The Umpteenth Journal Attempt (Version III)

It seems Friendster keeps adding new features, obviously to keep up with all those mushrooming friend network websites out there (Yahoo 360 and MSN Spaces, anyone?). Heck, this blog wouldn’t even be here if they weren’t trying to stay on top.

But there’s one feature I haven’t been interested in using, and that’s the search engine. I’m more partial to Google, as are most Internet-savvy people, I assume. So it just feels awkward having to use something else, much like it’s awkward trying to use those Friendster clones. I still haven’t made a MySpace account, mostly because there’s no use yet.

Anyway, the "selling point" of Friendster’s search engine is that all searches are tallied, resulting in a top 10 chart of searches in your network. From what I gather, a Friendster network consists of all three degrees of people who’re connected to you. In my case, that’s just under 1.2 million people.

Thus, the question is: what are the top 10 things that the 1.2 million people in my network are searching for?

The answer:

1. arab men
2. tanpa bh dan cd
3. true love quiz
4. free mp3 download
5. what is the meaning of my name
6. Gift Ideas
7. diesel bags
8. love match
9. personality test
10. plasma screen TV

Woo-hoo! Go…Arab men? The other entries are more comprehendable, seeing as they appeal to what most people who get on the Internet are looking for: romance, porn and free stuff. And to some extent, that also applies to Arab men; I guess the (apparently plentiful) women (I assume) who did those searches figure that all Arab men are loaded, hung like (Arab?) stallions and will bestow upon them endless amounts of cash and great sex. Stereotyping, of course. For all we know, most Arab men could very well be dead skint and have soggy peanuts for dicks. Anyway, check out your own top 10 search chart to see what bizarre stuff your network is up to.

…gotta make a blog entry. Not that I have anything important to write about at the moment, and some might argue that was also the case in the previous entries. I just thought it’d be a shame to have an entry-free month. I’ve been neglecting this blog enough as it is. Or maybe I’m doing this deliberately, so when I do get around to posting, it becomes more of a special occasion for whoever’s keeping tabs? Mind games ahoy!

Anyway, to whoever’s keeping tabs: sorry to disappoint you. I really don’t have anything interesting to say right now. But I guess there’s good news: at least I’ve started writing. As someone who gets paid to write (though not for this blog…maybe that’s the reason I rarely post? The mystery deepens…), usually the main obstacle is getting started, actually getting stuff written down. Ideas are always there, but they’re not always easily expressed, let alone expressed in a manner that doesn’t make you want to permanently take your keyboard out of commission, which is the case for me more often than not.

This is a far from ideal situation for someone who’s prone to procrastination even at the most productive of times. Add deadlines and editors breathing down your neck, and it’s not exactly a recipe for quality nor sanity. I wish I could be more inspired and productive, but I guess that’s something that comes with practice. Maybe if I blogged more often I could get that practice, but the difference between this and writing a magazine article is that, in the latter’s case, I have to have something worth writing about, and even if I do, I can not ramble on endlessly. Whereas when it comes to blogging, well if you’ve got this far then you’ve just read three rather lengthy paragraphs about nothing in particular, so I’ve proven my point, no?

That’s what it all boils down to, basically: editors. No one edits this blog, so I’m free to indulge in whatever brain farts I choose to unleash on you, the audience. For the magazine, I have to follow through on whatever newsworthy story I’ve volunteered or have been assigned to do. Enthusiasm for the article subject is always a good thing, but to quote the first episode of House, which quotes the "great philosopher, Jagger": you can’t always get what you want. When that happens, all you can do is suck it up and try your best to make it not suck, because at the end of the day it’s your name that gets attached to it.

Of course, the end product is (generally) the fruits of a collaborative effort between writer, editor, photographer and graphic designer, and as but one cog of the machine, you can only do so much  to determine whether the afore-mentioned fruits turn out ripe or rotten. You do your best, of course - mood notwithstanding, because you’re supposed to be professional -  to at least make sure that you’re not the one stinking things up, and maybe weigh in on what your collaborative partners are doing to ensure that things turn out as close as to what you’d hoped. Or just trust them to do their thing without intervention.

Unfortunately, it seems I have trust issues. Believe me (ha!), I’d like nothing more than to sit back after my work is done and let the others handle the rest, but …well let’s just say that that doesn’t always work out well. An ego thing, I suppose - I just want whatever I’m directly involved in to come out as great and as untarnished from my original vision as possible, and as true as possible to the spirit of the mag, at least content-wise. Based on these past few months’ experience, that’s not always the case, and I’m not always in a position to do something about it. The downside of teamwork, I suppose. I wonder how much a clue costs, because I know one or two people who are in desperate need of one.