Alright… alright it has only been a few weeks since launch and things have been going great so far thanks to all of you guys who supported us from Day 1.

Now we’re looking to expand and we need more programmers!!!

So if you’re

1) Based in Penang (or willing to work in Penang).

2) Excellent in PHP/MySQL

3) And love to eat Cheezels.

E-mail me your CV at timothy [@] nuffnang [dot] com.

We’re also looking for web designers so write in.

One thing I have to clear up though (since a few people have asked me this before), everyone at the Nuffnang has excellent academic results, with even one of our programmers scoring a CGPA of 4.0/4.0.

But that does NOT mean it’s a criteria to join us at Nuffnang.

What we’re looking for is passion… not how many words of your textbook you memorized before each exam at uni.

If you share the same passion as we do (and you love Cheezels)… you’d fit in just fine.

This is another e-mail I sent out to our Nuffnang bloggers last night.

Dear Nuffnang Bloggers,

When Nuffnang carried out its BETA launch a little more than 2 weeks ago, the team at Nuffnang tried very hard to remind bloggers that it would take up to 1-2 months from launch before the paid ads start rolling out.

We said 1-2 months because we did not want to disappoint. We were afraid to promise too much too soon and end up delivering too little too late.

But as I sit at my work station now after a long day of meetings, I can confidently say to all of you now that we have gotten advertisers on board and the first paid ads will roll out the week after next on the 25th of March 2007.

How did we manage to shorten the time we needed since launch to get our advertisers on board?

It was not because of the hard work all of us at Nuffnang had put in the past couple of weeks, nor was it because Ming and I are good at talking during marketing meetings, but it was because of the support all of you had given us since our BETA launch.

Without your support, our community would not have the reach and coverage that we have today and without that, we would not have been able to impress the advertisers with numbers at meetings like we just did. Without your support, there will be NO Nuffnang.

On behalf of all of us at Nuffnang, I just have to sincerely say a big THANK YOU to each and every one of you. Thank you for your support. Thank you for believing in us. Thank you for putting enough pressure on us to make sure that none of us slack.

Now that I have effectively polished all your shoes and made you smile, it is time for me to ask two favours of you.

Firstly, the advertisers who will be advertising on our network for the first two weeks are especially interested in advertising in your Skyscraper Ad Units. However, they were quick to note that a number of bloggers had put their Skyscraper Ad Units too far down the Sidebar to garner any attention. The rule of thumb is that each Skyscraper Unit must be placed high enough in the sidebar such that it is visible when your blog first loads up (without the need to scroll down).

The advertisers have said that they will NOT advertise on any blog that has its Skyscraper Ad Units placed too far down. So if your Skyscraper Ad is placed wrongly, please correct it asap and we will do our best to make sure that you won’t miss the first round of ads.

For those of you who have placed the Large Rectangle and Leaderboard ad units. Well done on that, the advertisers were very happy with the placements.

The second favour I have to ask of all of you is when our ads launch, please do support our advertisers! Let us show them that this new medium of advertising is not overrated.

Let us show them the power of the blogging community!

The Star came out with an article lately.

Blog enthusiasts collect clues in a race to win Malaysian Grand Prix party invitations.

By NASA MARIA ENTABAN

IT’S amazing what some people would do to get special invites to a Malaysian Grand Prix party.

Avid bloggers and blog-readers hunted high and low in a race that began in the physical world, which then moved on to cyberspace, before they ended up racing to a physical finish line.

The event, dubbed “Spot The Raving Blogger” began on March 1 and will culminate at one of Kuala Lumpur’s most prominent landmarks, the KL Tower.

On the first day of the race, participants were given a clue in The Star that identified a local blogger. On that individual’s blog, more clues were posted which directed the participants to other blogs, over the course of 10 days.

The last clue, which read, “A coffee house in the new wing of 1-Utama” led the participants to a final location – Starbucks Coffee at 1-Utama Shopping Complex where the five bloggers were waiting to be identified at 1.45pm.

Race participants reached the location panting, after they had run all around the shopping complex in search of the right outlet. The first 50 participants to arrive each won passes to the Speedzone Tour 2007, the official Malaysian Grand Prix party.

“I think this event is a fun way to give out passes, instead of the usual slogan-writing contests,” one of the featured bloggers, Suanie (www.suanie.net), said. “The clues are a new and interesting way to get people to join in.”

The five bloggers were selected based on the popularity of their blogs as well as their blog themes.

Suanie, who has been blogging for several years, usually writes on music, lifestyle and clubbing – which made her an ideal candidate for the contest.

The others who were involved were food blogger KY, 29 (www.kyspeaks.com); lawyer Xes, 26 (www.xes.cx); accountant Fireangel, 27 (www.fireangelism.com); and karate practitioner Gareth, better known as Shaolin Tiger, 28 (www.shaolintiger.com).

One of the race participants, Nigel Low, followed the clues all the way and was thrilled to win the free passes.

“I’m also glad I’m finally getting to know the bloggers in person,” the 31-year-old human resource manager said. “This contest is a very interesting and new way of doing things.”

Low is one of the many people who will be partying at the KL Tower terrace event, on April 7, which will feature local DJ extraordinaire Joey G alongside international DJs such as D-formation, Marco V and Yoji Biomehanika.

Source: http://thestar.com.my/youth2/story.asp?file=/2007/3/14/youth2/17119533&sec=youth2

Yep everyone!

I just happened to be there at 1-Utama that day to show a little support to Kim, Gareth, Suanie, KY, XES and the group… and look.. I had my picture taken.

Not because I’m a fehmes blogger… cuz I’m not.. but because… I’M A PARTICIPANT.

Boss Stewie is not a blogger… nono he’s not.. if he is… he’s too tiny to get anyone’s attention…. I’m lucky to have the remaining 8 of you readers out there that read my blog.

To my 8 readers, thank you very very much for reading my blog.

Jason brought this cake down from Malacca to KL last weekend.

It is fattening… but it makes me sooooooooooooo HIIGGGHHH!!!!!!!

If you haven’t had the chance to eat this cake yet… then you’d better make friends with Jason quick…

I found myself at Federal Hotel for the Together Gather Blogger Meet that Wingz and his committee organized last Friday.

I arrived far before anyone else had arrived, when the tables were empty and the chairs were all nicely arranged.
But I had an ulterior motive for arriving early that night.

I was there with my crew to set up our Nuffnang Booth.

At least half the bloggers we met there were already with Nuffnang, so the booth gave us an opportunity to meet in person a lot of the bloggers that have so far supported us.

And also to give out freebies like Nuffnang Bookmark and Pin BadgesNuffnang Car Stickers

And for the bloggers that have joined us, Nuffnang Digital Clocks.

We have 3 staff manning the booth the whole time while Ming and I ran back and forth meeting people and getting feedback on what they thought about Nuffnang.

But on the rare occasion that we all got to sit at the booth together, we took a picture of Ming, myself and most importantly Kelly who was essential supervisor we had that night.

I also managed to take a picture with Wingz at our booth.

A picture of Cely and Earl grabbing some freebies from our booth.And a picture of Ming teaching new bloggers how to sign up.

Oh and I managed to grab a picture with Yvonne Foong, April and Minishorts who were seated at the booth next door.
All that action while Lilian was busy Live Blogging at our meet.

Unfortunately that was just about all the pictures I took that night at the meet. I spent the rest of the time chatting with the other bloggers and forgetting to camwhore 😛

I’m sorry my dear readers… but this is all Boss Stewie can tell you about the meet for now.

In the mean time, check the other blogs. There is even a big picture of everyone at the meet (which I missed out on).

Ahh my dear readers.

You are all probably going to start sending me e-mails on why I haven’t updated in a few days.

I’M VERYY SORRRYY!!!!

My schedule has been very very tight lately and I’m sitting at Coffee Bean right now using the internet to make a quick update before a meeting I’m about to have.

That doesn’t mean I don’t have time for you guys… it just means.. I’ll have to owe you a bit first okie?

Hehe thank you for understanding ar!

Last night, Ming sent out an e-mail to all the bloggers that have so far joined Nuffnang.

He has since received many e-mail responses.

Let me share his e-mail with all of you who haven’t had the chance to read it yet.

Dear Bloggers,

Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Ming Shen or Ming, and I am the “co-founder” of Nuffnang.com.

I used the inverted commas because even though Timothy and myself initiated this network, every single one of you who is reading this email is a founding member of what we hope will be Malaysia’s biggest and most influential Blog-advertising community.

Herein lies our philosophy. Being young and green internet Entrepeneurs, we want to run things differently.

1st principle

We want to be a network By Bloggers for Bloggers. How do we propose to achieve this aim?

Well, for a start, Timothy and myself are avid Bloggers. But to tell you the truth, before I started this project, I had very little idea why people Blogged. Now, I find myself having difficulty going anywhere without a camera, and hear myself saying alot more, “Hold on! I want to take a photo for my blog!” We hope, that through our own experiences, and our interaction with fellow bloggers, we will always be aware of what your needs are.

Secondly, for a while now, we have been identifying bloggers of certain repute and specialties to take a stake in our company, in most cases for free. One thing we realised almost instantly from our many meetings with bloggers are that they are a very talented mix of people! Why not make them partners, and make use of their skills to make a stronger network? We are talking about photographers, consultants, programmers, graphic designers, and the like.

They are also our ambassadors. They will help bridge the gap should ever we miss the small picture (which we will try our best not to do). Over time, their identities will be revealed to you (We have not approached all of them yet, so hold your breath!)

If you feel you are a possible candidate, then do drop me or Timothy an email. We would be more than happy to consider it. A word of warning though, being a business partner in this network means high levels of commitment and contribution in the company’s workings.

2nd Principle

Bloggers of all sizes, shapes and colours

You are not merely a statistic. No matter how small your Blog, you are important to us. And we mean it.

We have tried as far as economically possible to include Blogs of small sizes (20 daily unique visitors). We are looking to build a community here. And as long as you are part of it, you are important to us.

3rd principle

Technology is important.

We hope you agree that Nuffnang.com is a solid and powerful platform. However, we promise to never stop improving and innovating.

What this means is that you will see interesting and engaging facets of our product come to light in the following months. Some will be brand new and never seen before, others will not be.

We are interested in getting the basics right. With a solid foundation, we can move on to greater things that the marketplace demands. And we will.

As we are in the Beta testing phase, some things may not run as smoothly as we might hope. I’d like to take this opportunity to thank you for your understanding.

4th Principle

We aim to raise the profile of blog advertising

We set up Nuffnang.com because we felt Bloggers and their readers deserved better! And they do!

We hope you will see RELEVANT advertisments on your blog. From CREDIBLE bluechip advertisers.

These advertisers are demanding, as they pay top dollar. Therefore it is imperative we have a strong set of credentials before we approach them. We need to fully understand what we are marketing before we can do the marketing.

How many blogs? How many readers? What kind of readers? Which kinds of ads? These are some of the statistics that we will have to gather in the next two weeks, before we can approach the RIGHT advertisers for you.

Therefore, I reiterate that the whole process might take at least one month before advertisements are served on your blog and you are payed!

Not to worry, over the past months, we have already created inroads and networks which we will be looking to exploit once we have the necessary information.

It could be sooner rather than later. But we want to be realistic and manage expectations.

5th Principle

Community and relationships first

Nuffnang.com is a community. In the future, functions will be added to emphasize that fact.

We will be organising exclusive parties, outings, to forster relationships between our members. These events will either be fully paid for by us, or heavily subsidized.

The generosity and friendships me and Timothy have encountered over the past few months have been simply amazing. We hope to grow these friendships and create new ones.

These principles will and more will in the near future be released on our website as a reminder to ourselves and to you of what Nuffnang stands for!

Thank you so much for your support! My email is always open for suggestions, or anything related to the Nuffnang community.

Humbly yours,

Ming Shen

I have been buried with work on my leetle dotcom lately.

So I went to Haagen Dazs with some friends for a breather.

The Hemsem waiter came over to take our order and I decided that it was only appropriate I have the maximum… the triple scoop.

Our ice-cream came and I gulped it away in no time!
But even after that I felt unsatisfied.

3 scoops of yummy delicious Haagen Dazs ice-cream wasn’t going to make my day any better so I pondered…

and pondered….

and pondered….

and then I finally decided
“AH FUK IT!!! I’ll just buy it”.

I left Haagen Dazs suspiciously carrying a bucket with me (nobody was looking).
Fortunately for me as well, they were having a Scratch & Win Promotion where for each RM50 you spent or something you get 1 voucher.

I got… quite a few

But the best part came when I went home and opened up by bucket to see my loveeely coffee flavoured ice-cream hiding inside.
It looked sooooo peaceful…

I so WANNA BITE IT…
But no… enough for the day!

I put it to bed.

Sleep my dear precious…

A couple of days ago, the Nuffnang Office in Penang received a particular envelope addressed to me.

There were no stamps, no address.. no nothing.. (and considering I’m still alive.. no anthrax too).

The mysterious sender just wrote my name on the envelope and chucked it into our mailbox.

I opened it in my office only to find this.

Curious to find out who sent me the wonderful book, I looked on the first page only to find a note from the sender.

“Scott Adams illustration wasn’t perfect when he first started but his ideas were funny.
He improved & so will you.”

My guess is this comes from a reader who managed to find our office address on the Nuffnang website.

To that dear anonymous reader, I don’t know how else to thank you but through this blog entry.

Thank you…

If you change your mind about being anonymous, send me an e-mail at lengmoublogs @ yahoo.com so I can personally thank you.

“Okay here’s what we’ll do. On the 27th, we’ll get about 5 blogs to sign up with Nuffnang. We’ll see how the system holds with just these few blogs and any small number of blogs that join us in this first week. We do this so we can run more tests before we get to the second phase of the launch which is when we will invite all the other bloggers that have agreed to join us.”

That’s what I told our team long before the soft beta launch yesterday.

I was expecting a slow gradual launch.

I have never been more wrong.
In just two days since a launch that was meant to be small, news of our website has somehow got around and we’ve been fortunate enough to have almost a hundred bloggers sign up with us!

So much that our server started overloading causing certain functions to stop working consistently, most importantly: Our default ad units stopped appearing consistently hence affecting the accuracy of the blog stats that we track.

The good news is that most of the bloggers signed up with us understand that this is a beta phase and beta phases are meant to weed out problems like this.

The bad news is…. all of us at Nuffnang haven’t been getting much sleep and we’ve been relying too much on Cheezels and Peanut Butter Sandwich biscuits to keep our stomachs full.

We’re rushing to get a new dedicated server of our own that can support this many bloggers.

Stay tuned guys… and thanks for understanding.

I am particularly touched by the few bloggers who have e-mailed me and said
“You know, I’m not interested in whatever money you can pay me, I’m just joining to support you”.

Another blogger said
“Let us all be your guinea pigs! We support Malaysian products!”

It is indeed very heartening to hear these kind of comments though we know that we just can’t simply take it for granted and assume that everyone feels the same way.

Many people expect us to perform… and perform we shall… (as long as our supply of Cheezels keep up).

I walked into the office yesterday morning only to hear a fellow Nuffnang Team Member say
“So… uhmm… 5 blogs eh???”