Former CNET Asia blogger; gadget lover; and currently working as Country Editor Yahoo! Indonesia (Comments expressed here do not necessarily represent the views of my employer, Yahoo!). meme.yahoo.com/budip
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How lucky we are living in today’s Internet era. You can easily find many good and generous guys who kindly provided many free and useful things for all.
That’s why it’s so easy to find helpful and voluntary netters in cyberspace. So it goes, too, in the land of the blogosphere. If you want to create your own blog, you can freely choose a blog design templates that you like. Just download and install it. So simple.
I’ve tried some of their templates for my blogs. I like it. I am sure you’ll like them, too. Would you like to try? Just simply visit their blogs. Here they are at: Isnaini, Didats Triyadi, William Pramana and Thomas Arie.
Check-out my CNET Asia tech post on Indonesian blog designers.
Para blogger diminta mengkampanyekan kebebasan di Internet.
Amnesty International mengimbau semua blogger di seluruh dunia bergabung memperjuangkan kebebasan blogger di Cina, Iran, dan Tunisia, yang dianggap masih berada di bawah ancaman.
Menjelang ajang Internet Governance Forum pekan ini, Amnesty International meminta forum memperjuangkan penghentian terhadap pembatasan akses Internet, penghormatan atas hak pribadi, serta pembebasan pejuang kebebasan berekspresi dan menyatakan pendapat secara damai dari tahanan.
Sebelumnya, Amnesty berhasil menghimpun sekitar 50 ribu orang untuk ikut dalam petisi online yang disampaikan kepada pemerintah Cina, berkaitan dengan sensor pemerintah terhadap Internet.
Mereka juga sempat meminta pembebasan blogger Iran, Kianoosh Sanjari, yang ditahan awal bulan ini karena melaporkan konflik pihak keamanan dengan pendukung ulama Syiah.
The Indonesian Government’s mission of going open source is nearly accomplished. The Government has already launched its latest distro IGOS Nusantara 2006 Release 3 for the country’s users.
IGOS (Indonesia, go open source!) is a national effort to strengthen the national information technology system as well as to exploit the global information technology development through utilization and exploitation of Open Source Software (OSS).
According to the Government, the objectives of the movement are to make OSS as alternative software to users and developers, stimulating developers’ creativity, R&D and industries and improving human resource capability in information technology.
The background is quite clear: OSS is one of the global issues on Information Communication and Technology (ICT), the implementation of intellectual property rights to prevent increasing software piracy and the presence of an information technology gap between developing and advanced countries.
IGOS Nusantara 2006 is one of the latest distros, a shorter for Linux distribution, provided for Indonesian users.
Check-out my CNET Asia tech post on IGOS.
Ah, yes. This is another good news. Clickgamer.com and Elements Interactive recently announced Max Studio, an ambitious mobile game studio based in Jakarta, Indonesia, as the grand prize winner of the The Cutting Edge Coding Competition 2006.
Burning Armor Code E, the name of the game, wins a two-year Edge license, an iPod Video and US$5,000 worth of free advertising at Clickgamer.com to promote the winning game.
Max Studio is a company incorporated by a group of Indonesian young people who posseses a strong dream and vision. Each team member has experienced professional training in their respective fields.
The game development team itself consists of three programmers and two designers. They are Eric Gunawan, Kukuh Wicaksono, Ricky Suryo Utomo, Hartono Widodo and Alex Sukandar. They are also supported by some freelancers and part-timers.
Check-out my CNET Asia tech post on Max Studio.
Only one of the ancient wonders of the world still survives — now history lovers are being invited to choose a new list of seven.
Check out the exciting New 7 Wonders of the World campaign, the world’s first-ever global vote.
The vote is organized by a non-profit Swiss foundation called New7Wonders which specializes in the preservation, restoration and promotion of monuments, and the results will be announced on July 7, 2007, in Lisbon.
About 20 million votes have already been lodged, including many from India, for the Taj Mahal; China, for the Great Wall and from Peru for Machu Picchu, the fortress city of the Incas.
I just voted for my favorite 7 of the 21 finalists that are competing. I am afraid that Indonesia’s Borobudur temple was out of the list.
The 21 finalists for the New Seven Wonders of the World, alphabetically:
Go to www.new7wonders.com to pick your favorite monuments and vote. Be part of the making of history!
Link
Written by Nursidah “Nida” Abdullah of Hasanuddin University, this article tries to view toward the extension of mass media in the future, by critical perspective from one of Mass Communication Theory; Cultural Imperialism Theory. Thanks, Nida!
CULTURAL IMPERIALISM THEORY
Explanation of Theory:
Cultural Imperialism Theory states that Western nations dominate the media around the world which in return has a powerful effect on Third World Cultures by imposing n them Western views and therefore destroying their native cultures.
Theorists: Herb Schiller
Date: 1973
Primary Article: Schiller, H. J. (1973). Communication and Cultural Domination. White Plains, NY: International Arts and Science
The long-term efforts of human to build their civilization and world history has created curves against humanity faces. Human, with an Anthropocentrism world of view has grown up superiorly than the other things in this world.
Not only like that, apparently they also have made hierarchy in social life interactions. Karl Marx says there are social classes in the society. His Assumption is based on capital resources of authority (HCR- NCR). They are bourgeois class and proletarian class. And , if you believe, there is no ahistorical side, ..of course..too easy to summarize that everything has their own history. Even, social constructions and one of them is imperialism. Absolutely.
Let me say ..this isn’t a silent story. But, on the other hand..some times we say like this.. ”yes, I see, the World Is built by imperialism, but I don’t have ability, nor is it right, to fight that because we don’t have a power…”
In my mind..that is absolutely wrong way. Not because of we are powerless, but hopeless. But, not all of us like that…Of Course.
Media theorist, James W. Carey said that “a ritual view of communication is directed not toward the extension of messages in space but toward the maintenance of society in time;not the act of imparting information but the representation of shared beliefs”
Media size up means take a look at history again. Therefore, using Cultural Imperialism Theory as perspective is still relevant today. And finally, talking about mass communication means talking about the power of media as medium in information distribution its self.
Media domination by Western nations has produced a media reality image, West is the Best. Mass Communication Theory above stritcs is destroying native cultures is the effects by this situation, if we are just silent… and let’s this condition become snowball either, without criticism retrospect.
Based on this thing, it is reasonable if our native cultures are going to abrade by outsider cultures penetration. From now on.. we can see that the Indonesian Program Television is far away from native cultures exploration, but on the other hand TV Station program today explore too much in metropolitan life style which are outlandish things for Indonesian people, specially for villagers and islanders.
An offer to solve this problem is making media community. Media Community is an alternative and independent media for people. This is kind of media which is built by a group of people who have common goal and social contract. And, it’s consist of radio, TV channel, magazine, newspaper,etc.
Gradually, I hope media communities become counter attack and counter culture against west media domination and alternative mass media for people in every place in Indonesia. So..our truly native culture can recognizable, not just for Indonesia generation, but people in worldwide.
Good news hit Indonesia’s cyberspace and blogosphere recently. PayPal is now available in Indonesia! This is a really good news for Indonesians to use this service for their online payment solution.
Prior to this announcement, Indonesian users could not apply for a PayPal account. My fellow countrymen, especially those living here, were previously unable to send and receive payment through the PayPal service. Of course, this wasn’t good since I could not even contribute online donations which require a PayPal account.
I don’t know what exactly happened with regard to PayPal’s policy, but it could most probably be spurred on by increasing cyberfraud in Indonesia.
But now things seem better, with PayPal’s decision to put Indonesia on its latest approved list. PayPal has announced that residents in 48 countries can now use PayPal in their local markets to send money online. The new markets include Indonesia, the Philippines (as my colleague Joey Alarilla already blogged about here), Croatia, Fiji, Vietnam and Jordan.
Check-out my CNET Asia tech post on PayPal in Indonesia.
Setidaknya ada tiga kejutan dalam proses transaksi Google mengakuisisi situs berbagi video YouTube yang terjadi pekan lalu.
Pertama: rumor ini pertama kali muncul di blog Techcrunch (www.techcrunch.com), Jumat, 6 Oktober, lalu. Posting tiga paragraf Michael Arrington itu langsung menohok pasar, menggelinding di seantero blogosfer dan bergaung hingga ke newsroom media-media utama.
Arrington menulis nilai akuisisi tersebut adalah US$ 1,65 miliar atau Rp 15,2 triliun. “Berdasarkan pengalaman, rumor semacam ini 40 persen benar,” demikian tulisnya di bagian akhir posting-nya.
Hanya berselang beberapa jam kemudian, masih pada hari yang sama, surat kabar besar Wall Street Journal (online.wsj.com/WSJ) mengkonfirmasi rumor tersebut. Techcrunch langsung menambahkan berita WSJ itu sebagai update di posting-nya.
Kedua: rumor yang digulirkan Techcrunch dan konfirmasi WSJ ternyata benar-benar terjadi. Tiga hari kemudian, yakni Senin, 9 Oktober, Google mengumumkan telah membeli YouTube dengan harga US$ 1,65 miliar dalam bentuk saham.
Tapi kedua perusahaan tetap akan beroperasi secara terpisah. YouTube akan tetap mempekerjakan 67 anggota stafnya, termasuk pendirinya, Chad Hurley dan Steve Chen, yang mendadak jadi miliuner baru.
YouTube diluncurkan pada Februari 2005 dan penggunanya tumbuh dengan cepat hingga menjadi situs berbagi video yang paling populer di Internet.
Saat ini YouTube menyediakan sekitar 100 juta video yang dilihat setiap hari dan diperkirakan dikunjungi oleh sekitar 72 juta orang setiap bulan.
Ketiga: inilah proses akuisisi tercepat sepanjang sejarah–setidaknya jika dihitung dari saat pertama dibocorkan blog Techcrunch dan pengumuman resmi Google.
Ya, inilah yang paling membahagiakan dan membanggakan saya: ketika blog sudah bisa disejajarkan dengan media utama, seperti WSJ.
Malah, dalam konteks kecepatan pemberitaan kasus transaksi Google ini, terbukti blog Techcrunch lebih cepat ketimbang WSJ!
Jadi bukan proses atau nilai akuisisinya sendiri yang menarik hati saya. Tapi, ketika sebuah blog mampu mengendus dan memberitakan rumor transaksi besar yang kemudian terbukti benar, di situlah letak kedahsyatan blog!
Bukankah ini sesuatu yang pantas dirayakan oleh para penghuni blogosfer?
Budi Putra
Koran Tempo, Minggu 15 Oktober 2006 | e-culture
Today’s Dispatch is not from Indonesia, but about an Indonesian female entrepreneur with a telco startup in Texas, US.
In several email correspondences, I was made aware that Irna Hutabarat is no ordinary woman, at least no ordinary Indonesian woman. Born in Padang, West Sumatra, and growing up in the States, she is now an American citizen, a part of the growing group of Indonesian Americans in the land of Uncle Sam. “Unfortunately Indonesia does not offer dual citizenships,” she said.
She is currently work as VP Corporate Development of damaka. This fast-growing communications and collaboration software company is revolutionizing the communications industry by developing a converged media and collaborative communications platform for IP-based networks for end users.
Hutabarat has over 10 years of experience in information technology, project management, sales and media.
Check-out my CNET Asia tech post on Irna Hutabarat’s profile.
Bruce Einhorn brings up a fascinating question in his post on how Chinese failed to create global brand like Japanese and Korean did it? Even the Indians are managing to do it now?
So why can’t companies from Greater China have more success building global brands? For years now, companies from China and Taiwan have been trying to develop global brand names – and do it fast. Rather than slowly, slowly, slowly building their brands overseas, the way that the likes of Sony and Samsung did, many have tried to go global overnight by buying famous but troubled brands in the West and trying to lower costs by shifting production to China.
Just consider. Nowadays, we can see that Chinese brand-name products poised to enter U.S. markets include Lenovo Computers — the world’s third-largest desktop PC maker — and Changhong, China’s largest consumer electronics manufacturer.
China’s 500 Most Valuable Brands in 2006 recently released by World Brand Lab (WBL) shows that Haier, with a brand value reaching 63.989 billion yuan, keeps the first place, followed by Lenovo, China Mobile, CCTV, with a brand value exceeding 60 billion yuan respectively. Besides, Chang Hong, Bank of Communications, GOME, China Life, CREC, Sinochem are among the top ten list.
Two years ago, for example, China’s household appliance giant Haier was once named as the country’s most valuable brand-name company in the January issue of the Chinese version of Forbes Magazine.
Li Wuzhou and Tan Zhen of China Today stated that China’s brands already started to go global.
China’s developing brands are also beginning to appear on the international market. Chinese Haier electric appliances account for 10 percent of the European market, and Chinese computer brands Lenovo and Donghai are advancing into the world IT industry. The state-owned Double-Star Group shoe manufacturers have grown from a 1980s small workshop to a concern encompassing 10 overseas companies registered in 46 countries. A large number of excellent and well-reputed local brands, such as Golden Star, Changhong, and Konka are also gaining ground on the world market where, in contrast to China, the Made in China label is actually becoming a common sight.
Indeed, China’s brand names prepare to go global but a Purdue University international marketing expert warns China has political problems such as the nation’s communist political system that involves the government as a major stakeholder in its companies. According to Jay Wang, another is its non-democratic political philosophy. Both of these issues affect brand perception and connection, and might put off some customers, Wang says.
Only time will tell.
Former CNET Asia blogger; gadget lover; and currently working as Country Editor Yahoo! Indonesia (Comments expressed here do not necessarily represent the views of my employer, Yahoo!). meme.yahoo.com/budip
Former CNET Asia blogger; gadget lover; and currently working as Country Editor Yahoo! Indonesia (Comments expressed here do not necessarily represent the views of my employer, Yahoo!). meme.yahoo.com/budip
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