Bully for the President

How naive can one get? The Internet can be a powerful medium to communicate and engage with lots of people but it has never been a Utopia.

In fact, from the start the Net has had a culture of crash and burn. It has not gotten any better with the millions of people now using social media. In fact it may have gotten worse as it gets easier to be stampeded by a herd mentality.

All this information has been available to anyone interested in finding out the working of the Net. So it is a bit rich for the President to complain about “bullying”. His social media team should have warned him before hand that the Net is a place for big boys who can take the hard knocks, not crybabies.

Which raises the often-asked question of prominent people who venture into social media use: why did they go in, in the first place?

BBC News – Indonesia: President ‘bullied’ on Facebook

Anti-social network? Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono’s not happy with some “fans”

Indonesia’s president complained about being “bullied” on Facebook, just a day after launching his fan page.

The press team of Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono – known as SBY by the Indonesian media – signed him up to the social network, along with YouTube and Google Hangout, on Friday, reports the Jakarta Post . And, having attracted almost 100,000 fans within 24 hours, the president declared in his first Facebook post: “I want to be able to communicate more with my fellow Indonesians.” He thanked all his followers for their input but added: “Sometimes I am being bullied.”

He later posted a poem dedicated to his wife, who celebrated her 61st birthday on Saturday. By Wednesday morning, SBY’s page had amassed nearly 250,000 “likes”. However, he still has some way to go to match the 2.7 million followers his @SBYudhoyono account has on Twitter .

Indonesian Minister’s morbid tweets about Hitler

Whatever he is, Communication and Information Minister Tifatul Sembiring isn’t boring, especially when it comes to Tweeting, which he or a team that he hires, does with religious regularity.

Of late, however, @tifsembiring’s tweets have taken a strange, some say morbid turn. He’s taken to Tweeting about Adolf Hitler, you know that guy who killed thousands of people in genocide campaign and brought the world to the brink of chaos with World War II?

First, Tifatul quoted Hitler with this Tweet: “the union between two children, when both of them complete each other, this is magic “.

Then he tweeted a joke involving Hitler, involving a wordplay of penyakit hidler, which is an acronym of hidung (nose) + meler (runny, as in runny nose). One supposes the humor that Tifatul found was between the wordplay of hidler sounding like Hitler.

The Tweets have unleashed predictable results. Dozens of Indonesia’s Tweeps have written in questioning the sense and sensibility of the man.

At the heart of this broughaha is a central question: what sort of a politician quotes Hitler and makes lame jokes about him on Twitter. What does this say of the calibre of Indonesia’s ministers?

Strange tune: Unknown 1960s Russian singer makes it big among Indonesian onliners

Why is the Indonesian online community paying undue attention to this 1960s Russian singer who, in this very aged clip, sings with a wooden face with lyrics no profounder than trolololololo?

Find out how and why this video became viral in Indonesia’s Twitterverse in Talking Points.

Getting Lunatic over infotainment journos

Apart from the fact that Luna Maya is probably justified to vent her anger at Indonesia’s equivalent to the paparazzi , Unspun‘s always wondered why those reporters are called infotainment journalists.

Why infotainment? The cover the entertainment so shouldn’t they be called entertainment journalists? Unspun wonders what’s the etymology of infotainment. How did that word creep into the Indonesian vocabulary.

Indonesian Celebrity Luna Maya Shuts Twitter Account After Infotainment Prostitute Slur

An Indonesian celebrity has been threatened with legal action by a journalist’s association and has closed her Twitter account following backlash against a heated message where she labeled infotainment television program crews as being “lower than prostitutes.”

Luna Maya, a television presenter, model and actress, apologized to her Twitter followers before closing her account, under the username lunmay, permanently after the outburst.

In a message posted on Tuesday night, she wrote: “Infotainment are LOWER than PROSTITUTES, MURDERERS!!!!! May your soul burn in hell!!!”

“I’m sorry everyone for the unimportant tweet. I thank those of you who understand (my reasons) and for those who don’t, I apologize,” Luna wrote on her Twitter account on Wednesday.

Luna was believed to have written the harsh Twitter message after being mobbed by crew members of infotainment television shows after she attended the premiere of the film “Sang Perimpi” (“The Dreamer”) at EX Plaza in Central Jakarta on Tuesday night.

Luna, who is in a relationship with singer songwriter Ariel from the band Peterpan, was watching the film with Ariel’s daughter from a previous marriage, Alleia, and his father.

When Luna left the movie theater carrying Alleia, who had fallen asleep during the film, the actress alleged that one of the infotainment crew members bumped Alleia’s head with their camera in the jostle for photographs and interviews. Luna had allegedly already asked the infotainment reporters to wait in the lobby at EX Plaza where she would give an interview.

After the incident, Luna vented her anger on her Twitter account at midnight.

Her comments sparked backlash from her followers.

via Indonesian Celebrity Luna Maya Shuts Twitter Account After Infotainment Prostitute Slur – The Jakarta Globe.

A more reliable Indonesia blog ranking system?

Following some discussions in Media-ide and Talking Points about Indonesia’s blog rankings, Patung promised that he would address some of the criticisms in Indonesia Matters‘ blog rankings, which, imperfect as it was, was still the best indicator of a blog’s influence in the Indonesian blogosphere.

Patung‘s made good his promise and the main difference seems to be that he now uses Feedburner rather than Bloglines as one of the parameters. It also adds back Tweets and although it still includes Technorati, the information is not computed in (which is about right since Technorati is on the decline and not relied on much by bloggers to get an indication of a blog’s influence)

Unspun doesn’t know the technicalities of all those ranking stuff but the new list (in which Unspun‘s ranked 10th overall and 2nd in the English blog rankings. woohoo) seems to be more reliable than the last one, which was a bit suss because people who rarely updated the blogs for month still stood quite high in its ranking system.

So the current top 10 are: Indonesia Matters, Anang, Raditya Dika, Ndoro Kakung, Budi Rahardjo, Media-ide, Chicken Strip, Enda Nasution, Blog Doctor, and yours truly, Unspun.

Unspun‘s sure that there will be many who will quibble with Patung but as in a recent conversation with some bloggers one of the things we discovered was how difficult it is to set the parameters for blog influence. Do you count the number of visitors, the number of links, the number of conversations, the level of engagements or what. We concluded that perhaps the best system would be a combination of objective parameters and a subjective decision, perhaps by a panel of prominent bloggers, on who’s influential and who not. Even then the garrulous would find grounds to quarrel with the outcome.

Speaking of garrulous, Unspun‘s sure that the new rankings, especially where the English blogs are concerned, would certainly put some noses out of joint. Said persons would then likely profess to the world that they really, really place no importance on such superfluous things in life as blog rankings as they write for themselves and not for some online popularity sweepstakes. LOL if you should hear such protestations as methinks such bloggers protest too much. They are as vain as any of us (yes, Unspun included) bloggers when it comes to rankings. Even when we do not take such things too seriously we gotta admit that some sort of recognition feels good, even if we labor for love.

Teachers are doing it for themselves – on the Net

How do you help increase the quality of education in Indonesia?

Well, if you’re Citibank, (disclosure: they are our clients and we helped in this project) one way is to help set up a forum where teachers can help themselves, learn from each other and discus ideas.

And this was what Citi did in conjunction with their NGO partner, HOPE Indonesia.

Yesterday, as part of their Corporate Social Responsibility efforts under the Citi Peka unbrella, Citi among other things launched the website aksiguru.org that it says is probably the first of its kind in Indonesia aimed at supporting teachers’ peer-development and student outreach.

It says high school teachers in Indonesia can, through aksiguru.org, embrace social media as a means of communication and a tool that has the potential to facilitate information and experience sharing among the education community. Through the site, teachers can exchange ideas and thoughts, and most importantly interact with their students most of whom are already tech-savvy. Citi, in is media release, added:

“We hope to boost teachers peer development by launching the Aksiguru.org website,” said Charles Ham, Country Director Yayasan Hope Indonesia. “The use of internet and social media as a means for widespread communication is remains relatively low among teachers in the country, and we hope to generate teachers’ interest and eagerness in sharing their creative teaching methods with others though this site,” he continued.

“We have seen Indonesian teachers’ ability to create interesting learning activities continues to grow over based on the 4,448 proposals CSF received in the past seven years. Now is time for these teachers to inspire one another through Aksiguru.org,” says Ditta Amahorseya, Director-Country Corporate Affairs Head, Citi Indonesia “We hope for CSF grant recipients and other high school teachers become role models for each other and their respective schools as well as pioneer education methods that are innovative, creative, and inspiring.”

As with so many sites utilizing social media these days aksiguru.org also uses Twitter and Facebook to amplify its messages.

From the response so far, it looks like teachers are taking to this new form of cooperation, co-learning and collaboration.

Related information:

Pendidikan dan guru 2.0

Guru Kreatif

Mengajar Lewat Blog by Ndoro Kakung

The plugged, in Twittering new Indonesian Information Minister

The new Information and Communications Minister Tifatul Sembiring is an interesting politician if nothing else. He was officially appointed to his post two days before Pesta Blogger on 24 October.

When the Pesta Blogger committee met we discussed whether to invite him and many of us thought that he would be too busy to attend a non-mainstream event such as Pesta Blogger.

But we decided to give it a go anyway and through Shinta, she with all the connections, we sent word to Tifatul that we would be delighted if he would attend. Surprisingly, he said he would. More surprisingly, he showed up (instead of delegating it to a director general as many monisters are won’t to do). Most surprisingly, he showed up on time (as many ministers don’t).

While in the VIP room waiting for Pesta Blogger to begin he was good natured and accessible, accepting interviews even from BBC radio in English. Apart from the fact that because of religious reasons he does not shake hands with women, he was all charm and when he addressed the bloggers, he adhered the crowd to him by saying that he was a blogger and a Twitterer who became a minister.

One for the album: Menkominfo Tifatul Sembiring (middle) poses with some of the Pesta Blogger Committee members just before the event

These days he still tweets regularly and he was quoted in one of the newspapers today that his Facebook page now had so many friends thathe cannot accept anymore – yet there were 10,000 pending friend requests.

Is Tifatul the new breed of politicians — media and tchno-savvy, at least bilingual and populist — that we will be seeing from now on?

Is Tifatul someone that Malaysian ministers could benefit to learn from?

This from The Jakarta Post today:

Tifatul Sembiring is the minister who tweets

The Jakarta Post | Mon, 11/02/2009 10:05 AM | People

JP/R.Berto Wedhatama

JAKARTA: How can a top government official get comments and ideas directly from the people?

By tweeting, of course. At least, for new Information and Communications Minister Tifatul Sembiring, twitter is the feedback medium of choice.

After his inauguration last month, Tifatul introduced himself to fellow twitterers with the nickname @tifsembiring. He immediately gathered a large following.

While many politicians might prefer to maintain a serious demeanor, Tifatul likes to tweet humorous poems.

He is also seeking input from members of the public by asking what they want in the telecommunications sector, using hashtag #tifsembiringasking.

Asked whether it is actually he who tweets, Tifatul said, “Sometimes I do. Tweets are short so I can still write them.”

Tweets at @boediono — for Vice President Boediono — are not written by the VP, but members of his staff.

Tifatul added jokingly, “That’s why I said to fellow bloggers at the blogger party [last month], you’re lucky that a blogger became minister.” — JP

What happens at Twitter parties?

What happens at Twitter parties, let along Indonesia’s “first” Twitter party? The rumbustious New Media Division of Maverick went there to find out and this is their report:

“is currently at @hardrockfm’s #twitterparty”

Aug 13, 2009 – This post is filed under Indonesian, Social Media, Trends

Oleh: Nena Brodjonegoro

Sekitar 3 hari yang lalu tweeps di Jakarta sempat ramai karena adanya undangan untuk hadir di acara TwitterParty yang diadakan oleh Hard Rock FM. TwitterParty ini adalah “the first in town”, dan merupakan salah satu bentuk dukungan terhadap gerakan #indonesiaunite. Selain itu, TwitterParty juga menjanjikan bintang tamu antara lain Desy Anwar, Dian Sastro, Melaney Ricardo, serta Endah n Rhesa. Jam 4-8 acara TwitterParty sudah mulai “pemanasan” dengan adanya live broadcast di program Drive and Jive Hard Rock FM. Jam 8, ketika live broadcast sudah berakhir, the party finally started!

TwitterParty dibuka oleh Iwet Ramadhan, yang menjadi MC pada malam hari itu. Iwet juga tampil bersama Pandji Pragiwaksono, yang dikenal sebagai pelopor gerakan #indonesiaunite dan penyanyi lagu “Kami Tidak Takut” – yang juga adalah salah satu bentuk gerakan #indonesiaunite.

Fore more on this article read here.

I thaw 10,000 fathes in a thea of red and white

A few days ago Unspun, and Anita Mackay in our respective blogs, asked what next after #indonesiaunite, at that stage a Twitter movement comprising of Indonesian Twitterers changing their avatars to red and white themes and using the hashtag #indonesiaunite.

Today, a group calling themselves The Twibbon Team responded with a website with this visual below as centerpiece that works well with Silverlight.

The idea apparently came from Stormideas that is based in Edinburgh (Unspun doesn’t know what the connection is here) and it’s very visually arresting. Whether this will inspire other ideas with even more tangible effects remain to be seen but initiatives like this, the initial spurt of #indonesiaunite on Twitter resulting it it at one time being the top trending topic and the Prita Mulyasari case leads Unspun to be more convinced than ever that 2009 is a watershed year for social media in Indonesia.

What we see is a flourishing of creativity and a sense of empowerment as the younger generation in Indonesia find a common voice through the tools of the New Media. Where it will lead, what all this will change, will be something fascinating to watch.

10,000 Supporters for IndonesiaUnite cause – A Twibbon Twibute

On Friday 17th July 2009, terrorists, presumed by authorities to be suicide bombers, launched co-ordinated attacks on two up-market hotels in Jakarta, Indonesia’s capital. Nine fatalities were confirmed, whilst at least fifty more people were reported injured in the atrocity.

As a worldwide audience gradually learned of these events over the subsequent hours, many began to form part of an extraordinary online movement, which has grown exponentially since in a moving and powerful display of solidarity. By Sunday 19th July, just two days later, the IndonesiaUnite Twibbon cause has already brought together 10,000 supporters on Twitter from across the globe. Tweeple used the Twibbon service to overlay a small icon depicting the Indonesian flag on the corner of profile avatars. #IndonesiaUnite supporters have ensured that their cause has remained the number one Twitter trend, eclipsing other popular online topics such as Michael Jackson and the Iran Election.

To celebrate this awesome demonstration of the power of social networking communities to unify in protest on a matter of such international significance, Twibbon have created a massive DeepZoom mosaic twibute to those individuals who have affiliated themselves visually with this important and inspiring cause.

The movement is still flourishing, and you can help spread awareness across the world. Join at http://twibbon.com/join/IndonesiaUnite and follow @Twibbon at http://twitter.com/twibbon.

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