Journalixm

Area Agency plies employees with caffeine. 👀☕️

‘This Is Still a Filipino Company,’ Says Company Founder While Bowing More Deeply Each Week

MANILA — Third Domingo, Founder and Chairman of IXM Hakuhodo, assured staff that the agency remains a proudly Filipino company—even as his bows to the Japanese representatives stationed in the corner conference room have grown noticeably deeper, longer, and closer to full-on floor contact.

“This is still our house,” Domingo reportedly said during Tuesday’s Do’s Day town hall assembly, while pausing to adjust his posture into a courteous, 15-degree incline. Observers noted it was a marked evolution from last year’s polite nod and slight waist tilt.

Founded in 2009 as IdeasXMachina, the agency quickly gained a reputation for its award-winning irreverence and Domingo’s gleeful disdain for anything remotely corporate. But since Japanese ad giant Hakuhodo acquired shares in 2018, insiders say there's been a quiet cultural recalibration—one that includes a sudden rise in Seiko watch enthusiasts, Pokemon fandom, and the repetition of the word “seikatsusha” in presentations.

Domingo, who still maintains the largest office on the premises, has kept spirits light. “Weekends are for my farm in Tarlac,” he reportedly told staff. “Weekdays are for tactical repositioning via respectful humility.”

Some team members have begun keeping a running tally of bow angles, affectionately known as the “Domingo Dip Index.” Current average: 38 degrees, with projections trending toward yoga-adjacent territory by Q3.

At press time, Domingo was seen motioning to an intern to fetch the Hakuhodo reps some Pale Pilsen from the office fridge—because this is still a Filipino company with excellent hospitality.

Who would've thought playing video games could win you awards?

Read ANINO, Bronze Winner of Craft - Digital - Best Illustration Category at the Kidlat Awards.

What does the recent papal conclave—and our response to it—reveal about the state of Filipino Catholicism today?

“After the Conclave: Notes Toward a Filipino Catholic Future” by the Journalixm Staff with Fay Ballo of Brand Y began as a reflection on Filipino papabili and grew into a wider interrogation of faith, identity, and the evolving character of the Filipino religious imagination.

Prompted in part by fresh data from the HILL ASEAN 2024 study on emerging family models, the piece asks: what kind of Church are we becoming—and what kind do we hope to be?

This feature is part of an ongoing series of collaborations between Journalixm and Brand Y, the strategy and cultural insight arm of IXM Hakuhodo.

*****

When Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle’s name began circulating once more in the lead-up to the conclave, a familiar current ran through the Filipino Catholic imagination. There was hope, and pride, and perhaps a flicker of destiny. For many, his potential papacy was more than a symbolic breakthrough; it felt like a culmination: of centuries of fidelity, of global diaspora, of a Church in the periphery ready to take the helm.

That moment has passed. The College of Cardinals has chosen Robert Francis Prevost of Chicago, now Pope Leo XIV, as the new Bishop of Rome. Another Filipino prelate, Cardinal Pablo Virgilio David, affectionately called Bishop Ambo, was also mentioned in pre-conclave coverage as a rising voice of the Global South, but the decision took a different turn.

Read the full feature:

After the Conclave: Notes Toward a Filipino Catholic Future What does the recent papal conclave—and our response to it—reveal about the state of Filipino Catholicism today?

Last April 24, IXM Hakuhodo Head of Copy and Journalixm Editor-in-Chief Mikael de Lara Co spoke the Philippine Association of National Advertisers (PANA) General Membership Meeting on storytelling, attentiveness, and Seikatsusha: the whole human behind every audience.

****

I'd like to start off with some candor here, because I just now realized: My literary and political communications credentials, slightly an overkill in the introduction, obscures the fact that I am relatively (actually very) young in this industry. So to be given this honor just barely a year after coming on board at IXM is something that I'm truly grateful for. I'm grateful to Third Domingo, our Chair at IXM Hakuhodo, who recommended that I talk, and to PANA of course, Sir Bobby and Ken and the team, for, I suppose, taking Third's word for it. I can only hope to do your graciousness some justice.

That said, despite my rookie status in the industry, I've spent many, many years as a student of language, of philosophy, of the philosophy of language and storytelling and feeling. And that's the lens with which I'm going to approach our talk today. Hopefully there's something to be learned here; hopefully it can be a welcome interruption from the usual lens we use in the industry to talk about storytelling.

I say this because my main problematique today is not to prove that storytelling works, or to shed further light on its importance. I'd like to talk, or at least begin, actually, about the why of it. Why do stories move us? What is it that happens inside us when we see a powerful story unfold? Suffice it to say that this is not a how-to guide; it's more of an excavation of the nature of the story, and why they move us so.

I like to structure these kinds of talks around a series of assertions. I have ten such assertions today. The first being: We are human.

I understand how it might seem as if this is a truth that does not need saying. But I say it not out of gratuitousness, but to interrogate what makes us human at all. Two and a half millennia ago, the ancient Greeks posited that what makes us human is our ability to reflect, which is to take stock of our own narrative; to understand that we are beings in this world; to be self-aware of the context that surrounds us. Now some might argue that there are animals that can exhibit a rudimentary form of such. But I think we all understand that largely, it's this capacity for reflection, the capacity to view ourselves as situated within a context, both spatially and temporally, that's allowed humanity to progress, form societies, and dream forward.

****

Read it here: https://journalixm.com/2025/04/30/seikatsusha-as-attentiveness-as-story/

In this series, Journalixm and Brand Y join forces to study patterns in data and what they can tell us. Housework may have become more egalitarian, but there are still burdens that fall heavily on women.

***

In Filipino households, the division of labor often shifts slowly, unevenly. Tasks once handed down through generations of women are increasingly shared across gender and age.

Except for one.

Read more:

The Chore No Mother Will Give Up Is laundry a labor of love—or a mental load minefield? In Filipino households, the division of labor often shifts slowly, unevenly. Tasks once handed down through generations of women are increasin…

While waiting for maintenance to arrive, Charles practices patience by writing about impatience.

***

As I start this essay, the maintenance people are an hour late. The motor on my AC broke down and we’re in the middle of a heat wave and I’m in the middle of losing my mind because the maintenance people are an hour late. I really needed to get out of the house tonight.

Do you know that marshmallow test? Kid in an empty room–if they eat the marshmallow nothing happens, if they wait a couple minutes they get a second marshmallow. Results show that the kids who waited went on to become more successful in life.

Read It here: https://journalixm.com/2025/03/14/why-cant-gen-z-just-be-patient/

REPOST: Looks like I might be getting a new neighbor! Learn more about the Hague and what the city is like.

Check it out:

Where the Hell is Snow: Den Haag Creative Director Snow Schnabel continues her exploration of the Netherlands at Den Hague.

Snow Schnabel, geek, writes an open letter to those new to geekdom. No gatekeepers allowed.

***

Hi Green Greek,

Welcome to the world of investing your time and emotion in your favorite things. It’s terrible, you’re gonna love it.

Nowadays, “geek” is chic. Everyone has a favorite superhero. Everyone knows what a “Jedi” is. We know “the way”. We understand the multiverse. As someone who was picked on for loving sci fi and sorcery, it’s hard not to be both awed and also a little resentful.

Read the rest here: https://journalixm.com/2025/03/07/retconned-an-open-letter-to-new-geeks/

Issue 18 of Komixm, words and art by New Villanueva

Flowers are impractical, expensive, and a hassle to take care of, but we still give them anyway. Are they a gift of the past, or do the reasons go beyond tradition?

Happy Valentine's Day!

***

My phone’s gallery looks like an orchard, a curse of my indecisiveness. She loves pink, but her favorite is the yellow sunflower–does that even match? Then there’s the whole language of flowers you have to take into account. Yellow roses mean friendship and that feels too adjacent to sunflowers and I don’t want her to get the wrong idea. If my friend didn’t own a flower store I’d have trouble getting them on time too. After talking it through and landing on an arrangement, it’s my wallet’s turn to stress out.

Try going through all that without taking a step back and reevaluating the whole tradition.

Read the rest here: https://journalixm.com/2025/02/14/the-inconvenience-of-flowers/

In this tumultuous time, we need to separate the signal from the noise. Today, Journalixm is throwing back to our political series from 2024.

Read it here:

Campaigning Uphill Today, we introduce Signal from the Noise, a new series on electoral communications. Our first contributor is Barry Gutierrez— human rights lawyer, communications professional, former Congressman, …