the big theme : why muslim world are so difficult to join with each other.

we have a conclusion that we actually speak different language, and each of us has our own issue, that we dont have common interest. except the religion things. that has been proved so far with the recent issues how the muslim country react differently with the freedom flotilla event instead of have some single resolution about the incident.

yet the relation between countries are still unclear ( compared to European Union ) with all the gaps in economics, education and so on. however, i saw malaysian are so proactive to propose anything in muslim world to tied them up (that’s why they held this WIEF event).  i have to admit that malaysian are have the muscle to held and tied due to it’s economic condition. malaysian are strong in business and economics. they have strong relationship with middle east capital like kuwait, abu dhabi and UAE.

while my beloved country –indonesia- are still struggling with the classical issues on corruption, internal politics and welfare. honestly my perspective are that they just care about their own issues and interest despite the constitution that “freedom is a basic right of every nation” and “the indonesian foreign politics are free and active in any means”. please note that malaysia and indonesia are also still have issues between each other which is i believe can explode in anytime. the tied with middle east are so weak – so far, only hajj things that tied up with saudi, we sent the largest numbers of people for doing hajj every year. indonesian are more to europe, american and chinese.

i think what we dont have at the moment are figure –a strong committed and respected person – and the common interest is not yet found.

Recently, I have had some conversation with Tristan Louis here. We were discussing about open internet and the side effects of it in asian country; The discussion isn’t over yet, and i try to explain as much as possible in this article.

Indonesia, a home for 200+ millions of people. also considered as the biggest Muslim country in the world. Ethnically the country is highly diverse, with over 580 languages and dialects—but only 13 have more than one million speakers. the country is suffered from military dictatorship ruled for over 32 years. In 1998, along with asian financial crisis, the country is having a bloody demonstration and chaos to forced President Soeharto to resign in May 1998. One year later, the country conducted the first democratic elections since 1955. However, The regime had left massive corruption through the government official.

After the resignation, Indonesia are enjoying totally free access to information (previously was censored). Newspaper have the freedom to write anything about everything, the internet itself due to it’s lack of penetration are only accessed to limited number of people such as scientist, academician and Indonesian that staying in developed country. A few years later, more and more people are having access to the internet. Some are using it in a positive way, some are using it to spread the hate between people, porn, gambling.

The country biggest problems to date are highly unemployment rates and poor education level. There are quite large numbers of people who still unable to read and write. These people are used by some elite politician to drive them for their interest, such as paid them to hold a demonstration and any other things that you can imagine. But do remember that it is not for the people good, but for the politician’s personal interest!

Remember how Geert Wilder(Dutch politician, creator of fitna the movie) are making mass demonstration in cities around the country, followed by a burning to some internet cafe in Jakarta and Bandung. Another case, there’s used to be an internet forum (indonesia faith freedom), which IF the site is leaked to the public or having a spot in traditional media. I believe it will created a riot as well. The last one which is still fresh are demonstration in front of parliamentary building. How many people are pissed and lost their time due to the riot?

To date, there are several things that the country did to filtering the internet. Gambling and porn are the clear example of the filtered content. Everyone is agreed with the filtering, so what?

I also believed that personally, I don’t care about who is ruling the country. as long as you can guarantee the economics stabilization, safety and security then go ahead.

this is what makes Indonesia are different with america and the others democratic countries. Also if you noticed that a lots of asian countries are having the same profiles with Indonesia. That’s why i think we still need to controlled some of the content in the internet, it’s also for the countries people safety.

Headline photos are taken by Surja W. Pranama

Even though that group has been closed down by facebook due to porn related images(yeah, it was some stupid people post that image to provocate the members). There was another group with the same intensity.

This is the sign that indonesian democracy is going to v2.0.

So, lets see whats happen next.

http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=76200719488

Indonesia’s big dream to connecting the whole archipelago with “Palapa Project” will be longer than it’s estimation, 3 out of 7 company has withdraw themself from the consortium.

This is the biggest project after Suharto’s era with his IPTN(Indonesian Aircraft Industri).

Personally I believed that this project will be make technology leapfrog to the Indonesians, because now the country has problem with slow and expensive internet connection.

The Company which is withdraw from the consortium :

• Macca System Infocom
• Infokom Elektrindo
• Powertek Utama Internusa

Member of the current consortium :

• Bakrie Telecom
• Excelcomindo Pratama
• Telkom
• Indosat

Many rumours said that this Mega $250 Million Project is non-transparent on it’s licensing and some pressures from national political parties. It’s unclear which parties doing the pressure.

This ambitious project is proposed from Indonesian Communication and Informatics Ministry Sofyan Jalil on August 2006. But after reshuffle cabinet, Sofyan Jalil become Minister of State Enterprises. His former department now held by Muhammad Nuh Dea, a former Rector of Sepuluh November Institute of Technology (ITS).

Sebenarnya istilah peer review(Bahasa: Penilaian Sejawat) itu digunakan untuk menilai, apakah artikel yang akan dimuat di jurnal/publikasi ilmiah layak untuk diterbitkan. Tentu saja, pada publikasi jurnal ilmiah internasional, makalah yang diterbitkan sudah melalui proses ini, sehingga kredibilitas dan validitas makalah tersebut bisa dipertanggungjawabkan.

Pada pembukaan UUD 1945 salah satu cita-cita nasional Indonesia adalah mencerdaskan kehidupan bangsa, pers adalah garis depan yang mengemban amanat tersebut, bersama-sama dengan guru, dosen, profesor, dan berbagai ahli yang memiliki kompetensi dibidangnya masing-masing. Namun sayangnya upaya pencerdasan kehidupan bangsa ini tidak sinkron di lapangan. Polemik tersebut hanya bisa dibaca oleh orang yang memiliki akses terhadap internet.
Berikut beberapa hal yang masih menjadi polemik(mungkin ada yang bisa membantu menambahkan):

• Bahan Bakar Air
• Blue Energy
• Metadata (Roy Suryo)
• Anne Ahira

Pembaca dapat melihat polemik tersebut apabila bergabung dengan forum kaskus, blognya Priyadi, Jay, dan berbagai macam forum/blog lain yang tersebar di internet.

Memang, kalau bicara soal kredibitas, saya sendiri masih bingung harus bicara apa, tapi di media tempat terjadinya polemik yang saya sebutkan juga memberikan argumen ilmiah yang cukup masuk akal menurut saya. Setidaknya saya memiliki sudut pandang lain dalam mencerna informasi yang diberikan oleh media mainstream, minimal, saya tidak menelan mentah-mentah informasi yang saya dapat.

Nah, tentang peer review sendiri, bagaimana seandainya pers kita melaksanakan hal tersebut. Tentu yang melakukan peer review tersebut anonim, untuk menghindari hal-hal yang tidak diinginkan.

Misalnya, Media A, ingin menurunkan berita penemuan baru, kemudian media A, menghubungi 3 atau 4 orang yang dikenal memang memiliki kompetensi di bidang penemuan tersebut, kalau memang tidak layak-misalnya ternyata penemuannya tidak benar-benar baru- maka berita tersebut tidak jadi diturunkan. Sehingga kualitas informasi yang sudah turun dari media tersebut sudah sangat-sangat baik.

Saya tidak tahu apakah media kita sudah melakukan peer review tersebut, tentu saja mungkin berita yang disajikan agak terlambat menunggu hasil review tersebut. Namun kalau belum, saya rasa hal ini penting untuk dilakukan. Saya tidak tahu dengan media-media di luar negeri melakukan hal ini atau tidak. Apa salahnya mencoba? Tentu saja batasan peer review tersebut hanya pada artikel/berita yang berkaitan dengan teknologi/ilmu pengetahuan.

Bagaimana tanggapan pembaca?

Akhirnya, setelah Markis Kido&Hendra Setiawan menjadi pemenang dalam pertandingan sebelumnya, pada sesi Final bertemu dengan tim dari Denmark.

Terjadi saling mengejar skor antara kedua tim, namun akhirnya setelah set ke-3 Indonesia keluar sebagai juara.

Akhirnya Indonesia Menang, meskipun saat menonton pertandingan tersebut saya sedang tidak enak badan dengan kemenangan tersebut membuat saya bangga keluar dari stadion bersama teman-teman kuliah saya.

Tadi Malam, ternyata ada pertandingan Badminton di Stadion Putra Bukit Jalil. Langsung saja saya berangkat nonton sekaligus menjadi suporter untuk Timnas Indonesia.

Kebetulan yang bertanding Indonesia VS Malaysia dan Indonesia VS Denmark.

Pertandingan sebelumnya saya tidak sempat untuk menyaksikan, Namun pertandingan berikutnya cukup seru, Duo Tony Gunawan(USA) dan Chandra Wijaya(INA) melawan Abdul Latif(Malaysia) dan Zakaria(Malaysia). meskipun pada babak pertama terjadi kejar-kejaran poin, namun akhirnya Duo Tony-Chandra berhasil melanjutkan ke babak semifinal. hal yang sama terjadi juga dengan pasangan Markis Kido-Hendra Setiawan. yang sangat disayangkan adalah pada semifinal nanti Tony-Chandra berhadapan dengan Markis-Hendra. Hal ini cukup membuat mood saya untuk menonton berkurang.

Namun tentu saja pada saat Final nanti saya akan menantikan permaian terbaik dari tim Indonesia, sehingga suara saya teriak-teriak tidak sia-sia.