"Having won the 'Most Educational to Follow' category in the Open Web Awards 2009, esoriano.wordpress.com takes its place among the top 50 websites and services of the year," says Pete Cashmore, CEO of Mashable.com, in an e-mail to Ang Dating Daan or The Old Path.

"Web users cast thousands of votes for the site, selecting it as the very best in its field," adds Cashmore, who, together with the whole Mashable team, dealt with "over 440,000 nominations with over 70,000 nominees and over 780,000 votes" for this year's Open Web Awards, as reported on Mashable.com.

Mashable.com, an international social media site, partnered with Motorola this year to bring the 3rd Annual Open Web Awards: Social Media Edition. Past winners of this prestigious international competition inlcude Youtube, Facebook, Twitter, Digg, and iGoogle, to name a few.

"Due to the legal nature of sending 'prizes' and the opportunity to increase gaming, Mashable decided not to offer actual awards this year," says Mashable.com's Chief Operations Officer Adam Hirsch, in his reply to a comment posted on Mashable.com. He also stresses that "These winners have active communities ... (and) Mashable also was strict (behind the scenes) with anyone or organization 'gaming' the vote."

Earlier this year, Esoriano.wordpress.com received the People's Choice and Most Popular Web Site laurels from the Philippine Web Awards.