Juwono’s Defense Blog attracting interest
July 4th, 2006 § 3 Comments
It seems that Juwono’s defense blog that I wrote about in an earlier posting and later carried as an article in The Jakarta Post, is attracting some interest, among them Naked Conversations‘ co-author Shel Israel, The Private Sector Development Blog which is part of the World Bank, and the loose Wire Blog by Jeremy Wagstaff.
Israel cited it as evidence that blogging is changing the world and Juwono’s blog reminds him of how much. The World Bank blogger was “shocked” by the fact that Juwono was blogging. I’m not sure how to read this and I’ve written to the author to ask him to explain the choice of word. Jeremy thinks its wonderful and all but is skeptical whether this will change the world or even Indonesian politics.
He may be right but I think it is too early to tell. Blogging will not change everything, but it will change something and perhaps also recalibrate the power equation between critics and the “status quo” (that’s such an old fashioned word these days, isn’t it?)
At any rate I am glad that Juwono, if nothing else, is helping through his blog to help dispel an image that Indonesia is in the backwaters and its ministers are all banana republicans. Perhaps, in time, the World Bank would not be so easily “shocked” by an Indonesian minister taking to blogging.
I love this country for the surprises that it can throw on everyone!
Don’t mean to be nitpicking, but is there a reason why you keep misspelling his name? It’s Juwono, not Jowono.
I stand corrected. Will edit my posting.Thanks for pointing it out.
[...] See for example his post on Defense Minister, Juwono Sudarsono’s blog which got some attention from other world bloggers like “Shel Israel of Naked Conversations, Jeremy Wagstaff of Loose Wire and Pablo Halkyard of The World Bank.” [...]