Staying online
It's rare that Jakartass gets a skinful of Bintang enlivened with intelligent discourse ~ yes, the two can go together.
O, frabjous joy, was how I greeted 'Er Indoors when I eventually returned to Jakartass Towers. She was not amused.
The main topic of conversation over the course of the evening in
Bugils was the democracy of blogging, the effort involved in producing pearls on a daily basis, and the potential, or lack of it, for earning an income from the internet here in Indonesia.
Of interest to your correspondent is that most of the protagonists have websites in early stages of development. Bart, the gaffer, now has c.5,000 subscribers to the
Indonesian Expat Newsletter which does generate an income. However, his
Bugils website is currently '
undergoing renovation'.
All my school reports had the comment '
Has ability, could do better'. That phrase and the word 'potential' sum up both Indonesia and Fabien's site,
City Control. The idea is to create single click access to booking services such as golf courses, hotels, taxi companies etc., whilst incorporating 'what's on' information. This is a fine idea yet to reach fruition; the site hasn't been updated since June 2nd.
Information needs sharing. I'm not at all sure that it should be sold. If it is, then editorial control is necessary and that isn't particularly democratic. I have the feeling that what is needed is an Open Guide, such as available for
Londoners, which is open source and built according to the interests of its users and subject to a
Creative Commons licence, as is this site.
The one thing which was agreed last night is that we have a synergy of interests; we are all expatriates resident in Jakarta for the foreseeable future. We have made a long-term, possibly life-long, commitment to this country and wish to make a contribution to the quality of life here. Bart, the Reveller and I also have a love of language; the internet affords us the opportunity to write and be read. Expect increased linkage between our sites and a pooling of thoughts in
Jalan-Jalan Jakarta, a project initiated by the
Reveller and I which has been slowed down by the Reveller's need to rebuild his computer. Expect developments, however, over the next few days.
We hope, too, that Soupy, a freelance writer who, to my knowledge, has absolutely no connection with
Man U. or Arsenal (or, indeed Crystal
Palarse) will contribute her idiosyncratic view of life here.
This is a
true, really genuine wish. As is the hope that we can stay online.
It really and genuinely pisses me off that I can rarely log on to Indosat in order to send my emails. I generally get online with Telkom in order to download web pages and incoming mail, but my monthly bills are exorbitant. Yesterday, both
Indosat and
Telkom announced record profits; Indosat's doubled to $152 million and Telkom's rose 14% to approx.$400 million.
Of the 50 emails sent to me so far today, 44 have been spam. As soon as my credit with Indosat turns into debit I shall use the
PostCast Server, which
is an SMTP mail server program that completely replaces your ISP's SMTP server. The free version does me nicely and can be downloaded
here.
Finally, a word or three to a couple of readers. Firstly,
dj wrote to me offline as follows:
I have just opened your blog and closed it very quickly in disgust. Hunter Thompson? P.J. O'Rourke? Unreadable the one, totally cynical the other! Bah, humbug. Your choice
dj, but I'd really really and genuinely have appreciated it if you'd used the Comment facility, thereby allowing others of my esteemed readers to have responded with refutations.
And
Hi to
Charby who was upset not to have registered my 10,000th hit. I would write to you offline if I could find an email address in your profile. I reckon that 10,006 is pretty good, so if you'd like a CD for Xmas containing loads of esoteric music, mainly bootlegs, which I've mentioned through my links and posts ~ I note that you'll listen to most stuff, and a photo of me, then do
drop me a line.
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