My i.ph story: Fun blogging times and letting go

It could be one’s innate need for self-expression that prompted me to blog way back 2006. I started blogging at Yahoo! 360°, a likely choice for me since I was already using Yahoo! Mail which was pretty much popular that time. However, after visiting some blogs, I realized Yahoo 360° had limited features. I started blog hopping, and eventually got hooked with the clean and simple yet visually appealing designs of i.ph blogs. It’s a free blogging platform provided by DotPH, the official domain registry of the Philippines. I immediately felt at home especially after reading some of the Bisdak* and Taglish blogs, and the best thing is it’s free.

I signed up right away and decided on a blog name that’s unique – a mix of my favorite word and favorite color, and thus ideasnpink came up. I chose a simple pink theme from among the many header images and background textures available at i.ph and eagerly wrote my first post titled My bee-log.

Using the “Shallow” template as my first blog theme, with a pomegranate in the side header.

Just few days after I published my first post, I got a warm welcome from other bloggers via messages on the tagboard and comments on my posts, some from Blogspot and WordPress blogs, and mostly from fellow i.ph users. I can’t describe how I felt writing and sharing my thoughts and ideas, knowing that my posts will be published in the World Wide Web where everyone can read it. I am basically a private person, so I made it a rule to simply filter out some information about myself that I consider as off-limits. My blog posts are usually more focused on my ideas and feelings than my hair color or weight or the name of my dad.

A change of blog template again using the “Muse” theme.

I did some blog hopping and commenting on others posts as well. I gained some blogsy friends along the way and even met some of them for real. When my blog turned a year older, my blogmates virtually joined me in the celebration.

The i.ph community was very much active that time. Those were really fun blogging times.

But things have changed. Early this year, I received an email from i.ph that broke my heart.

Dear i.ph blogger,

All good things must come to an end.

It’s been a fun ride, but we will be closing the i.ph blogging service on May 21, 2012. Maintaining it as a free service has become unsustainable and we are unable to devote the resources necessary to keep it going.

I felt sad as I continued reading the email, informing me that I have 2 months to transfer my blog contents to another site because all i.ph blogs will be forever deleted from their servers. They offered an option to have a low-cost personal domain at $14 reservation fee for two years. I immediately signed up the reservation form and paid for my two blogs (I have another i.ph blog aside from ideasnpink).

I thought my blogs were secure, and won’t be deleted, but my hopes were dashed when I got a call from them last April, informing me that the low-cost personal domain option won’t materialize and they can only offer a refund or a temporary domain redirect service. I was in a state of denial in the days that followed. But then came acceptance, and the need to let go.

Up next: My i.ph story: Service shutdown and lessons learned

* bisdak – is a shortcut for “Bisayang Dako”, a portmanteau of the words “Bisaya” and “Dako”, derived from the Cebuano dialect. Bisdak means a true-blue, authentic or full-blooded Bisaya, where Bisaya could mean a person or a dialect. Read more discussion about the word Bisaya in this post: Bisaya gid! “Dako” literally means “big” in Cebuano, but in this context, it implies authenticity of the person as a real Bisaya.