Miss World bet asks Pinoy netizens for text votes

MANILA, Philippines - Newly crowned Miss World Philippines 2012 Queeneerich Rehman is seeking the support of Filipino netizens to vote for her in the pageant’s online poll.

The 24-year-old Moroccan-Filipina, who bested 24 other candidates last June 24, will represent the country in the Miss World 2012 competition on Aug. 18 in Inner Mongolia, China.

Rehman made the appeal during the Philippines’ first Social Media Day celebration last June 30 in Makati City.

Meanwhile, over 400 Filipino netizens converged in Ayala Triangle to mark the first ever meet up of Filipino Twitterati, bloggers, advocates and social media users.

Social Media Day is an annual gathering for social media enthusiasts spearheaded by US-based technology website Mashable.

In the Philippines, TweetUpManila hosted the event.

During the social media get-together, three social media advocates shared their insight of how social media had helped them in their campaigns for a cause and how it made a positive impact on the lives of people.

TV host Daphne Oseña articulated how social media were used as a tool to help victims of disasters, especially during the onslaught of “Ondoy” and “Sendong” through citizen journalism.

Gang Badoy, founder of the volunteer group RockEd Philippines, discussed how social media promote various advocacies, noting that “one accomplishment of this day is that it makes the cyber and real worlds fuse and merge.”

TV-5 senior manager for Social Media Marketing Carlo Ople said that what makes the Philippines the “social media capital” is the way Filipinos use social media.

He cited the story of Alfred Salmos, an overseas Filipino worker who was electrocuted in Saudi Arabia and sought financial help so that he could return home. His story spread over Facebook and was featured on various news programs that helped him gather enough money through donations for passage back to the country.

Ros Juan, one of the organizers, added that the event also launched Project 140, which aims to support 140 deserving scholars from the poorest provinces of the country.

Social Media Day was also staged in Quezon City, Cebu, Iligan, Bukidnon, Cagayan de Oro City and Davao City.

Acknowledged as the social networking capital of the world, the Philippines continues to prove its overwhelming growth in social media with over 27 million Facebook users, and ranking eighth with the most number of accounts on Twitter worldwide, according to a recent study by research firm Semiocast.