A big number of bloggers attended today’s WordCamp Philippines at the De La Salle-College of St. Benilde in Manila. Touted as the first such event in Southeast Asia, the event is now part of local blogging and internet history.

Keynote speaker was Matt Mullenweg, Mr. WordPress himself, who had an instant rapport with the admiring audience of Filipino bloggers. The sampling of bloggers gathered at Wordcamp was pretty impressive. That Mindanao Bloggers spearheaded this effort speaks volumes about the group’s capabilities and level of commitment in encouraging the WordPress users in the Philippines.

Twas also a chance to meet other bloggers like Marck of marocharim.com and to say hi to old friends like Ederic and Mhay. Saw plenty of “sikat” bloggers from afar.

In his talk and his “powwow” with bloggers, Matt announced major developments in the upcoming WordPress 2.7 which will come out in two months time. He also said that the Philippines now ranks 24th among countries with big numbers of WordPress users, be it the free WordPress.com or the hosted WordPress.org. Matt added that the number 24 is also the rank of WordPress.com among all sites listed by Alexa.

Matt also told the audience that he’ll be voting for Barack Obama in the US presidential elections because he “wants change”.

Some suggestions to the organizers: Can we have more person-to-person contact and interaction and have it become an integral part of the program? Can we possibly limit the plenary sessions to only a select few, or at least make sure that the presentations are short and interesting?

Overall, the camp was a success. Kudos to to the organizers and thanks to all the sponsors.

Now everyone’s so excited to blog, and to join the Cebu Pacific blogging contest that was launched at the tail-end of the camp.

Below are some photos I took in today’s big event: