Post by quattro on Oct 2, 2008 10:18:53 GMT 7
by DAVID DIZON, abs-cbnNEWS.com | 10/01/2008 7:19 PM
Here's a newsflash: another Filipino has made Web history by hacking into Internet search granddaddy Yahoo!
But before anyone starts screaming "Onel de Guzman", this hack is quite different. Baguio native Andrei Marinduque Navarro didn't just hack into the site anonymously; he was one of three Asians flown in to Sunnyvale, California to participate in Yahoo's Open Hack Day on September 5 and 6.
Not bad for a guy who's only 23.
Navarro, who finished with a Bacher of Science MIS degree from the Ateneo de Manila University in 2005, sat down with reporters recently for the launch of Yahoo's Open Strategy in the Philippines. A self-confessed programming geek, he said he joined a startup instead of traditional outsourcing operations in the Philippines after graduation because of a desire to create his own technical innovations for the Web.
In 2006, Navarro had his first taste of digital fame when an application he created for FBM Software was reviewed on Techcrunch. The application, which was dubbed Wablet, is an embedded chat application similar to Meebo that can be placed in a blog or any other site.
When the Wablet app failed to take off, Navarro moved on to another startup and even vacationed in the US for a year. Wablet, however, remained his online calling card and helped him get a ticket to the Yahoo! Open Hack Day last month.
Navarro says he signed up online for the chance to join Hack Day and had several phone interviews by Yahoo executives in Singapore. News of his Sunnyvale trip, however, arrived just a week before the trip.
"Luckily, I had a US visa! One member of our team, Gavin Bong from Malaysia, didn't have one and had to rush to get it," he said.
Asian team
Navarro, Gavin and Haresh Mallibedi of Singapore were the only representatives from Asia who were sent to participate in Yahoo! Open Hack Day. Navarro says working with the Asian team made him appreciate other developers' approach to programming.
"I got a lot of ideas from them. Everyone had their own style of coding but everyone had mutual respect for what the other person was doing," he said.
The two-day Yahoo event was also an eye-opener for Navarro. Rather than look down on their achievements, he says developers participating in Hack Day all showed a similar passion for the latest technological trends and were equally excited to hear what the Asian team had brought to the table.
"They were all very passionate about what they do for Yahoo. And (Yahoo! head honcho) David Filo – we didn't even know it was him. He was like a normal geek, always willing to listen and help out when we needed it," he said.
After a full day of developer workshops and a concert, developers including the team from Asia finally settled down to work on their hacks.
Navarro says the team had to discard their initial ideas of doing tweaks on Flickr and Fire Eagle but concentrated instead on Yahoo's Query Language application. The hack, using YQL and Mozilla Ubiquity, allowed users to make natural queries instead of typing in SQL syntax.
"We had a lot of ideas but settled on natural language queries, which is very similar to semantic search. For example, if we typed in a query for 'show all the cats in Flickr', it would show exactly that, instead of a group of unrelated articles about cats in Flickr," he said.
90 seconds of fame
Finishing the application was just the first part of the hack as the Asian team also had to present it to all the developers attending the Hack Day. As Navarro puts it, it was their "90 seconds of fame" during the event.
"We told them: 'We flew 8000 miles to hack here today' and they were very impressed. Some were from Israel and France but we came from halfway around the world," he said.
After their presentation, he said several people approached their team and asked if they were interested in finding work. He said, however, that he preferred to go back to the Philippines and work on a supersecret project with local startup Halo Nine.
Navarro says he sees great potential in the local developer community.
"Being in Silicon Valley made me realize that all we really need is the passion to develop our own ideas. I know we have a lot of talent here, and there are foreign investors who are creating startups in the country. As long as we get our ideas out and create our own startups here in the Philippines, that would really be big for the local developer community and it would put the Philippines on the map of technology innovations," he said.
Here's a newsflash: another Filipino has made Web history by hacking into Internet search granddaddy Yahoo!
But before anyone starts screaming "Onel de Guzman", this hack is quite different. Baguio native Andrei Marinduque Navarro didn't just hack into the site anonymously; he was one of three Asians flown in to Sunnyvale, California to participate in Yahoo's Open Hack Day on September 5 and 6.
Not bad for a guy who's only 23.
Navarro, who finished with a Bacher of Science MIS degree from the Ateneo de Manila University in 2005, sat down with reporters recently for the launch of Yahoo's Open Strategy in the Philippines. A self-confessed programming geek, he said he joined a startup instead of traditional outsourcing operations in the Philippines after graduation because of a desire to create his own technical innovations for the Web.
In 2006, Navarro had his first taste of digital fame when an application he created for FBM Software was reviewed on Techcrunch. The application, which was dubbed Wablet, is an embedded chat application similar to Meebo that can be placed in a blog or any other site.
When the Wablet app failed to take off, Navarro moved on to another startup and even vacationed in the US for a year. Wablet, however, remained his online calling card and helped him get a ticket to the Yahoo! Open Hack Day last month.
Navarro says he signed up online for the chance to join Hack Day and had several phone interviews by Yahoo executives in Singapore. News of his Sunnyvale trip, however, arrived just a week before the trip.
"Luckily, I had a US visa! One member of our team, Gavin Bong from Malaysia, didn't have one and had to rush to get it," he said.
Asian team
Navarro, Gavin and Haresh Mallibedi of Singapore were the only representatives from Asia who were sent to participate in Yahoo! Open Hack Day. Navarro says working with the Asian team made him appreciate other developers' approach to programming.
"I got a lot of ideas from them. Everyone had their own style of coding but everyone had mutual respect for what the other person was doing," he said.
The two-day Yahoo event was also an eye-opener for Navarro. Rather than look down on their achievements, he says developers participating in Hack Day all showed a similar passion for the latest technological trends and were equally excited to hear what the Asian team had brought to the table.
"They were all very passionate about what they do for Yahoo. And (Yahoo! head honcho) David Filo – we didn't even know it was him. He was like a normal geek, always willing to listen and help out when we needed it," he said.
After a full day of developer workshops and a concert, developers including the team from Asia finally settled down to work on their hacks.
Navarro says the team had to discard their initial ideas of doing tweaks on Flickr and Fire Eagle but concentrated instead on Yahoo's Query Language application. The hack, using YQL and Mozilla Ubiquity, allowed users to make natural queries instead of typing in SQL syntax.
"We had a lot of ideas but settled on natural language queries, which is very similar to semantic search. For example, if we typed in a query for 'show all the cats in Flickr', it would show exactly that, instead of a group of unrelated articles about cats in Flickr," he said.
90 seconds of fame
Finishing the application was just the first part of the hack as the Asian team also had to present it to all the developers attending the Hack Day. As Navarro puts it, it was their "90 seconds of fame" during the event.
"We told them: 'We flew 8000 miles to hack here today' and they were very impressed. Some were from Israel and France but we came from halfway around the world," he said.
After their presentation, he said several people approached their team and asked if they were interested in finding work. He said, however, that he preferred to go back to the Philippines and work on a supersecret project with local startup Halo Nine.
Navarro says he sees great potential in the local developer community.
"Being in Silicon Valley made me realize that all we really need is the passion to develop our own ideas. I know we have a lot of talent here, and there are foreign investors who are creating startups in the country. As long as we get our ideas out and create our own startups here in the Philippines, that would really be big for the local developer community and it would put the Philippines on the map of technology innovations," he said.
