WoW

WoW stands for World of Warcraft and is the most popular MMORPG on the Internet. The acronym stands for Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game and the 8 million registered players in WoW, not surprisingly, assume various roles and collaborate on quests of one sort or another. I know all this because I set my year 11 computing class to find out as much as they could about online gaming. I'm still assessing what they discovered but I did my own research and was surprised at the numbers of online gamers as well as the huge revenues that the industry generates.

The class is also investigating online gambling and so am I. The graphic above is a screenshot of a slot machine taken from www.freeslots.com where I've been playing on and off. As you may be able to see, I've accumulated 2359 credits but unfortunately this does not represent real money. Compared to the real slot machines that I've played, the returns on this virtual slot machine seem remarkably generous. I've discovered that there are online poker rooms, online casinos and online bingo. Interestingly, the 2003 world poker champion started out playing in one of these virtual poker rooms and in this way secured an invitation to a real world event that he went on to win, much to everyone's surprise.

In my online investigations, I've also come across a site called Second Life where you can lead a virtual second life in addition to your own real world life. You join up and select an avatar, a character to represent you in this virtual world. It doesn't cost any money to join but if you pay money, you can buy virtual real estate and build a house on it and presumably live in it. For purely educational purposes, I've joined Second Life, selected my avatar and am ready to interact in my new virtual world. Unfortunately, not having paid any money, I don't have any virtual money (called Linden dollars) and so I'll be roaming about as a virtual beggar. I still have to download the software from the site so that I can begin my second life but because I've seriously exceeded my monthly download quota, I'm waiting for the new month to dawn. Then I'll be ready for a new adventure.

Memorandum of Understanding

It seems that Microsoft's recent MoU (Memorandum of Understanding) with the Communication and Information Ministry has come under fire from critics in the House of Representatives who are arguing that "it would create a monopoly for Microsoft, and undermine the government's own "Indonesia Goes Open Source" program, which encourages the use of free and open source software in the public sector". Here is the full text of the article that appeared in The Jakarta Post of January 19th:

Microsoft defends multimillion dollar deal with RI government

Business News - Friday, January 19, 2007 Urip Hudiono, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta 

Microsoft Indonesia has spoken out on a controversial recent deal with the government, arguing that the deal was initiated by the government as part of its efforts to improve Indonesia's information technology sector as a whole.

Microsoft Indonesia president director Tony Chen told reporters Thursday that the agreement had been clinched against the backdrop of the government's efforts to reduce software piracy, including negotiating with major software vendors for the use of their products by government institutions.

"As a majority of the computers in government institutions use Microsoft products, we were among the first the government invited," he said.

The Communications and Information Ministry signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with Microsoft Indonesia in November last year to provide a total of 35,496 licenses for the Microsoft Windows operating system, and 177,480 licenses for the Microsoft Office productivity suite to government institutions.

The MoU will also offer long-term guarantees for the new software investment, ensuring free upgrades for up to three years.

Microsoft Indonesia is also required to work closely with the government in a partnership to improve IT literacy in the country, including providing computers and IT training to schools across the country.

Tony said that the MoU -- with a 70 percent discounted licensing price -- would result in savings of up to US$200 million for the government, compared to the $250 million it would cost if the government was to buy licenses at regular prices. The government would also save $60 million on the free upgrades.

He said that the agreement also showed the government's seriousness about fighting software piracy, which would help attract more investment to the country's IT sector.

Yet the deal has come under fire, including from the House of Representatives, with the critics arguing that it would create a monopoly for Microsoft, and undermine the government's own "Indonesia Goes Open Source" program, which encourages the use of free and open source software in the public sector.

The trend to use free and open source software has emerged in recent years around the world based on various reasons, including antimonopoly sentiment, transparency, cost efficiency and national security. Among the countries and institutions that have gone open source are Peru, the Extremadura region of Spain, the municipality of Munich in Germany, and a number of government agencies in China.

Microsoft and other proprietary software developers do not disclose the source codes of their products.

Tony said that the government had opted to sign the MoU due to the still-limited use of IGOS, while it needed to move fast to improve both Indonesia's IT sector and public services.

Tony's arguments were confirmed by Communications and Information Minister Sofyan Djalil.

Yes indeed and whatever did happen to the IGOS (Indonesia Goes Open Source) program? Well the website is still there at http://www.igos.web.id/english/english.htm but obviously forging a deal with Microsoft will help ensure that the use of open source software remains "still-limited".

If ever a country needed free software it's Indonesia and it's good to read that at least some parliamentarians are questioning what the hell is going on. The graphic in this blog entry I found on the site www.uncyclopedia.org that is actually a wiki and contains some funny entries about IT topics. I found the graphic by entering the word "Microsoft" in the search box.

Alternative Measures

What do you do when you've lost a plane with one hundred people on board and the search has drawn a blank? You slaughter a buffalo of course! The Adam Air plane is still missing but searchers have not given up as this article from today's daily paper confirms:

Searchers slaughtered a buffalo in a traditional ceremony and consulted psychics Friday, the fourth day after an Adam Air jetliner went missing over Sulawesi. In Majene, West Sulawesi, a search and rescue team enlisted the help of local shamans and slaughtered a buffalo in a traditional ceremony, where food offerings were made to the spirits of the jungle and prayers were offered to ancestors to "clear the path" for the operation. "When we come to a new place we greet the spirits here," Majene military chief Zakariya told AFP. "You can see that even when using very hi-tech devices and enlisting the help of Singapore, we have still not found anything. So this is an alternative measure that we are using", he said.

I think this local article nicely complements my previous post concerning the camel sacrifice in Turkey. It's refreshing to know in 2007 that in this corner of the world reliance is not being placed solely on "hi-tech" solutions to solve problems and that traditional methods are still being embraced. 

This is indeed a search that has not gone well from the outset. Initially it was reported that wreckage of the plane had been found and that there were ten survivors. This turned out to be totally fictitious. Waiting relatives and friends of the missing passengers were outraged but there is little they can do but wait.

On a final note, it occurred to me that Adam Air could be an unfortunate name for an airline company in Indonesia because "air" means "water" in the Indonesian language. It would seem very likely that the missing plane has gone down in the sea. Meanwhile, about 400 ferry passengers are still unaccounted for and the chances of their survival look bleak.

Disaster Strikes

I'm afraid I couldn't resist posting the photo from the front page of today's daily newspaper. The caption for the photo is "POOR MAN'S MEAT: A woman sorts through meat to be distributed to the poor at Bogor's Parung subdistrict Sunday." 

Yum! Pity we can't see the flies buzzing around. I read today that some of the poor were far from happy however, complaining that they received far less meat than last year and what they did receive was largely bone. So who got all the juicy bits? 

The year has started rather badly here in Indonesia with 400 still missing in a ferry sinking and a plane missing with 102 people on board. This comes on top of ongoing floods and landslides. The disasters just seem to keep coming. Another report in the paper states that: 

More Indonesians say they are economically worse off compared to 12 months ago and most cite the increased costs of basic goods and travel expenses as the main reasons, an end-of-year survey says. 

How citizens here cope on the meagre wages that they receive is a mystery to me. Of course, there are an estimated forty million who are unemployed and don't receive a wage at all. It's hard to imagine how things could get much worse here but of course they could.