.
So if you find something on this top 10 list unfamiliar to you, you might as well go check them out para "in ka" haha.


1. Friendster is a leading global social network emphasizing genuine friendships and the discovery of new people through friends. Search for old friends and classmates, stay in better touch with friends, share photos and videos, and so much more.friendster.com

(add me in friendster : tsaikoboy )

2. Yahoo!
Personalized content and search options. Chatrooms, free e-mail, clubs, and pager.yahoo.com

(add me in Ymessenger : project_tsaiko )

3. YouTube

YouTube is a way to get your videos to the people who matter to you. Upload, tag and share your videos worldwide!youtube.com

4. Google.com.ph

(add me in google blogger: tsaiko )

5. Multiply.com

(add me in multiply: tsaiko )

6. Google
Enables users to search the Web, Usenet, and images. Features include PageRank, caching and translation of results, and an option to find similar pages. The company's focus is developing search technology. (Im not sure Why Alexa put their chief competitor on the top 10 twice...maybe technical error or Filipinos are just googling too much heheeh)

7. Wikipedia
An online collaborative encyclopedia.wikipedia.org

8. Imeem.com

(add me in imeem: Tsaiko)

9. Blogger.com Free, automated weblog publishing tool that sends updates to a site via subscription or feeds.

(link to me in blogger: tsaikoboy.blogspot.com)

10. Microsoft Network (MSN) Dialup access and content provider.

(***WARNING: Alexa listed 100 top Pinoy searches i think, but i PURPOSELY cut mine to Top 10. Some sites from 11 onwards include pornographic content***)

ADVANTAGE OF BLOGGER / BLOGSPOT

Why switch to Blogger.com (also known as Blogspot.com)
I have nothing against multiply or friendster or any other networks
I actually find their animated-petal-thing (when you hover over someone's picture) amusing...i get hypnotized by them when they go on forever when my internet connection is slow heheh.
But yah to make it convincing to you on why you should switch (or at least considering making an account) to blogspot, i'll put it in the pro/con format:
WHY SWITCH:

PROS:

• its the fad, i mean believe me there are millions of filipinos taking blogspot as the alternative
• its got class...um not too be mayabang or mean but i've heard a few friends call friendster cheap or oldschool. blogging is a global phenomenon so it's not exclusive to the english language, and i've seen very impressive Pinoy blogs, spanish blogs, pig-latin blogs(joke).
• its got a vast range of interesting and informative blog network...actually i use blogs as a second alternative to online encyclopedias...personal posts from bloggers can contain a lot of meat..
• you can blog about your photos, music, videos and just about anything you want to blog about
• you can expand your network (also see cons)
  you can monitor how many viewers you've had, where they came from, what they read the most, etc..
  you can have subscribers to your blogs via email or live-feeds (i really find this a plus, it makes my eyes cry teeny-weeny tears of joy every time i see more subscribers to my blog)last but not least
  you can earn from posting your blogs in blogspot (there's more steps to it in my site if you want to go into details: tsaikoboy.blogspot.com)

CONS:

• its exclusive to bloggers (Blogger/blogspot..um *obvious ba)about that expanding your network---blogspot has no "add-as-friend" button (you have to manually put links in your blog to connect other bloggers in your network...follows the typical website idea) (ps, i'm trying to filter out the non-bloggers here so if you're into the friendnetwork type, you may well stick to multiply or friendster)
• it's becoming more and more commercialized (i'm not sure if this is altogether bad but it looks greedy for some)
• it takes time to get used to the format and blog layout (um it took a full time Nurse intern like me who only gets online on rare occasions a WEEK para masanay)
  um..so far that's all the cons i can think of..(earning four-digit amounts every month kinda makes a person focus on the PROS hehehe)

To end on a positive note, I personally have decided not to terminate my account (terminator?eh muvie yan eh amp***) in multiply due to kia's cute baby pictures, joke heheeh.I can manage to juggle 2 friendster accounts, 2 blogspots, 1 myspace, 1 facebook, 1 multiply, 1 technorati, 1 mybloglog, 1 blogrush, 10 intern groupmates, 4 days of hospital duties, 2 days of schoool, and 1 day of worship and board-exam review *PHEW* (hehe pinagyabang na.,..i know there are more of you busier than me*belat*)
(PSS author reserves the right to not mention his beloved parents and family and online games on this blog hehehe)(PSSSS. THERE IS NO REFERRAL SYSTEM IN BLOGSPOT SO THIS WAS NOT POSTED SO I CAN EARN CREDITS OR MONEY OR VIRTUAL WEALTH . LOL.BOW**)