Constant Random Change

[EDIT: This isn't an in-depth look at "crab mentality" so I changed the title. The real in-depth look at the term is here.]

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Yay, they finally said who they were. (Spoiler: it’s DDB)

Issue resolved too quickly for your taste? Here’s another lulz-y issue.

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One of the common annoying things about the past few blogosphere-buzzes-of-the-week is when people use the term “crab mentality” to defend the target of the issue.

It’s just… well.. feels wrong to use them in those instances.

Take for example the (I’m not naming names here ) one about the teenage girls who arrogantly maul the English language without even knowing it or the one about the high class people who arrogantly maul the intelligence of those who witness their… whatever. We aren’t laughing at them because we are insecure that we are not as popular or [insert positive trait here] as them so we want to drag them down. It’s simply because there’s something really funny about what they’re doing and they should be able to take the hint. I’d admit, some of the insults are going too far, but if you really know what you’re doing, you should at least know that striking back with something as pathetic as “crab mentality” won’t go anywhere.

Or that judging fiasco/drama. I won’t say much about the issue because, like /b/-tards, white knights are everywhere and nakakatamad mag-delete ng mga walang kwentang comment. I’ll just say that the “crab mentality” attack is directed to the wrong people.

And now the Ako Mismo. No, we’re not scrutinizing the privacy policy and questioning the amount of sensitive information needed by the site because we are selfish bastards who don’t want the country to get out of its current state. We’re just concerned about identity theft. You know, the one where people can pose as you and steal all your money because they know your private information? Oh wait, you’re not working for the food on your family’s plate so I guess you can’t understand what’s in stake here.

The only issue wherein “crab mentality” makes sense is the The Great Book Blockade of 2009, and even the scope of that issue isn’t that clear yet.

The lesson here?

Kids these days are more pathetic at flame wars than back when we were pathetic kids.

ABS-CBN News couldn’t even figure out who’s behind this so there’s nothing else we could do but speculate…

So far, we only have a few facts regarding AkoMismo.org:

First, the domain “AkoMismo.org” is owned by an ad agency, Tribal DDB. This supports the theory that this campaign is for the 21st Ad Congress as mentioned in Martin’s post.

Second, the IP address “125.5.116.82″, as pointed out in YugaTech, is owned by PLDT. This supports the theory that this is for a political campaign for Manny Pangilinan, PLDT Chairman.

However, Smart denies any involvement in this.

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While thinking about this issue, I remembered that PLDT provides static IP addresses in their business solutions packages. PLDT owns the entire 125.5.*.* range, but it’s possible that they’re just the ones managing and leasing the IP address.

After a bit of brute forcing, I found out that Infocom/PLDT leases out IP addresses under that range to other entities. For example, 125.5.114.58 is for Mindanao Daily Mirror, a newspaper based in Davao City. Another is 125.5.123.40 which is used by GlyphStudios, Inc. for BUZZ.

By now we should be sure that PLDT doesn’t own AkoMismo if not for one catch: there are no other websites using the 125.5.116.* range. On the other hand, the 125.5.114.* and 125.5.123.* ranges contain multiple websites from different companies.

It is still possible that PLDT actually owns the range for their own use because otherwise the APNIC result would show who they’re leasing the range to. For example, Z-Zone Games owns the 125.5.2.* range and the inetnum in the APNIC hit is different from AkoMismo’s result.

In short, we’re back to “it’s DDB leasing a PLDT IP address for their site” vs. “it’s PLDT hiring DDB to run their campaign” and “it’s a political phishing scam” vs. “it’s an unintentional mistake from an honest advocacy group”.