PICS christmas party Dec 20, 2006

The Philippine Internet Commerce Society held its christmas party last Dec 20, 2006. The program higlight was the signing of the Charter with Phil Center for Entrepreneurship (PCE) which will determine the working committee for various projects of both PCE and PICS. Mon Lopez represented PCE and Teddy Kalaw for PICS. This was witnessed by DTI Undersecretary Carissa Cruz who earlier presented the One Town One Product Project of her office.

The fun part followed after composed of the hilarious games such as christmas carol songs, Paint me a picture and Maria went to town. See the various photos below.

PICS at SEO Phils BeerCon

Attended the SEO Philippines BeerCon 2006 last saturday night upon the invitation of Marc Macalua list owner of they Search Engine Optimization mailing list.

Photo collage (note: had to replace collage with actual shots for blogger didnt want to accept this weird, since it was done in picasa) shows other directors from the Philippine Internet Commerce Society (PICS) and colleagues in the industry Edna and Arnold Belleza, Erwin Oliva, Bobby Gantuangco, Rowena Rivera, Mon Lizardo, and Aileen Apolo, google Philippine consultant who was a guest speaker.

Marc raffled off an I-pod based on a raffle which I was asked to draw. I picked a number from three halloween containers which gave the number 43. Whoever was in that google rank got the prize. Lucena dot com apparently won the prize.

Drinks and food abound at Jill's restaurant at the Fort Strip. I didnt realize that a colleague back in college, Ito Ramirez, PLDT executive was part owner of the place.

Didn't plan to stay long but left the place close to midnight.

eBusiness Made Easy book Launch

Last September 25, 2006 we finally launched the much awaited book eBusiness Made Easy : The Philippine Internet Society's Internet Roadmap for the Small and Medium Entreprises.

This was held during the General Membership meeting of PICS at the Zobel Dining of Makati Sports Club.

I would like to thank the writer, Joey Alarilla of Inq7.net, the editor, Winthrop Yu, and Project Lead Edna Belleza.

The book was sponsored by Innove Communications, PLDT, Jobsdb.com, Microsoft, Yes IT, Plantersbank, Yahoo and Tech Cellar.

Speakers during the launch were Gil Genio, CEO, Innove Communications Inc, Tim Diaz de River, Director General of the National Computer Center, Joey Alarilla who spoke about his experiences on the book project, and Marie Cortez Marketing Manager of VMV Hypoallergenics, who spoke about the company experiences as the company was featured in the book.

The book was endorsed by Joey Concepcion, Presidential Adviser on Entrepreneurship, President and CEO, RFM Corp, Napoleon Nazareno, President and CEO Smart Communications and PLDT, Jayjay Viray, Country Manager, Jobsdb Philippines, Ruperto Alonzo, Director UP Institute of Small Scale Industries and Gil Genio, CEO Innove Communications.

Induction of the new PICS Board

The induction of the new board of PICS was held last May 17, 2006 at the Zobel Room of Makati Sports Club. Keynote speaker was the new CICT Commissioner, Secretary Ramon P. Sales, a former colleague in BPI.

It was a teribly stressful day for me as I came straight from the airport from Cebu having attended the wake of a dear friend. I instructed our helper to just put my clothes for that evening in my car so when the driver fetches me I can proceed to my condo to change. I had to finish writing my speech when I arrived, change, proceed to an internet cafe to print it then rushed to the venue.

Below are some of the photos taken by a really good photographer commissioned by the Inquirer Publications where Edna is connected with.

The General Membership meeting was sponsored by Yahoo Philippines, Intel Phils, Innove Communications and Hewlett Packard.

The new officers are as follows:

Mary Anne D. Tolentino - President

Ramon Lizardo - Vice-President

Winthrop Yu - VP Treasurer

Mike Abundo - VP Emerging Technologies

Erick Kalugdan - VP Projects

Edna Belleza - Corporate Secretary