mobile internet potential in Indonesia

(note: I refer mobile internet as accessing internet in your mobile and not using your mobile as a modem )

When mobile internet service was firstly introduced by IM3 (as their differentiator when they launch their network), GPRS only become a very hot topic; so many people talk about it, but only one of two use it. Although it was free for a year, network footprint, handset readiness, and handset setup become barriers. Soon after IM3 launch the service, existing mobile carriers that have bigger footprint also launch GPRS product.

But GPRS take up was disaster. All operators were in the race launching GPRS service and get media coverage but forget how to activate people. Unlike other countries, mobile carriers don’t control handsets distribution in Indonesia. Handsets in the market are open for any mobile carriers without any network preset and there was no GPRS OTA setting provided by mobile carriers (10 years after the product was launched (2007), Hutchison 3 become the first operator in Indonesia that give GPRS setting OTA push message automatically when subscriber insert their SIM card in to the phone).

All mobile carriers seemed treat GPRS as a ‘we_also_have_it’ product without any development or exploration on how to increase GPRS traffic. Although I believe they realize this will be a very big potential due to low penetration of fixed line internet.

Content providers and handset manufacturers were become a ‘hero’ on educating GPRS products. CP starts by build a WAP sites and provide various services that require GPRS (poly-ringtones, color pictures, true-tones, java-games) while handset manufacturers inject setting wizard application for GPRS and MMS settings.

At 30% of mobile connectivity penetration (~15% mobile penetration -not_confirmed-) with combination of ‘change_handsets_every_3_months’ habit and affordable GPRS supported handsets product aggressive penetration, a research from one of handset manufacturer said that 90% subscribers in Indonesia are using GPRS supported handset.

Potential? YES, a few months ago in Indonesia Mobile Monday launch event, T. Fuad from Yahoo! Asia HQ in Singapore announce their foot print in Indonesia by having their one-search and Yahoo!Go mobile apps. in all GSM mobile carriers. Unfortunately, usage growth result is not as expected. I don’t think setting was the problem, it because lack of activation activity from operators that happened to be got the ‘exclusive’ deal with Yahoo! as the pioneer for Y!Go app. launch. Beside lack of activation activities, pricing also become the biggest barrier -people perceived there will be more bytes to be downloaded if they’re using the application because it has a lot of graphics, thus they perceived it will be very expensive to them.

So is it mobile carriers fault? not 100% correct though I don’t think Yahoo! had done their homework by research on ‘the most popular service that accessed in their line of services portfolio in Indonesia’, because they took off Y!Messenger in new Y!Go that launched in Indonesia, or maybe it was their global strategy to push mobile internet ad in all of their foot prints. (fyi, youngsters in Indonesia willing to pay US$ 1 / month(exclude GPRS charge) to one of mobile carrier for 3rd party mobile IM application that can connect to Y!M).

Will Yahoo! bring their mobile IM product to Indonesia? I surely hope so, because the application is very straight forward and easy to use. Mobile users only need minimum education to use the product. Look at blackberry users in Indonesia, they all use mobile Y!M. Imagine it can be extended to normal java-supported phones. Then we just need mobile carrier to give a special bundling data package for it (I heard one of the mobile carrier willing to do so… )

Along with IM application, other form of mobile marketing through mobile IM application, rich mobile content promotion (truetone, polyringtone, color-wallpaper, mobile avatars), and content recommendation can be easily pushed. Even, mobile carriers can also promote other GPRS required product (their WAP site, mobile carriers social network initiatives, even to 3G contents like fulltrack music download). So they will give cheap GPRS charge for mobile IM, will lead mobile carrier to be able to get more revenue.

Activate mobile subscribers to more advanced products by introduce PC internet application to mobile will really lead to over all mobile internet success story in Indonesia, IMHO.

we are not quitters!

This inspiring video is one of the Gudang Garam commercial (cigarette company in Indonesia) during last year Indonesia’s education day, inspired by true story about kids in a village in West Java that have to swim across a river everyday in order to get their formal education.

I’m very proud and sad at the same time whenever I watch that commercial; proud because we are not quitters country and it shows in very explicit way on how those kids are risking their life to get their rights. How those fighters do their best in order to get ready for their future no matter what.

I also very sad how this kind of story was not become an interested story to reporters (especially foreign reporters who just exposed Indonesia’s bad stories that create negative image to Indonesia. those reporters who over expose our wrong-doings and our fault without being honest to themselves about their own country). Everybody know the power of media, everybody try to expose every good deeds in the media, but I wonder where are those foreign reporters that can look for sensitive information related to Indonesia (a negative ones) when this kind of media coverage should bring those kids a better way to achieve a better education, a better future.

This story was taken from one of Kompas’ reporter article related to education day. Gudang Garam advertising agency (octovate) asking permission to take that story and make a commercial based on that true story.

the impact? civil engineering from University of Indonesia built a new bridge for those kids for free….

that’s how media can give power to powerless people… Hopefully, this will inspire more people in industry to build a commercial that also have positive impact to society, to Indonesia.

 

wet @ embassy playground 2008

Embassy Playground

PLUS : big event, big DJs, reunion, and safe

event promotion and communications were very big, in duration and presence manners. all Marlboro billboards were changed into this event promo. PVD (former/still (?)) a #1 DJ, become its main attraction. Every party-goers in Jakarta are attracted to this event.

EO also (try to) accomodate all dance music genre (including RnB ) that’s why they have arond 5 venues; 3 in open area, 1 @ segara, and 1 @ jimbaran resto.

the best thing was I met a lot of old friends in the event; which reduced my disappointments.

MINUS : bad sound system arrangements, bad environment settings, bad songs flow

There are 2 stages beside the -massive_lighting_main_stage- , unfortunately sound system arrangement was not carefully done. Unless you really close to stage’s main speakers, sound from ‘neighbor’ stage will be very disturbing.

When PVD start, everybody were so happy… but what this (former/still(?)) #1 DJ not really showed his quality. So many people were complaining about his song flow and how he left DJ deck in the middle of his show — although he came back and somebody (maybe his assistant) need to be beside him until he finished his job…..

free internet presence cost (a google apps testimonial)

When I start my company ; a creative digital media agency (mobile media and internet media), my first priority is to set-up a domain name, e-mail, and (still under-construction) website. 

At the same time, I was really into all Google innovations and been trying to keep track of what they’ve done by browsing their google labs and tried out some of their future features in there. My eyes was really into google-pages. I thought to my self, if only google also give a web hosting service with customized domain for free. It will be very useful for a low budget company in order to get exposure in unlimited potential of www.

We can train home industries or help them to use this google-pages as their online front-end with email to contact/contact number so it will eliminate unnecessary mediator that took incredibly high margin and still pressed these home industries to give the lowest price for them. 

For example; a handicraft home industry can show their product in WEB by build a simple homepage, using easy to use google-pages and upload their product images.  Then point their selected domain name to Google free web-hosting facilities. This will stimulate faster community development.

A month after google-pages tried out, I find an article in my google-reader that google launch their new product called google apps (google applications). 

 

It has google docs, google calendar, google pages, start page, etc. I tried out google apps standard edition (because it’s free :p). It turns out they provide mail service and customizable domain into what-ever domain you have. So I try my company domain, dotjuicer.com

Now, I have my domain web-page (although it still under-construction :p), my email service (using @dotjuicer.com) that also can be retrieved using POP3 or IMAP, and ‘dotjuicer’ calendar. 

Total cost: IDR 100,000,- (for a year domain name rent)

If we can leverage this and equipped home industries so they can have their front-end in internet with this low cost implementation, I believe they will get lots of benefit out of it.

It’s cool, it’s cheap, it’s applicable, and relevant for community development in emerging markets. 

 

Will adsense/adwords work for your company/product?

One of Google remarkable innovation in media and advertising industry is adsense/adwords. The question is; will it worth for your company to use this service?

Not to worry! Google provide the tool to examine whether adsense/adwords will work for your company. It’s in google labs site, but everybody can try it.

Google trends will see how frequent a keyword searched in Google by internet users. The beauty of it is not the rank it self or you can compare more than 1 keyword at once; but it also presented based on region and time (cool!! – IMHO) . I tried the service by comparing “motor yamaha” and “motor honda”. The result is as follow (see the detail of originating area the search was made);

So, does your company website / product is worth to be registered as a adword/adsense? try it out in Google trends

re-inventing the wheel

I browse around universities websites and find all universities have e-learning features in their web. Most of them are created by in-house University’s IT team.

Hopefully, those universities share the same vision and standards on how to deliver best computer mediated learning system to their students; or even extends it to anybody who join the programs. Because I remember my programming concept lecturer said “don’t reinventing the wheel”.

If e-learning developed by every universities built by their own standards, there will be a good chance to have same functionality in many standards, many algorithms in many programming languages. It will be such a waste of ‘intelectual’ time .

Why don’t universities gather and create a forum (doesn’t need to be a physical forum, can be virtual forum – try google project ) to share, create, and develop a standard to deliver the best computer mediated learning system in Indonesia. Or building an the best e-learning system is ‘unofficial’ way to show my university is more andvanced than yours?

Let’s imagine that all Universities are working together to build a standard for e-learning system focus on high-school graduates, it will be such an efficient way because no one research, build, and solve the same issues; and Universities can do their individual effort by customize e-learning system for people in rural areas around Universities’ city. There will be more challenges for universities and good impact for communities development.

Look at Google, their commitment on solving problem and their openness become their unique value that lead them to be the most respected .com company. They engage more talents to achieve one goal: create the best search engine that works for everybody.

Having a working e-learning system for IT literate people especially Universities students for me (IMHO) is useless. Because there are facility like Google, Wikis, Specific interest groups, scientific articles, and other technologies can be easily accessed and used by Universities’ students.

But creating an e-learning applications for non IT or English or Bahasa literate community will be a challenge that need to be conquer. They are actually communities that really need technology to accelerate their learning processes. They really need a technology that work for them, not the other way around.

‘nrimo’ – javanese concept of life

nrimo, is suppose to be a great concept of life that teach us to accept everything we deserve as a compensation of what we’ve done.

An elementary school teacher in Indonesia will not be able to afford a Harley Davidson just count on their salary every month; but they will get other non-material appreciation because of their service to produce Indonesia’s next generations. If someone choose to be an elementary school teacher, they should realize this and commit to this path without compromise.

Unfortunately this concept of life become a weapon to irresponsible people to continue their economic colonialism to people in rural areas. People in rural areas are brainwashed so they will receive their destiny to be poor. Somehow, ‘nrimo’ is perceived as blindly rely your life to the destiny. If God wants you to be poor, then what ever you do, you will always be poor.People in rural villages are made to believe that being poor was their destiny by neo-colonialist people, so they can take maximum benefit out of it. These low educated people are brainwashed so they don’t have any desire to develop themselves and easily satisfied by minimum material appreciation.

It’s been happening so long that they believe that there is no other way to life their live but being poor. During Soeharto’s era, this situation was strengthened by subsidizing on every life-critical needs so these poor people didn’t see negative impact of this misdefined ‘nrimo‘.

In contrast in most cities, invasion of consumerism that lead to corruptive behavior is caused by the absent of ‘nrimo’. Many people want more than what they can afford, try to find a shortcut to get what they want, and do anything to achieve what they want.

why I love telecommuting?

   telecommuting:”Telecommuting, e-commuting, e-work, telework, working at home (WAH), or working from home (WFH) is a work arrangement in which employees enjoy limited flexibility in working location and hours. In other words, the daily commute to a central place of work is replaced by telecommunication links.more“  

I’ve spent 1.5 hours driving to my office (around 35 Km), it will be the same time frame for me to conduct a weekly meeting to set a week goal(s). Although I’ve spent most of time reading google reader from my mobile (not a good sample of safety driving, but I was so bored… because my car only move once every 5 minutes). 

I’m subscribing to wireless internet connection for IDR 350,000.00 (US$ 40) for 1.2 GB volume/month. On top of US$35 / week for gasoline, stressful experience on the road, possibility to get a scratch car because motorbike. As soon as I arrived at the office, then I open my notebook, connect to Internet (using my office’s internet line), and start to work.

I wonder, how many people in Jakarta are actually a ’space independent’ work force. How many of them have to spend hours of their time and travel from their house to their office. Then I start to think how can they actually save their salary.

If it’s not for having a meeting and monitor my subordinates, I can stay home and work from my bedroom without have to worry about which way I should take to avoid 3 in 1, which way that have the least traffic and where I should have my lunch.

Not just it will cut half of my cost per-month, I also actively contribute to reduce pollution, decrease traffic accident statistic, and increase revenue to people that open a business around my house especially restaurant.

All I have to do is create a working standard in order to make telecommuting works in my company. I know that not all business will be effective by this working type, but creative agencies, digital media people, software developers, even receptionist and secretary can work from their house.

It will be the best long term solution for traffic jam rather than build never ending ‘busway’ road and mono-rail projects that not resulting anything but corruptions and more traffic jam. 

10 reasons why google should open their office in Indonesia….

1. They good on data-mining, Indonesia doesn’t have accurate integrated information in www
2. They can help Indonesia to make a working standard for citizen’s ID
3. Google powerful solution will be more accessible because only use local bandwidth
4. Huge home industry potential that will be well exposed by Google applications
5. Google solve problems, Indonesia has so many….
6. Indonesia will be the next super power country; human resource potentials and huge natural resources
7. Integrating IT in Indonesia like google do in www will potentially help to reduce corruption, because computer programs doesn’t like money and always present the truth
8. Big potential for mobile penetration (30% mobile connectivity on 2007, 75% mobile connectivity on 2015)
9. Google powerful PCs farm solution can be a standard to developing country like Indonesia
10. There will be an internet new users booming in Indonesia because of rapid mobile network development

Nomad to Nomad ?

Some of you might have previous version of image above showing how people evolve. For me; image above will tickled me in a way that we actually going back to nomad because technology enable us to do so.

The difference between ancient and ‘neo’ nomad maybe only its tools and ‘know-how’. On ancient nomad, people will and always gather in groups, have their own sign/language, their own symbol, create their own currency (on bartering things) and their own unique habit (culture). All tools that used as means for their activities are simple, practical, and specific. Even, in some literature fashion also indicate their identity as a member of specific ‘ancient nomad’ groups (-although I’m still curious on how we can know how a pre-historic people dress-up-). Ancient-nomad will move places because many reasons included in this 2 groups; resource to support their groups and/or security.

‘Neo-Nomad’; will have all the social values had in ancient-nomad. Especially in Indonesia; I think Indonesian will be very easy to complete this sentence ‘let’s gather for ….”. We have community for almost every car type(even if it not a rare car), specific product from a brand – from id-mac, id-apple, ipod touch community, iphone, etc- , and specific sub-(sub-sub-…)group.

Thanks to technology, physical appearance will not be a mandatory; because we can have a ‘gathering’ in mailing lists, chat rooms, multiparties calling, and group SMS. Every participant can/want/need to be involved in decision making process; although most of the them never meet each other in person.

Demands (or dreams) to get more than what we have will always be there; either we need it or we want it. Started with a device that can only receive limited characters and a device that can exchange single duplex voice; now a device can do all things; text, voice, internet, music, photo, and ‘carry-able’.

Why we need it to be a ‘carry-able’ device? One of the reason is because we really want to take control on what we have, including our social networks / groups / community.

Technology shifted us to a ‘neo-nomad’ creatures.

1 million question: are we ready for this?