The Inquisitr » indonesia

Thousands missing, feared dead following Indonesian earthquake

Duncan Riley — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 00:18:09 +0000

Thousands are missing, feared dead after an earthquake struck off the coast of the island of Sumatra, Indonesia Wednesday.

As we reported earlier, the 7.6 quake struck at 5:16pm local time and caused a tsunami alert for Indian ocean countries. There is no reports of a tsunami occurring, unlike the Somoan earthquake yesterday, however the size of the earthquake and its proximity to land has caused massive damage across Sumatra.

The town of Padang, West Sumatra, home to 900,000 people was closest to the quake epicenter, and reports from the scene note that there are widespread fires, and that possibly thousands of building have collapsed. Rescue efforts have been hampered by roads into the town being cut off by mudslides, and the airport in the city is closed to air traffic due to damage. There are also reports that at least some of the towns hospitals have been destroyed by the quake.

Indonesia’s health minister told local media that the death toll could end up being “higher than the Yogyakarta quake in 2006,” a quake that left over 5,000 people dead.

The official death toll stands at 75, although is expected to rapidly rise throughout the day.

19-lb Indonesian baby terrorizes nursery

Kim LaCapria — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 14:19:16 +0000

Well, not really. (But isn’t the other baby’s face priceless?)

The baby, still awaiting a name, is pictured above next to a more average sized baby. The child’s unusual size is thought to be a result of common condition gestational diabetes. Luckily for mom Ani, 41, he was born via c-section, unlike his three home-born siblings. Even delivered surgically, the 19 lb baby posed a bit of a challenge for doctors to deliver safely:

“This heavy baby made the surgery really tough, especially the process of taking him out of his mum’s womb. His legs were so big,” said the gynecologist, Binsar Sitanggang.

Sitanggang said the boy eats like Pac-man, though:

“He’s got strong appetite, every minute, it’s almost non-stop feeding. This baby boy is extraordinary; the way he’s crying is not like a usual baby. It’s really loud,” he added.

The 19 pound baby broke the record for Indonesia’s heaviest baby, previously held by a wimpy 15.2 lb baby born in 2007.

Indonesian Province Passes Law Stoning To Death Adulterers

AHN — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 20:29:00 +0000

Banda Aceh, Indonesia (AHN) – The parliament of Indonesia’s religiously devout and semi-autonomous Muslim province of Aceh on Monday passed a law that imposes the punishment of stoning adulterers to death.

The new law based on the Koran and the hadith also imposes the punishment of lashing women who commit pre-marital sex 100 times as well as criminalizes drinking alcohol, gambling, rape, pedophilia and homesexuality.

The law will take effect after 30 days with or without the approval of the northern Sumatra province’s governor, according to parliamentary special hearing chairman Bachron M. Rasyid.

The law seeks to deter moral degradation, explained Moharriyadia, a spokesman for the Islamic-based Prosperous Justice Party (PJP).

Governor Irwandi Yusuf and women’s groups oppose the new law.

PJP member Bustanul Arifin said the new laws may still be redrafted before presented to the governor and the national parliament may overturn them if it conflicts with national and international laws.

Indonesian State wants to tag AIDS patients with RFID tags

Duncan Riley — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 04:58:34 +0000

The Indonesian State of Papua is preparing to pass a new law that will require some HIV/AIDS patients to be implanted with RFID chips.

Under the proposal, patients who had shown “actively sexual behavior” could be implanted with the RFID chip to monitor their activity.

Lawmaker John Manangsang told Reuters: “It’s a simple technology. A signal from the microchip will track their movements and this will be received by monitoring authorities.” If a patient with HIV/AIDS was found to have infected a healthy person, there would be a penalty.

The Jakarta Post newspaper the head of Papua’s National AIDS Commission as saying the plan violated human rights. The Indonesian Government claims that the number of HIV/AIDS cases in Papua is 20 times the national average.

I have to agree with Gizmodo on this: “I wonder if his plan B is just putting them in camps or shoot them straight away.”

Focus On Asia: Indonesian Startups

Duncan Riley — Mon, 19 May 2008 07:00:47 +0000

This is the first post in our series exploring Asian startups, where each day we’ll explore some leading startups and 2.0 services from each country in the region. More info here.

Indonesia is a country that isn’t well understood in the West. After years of one party rule, Indonesia has emerged as the largest Muslim democracy in the world (234 million people) and a slow opening up of the local economy has seen an emergent middle class. Internet penetration in Indonesia is growing, but still only totals 20 million users, not helped in the least by Indonesia’s geography of 17,508 islands of which around 6,000 are inhabited.

Here’s some of the startups and 2.0 services making their presence felt in Indonesia.

Moodmill

What they say:

Moodmill is a social mood management website. It’s a personal mood management, a log, a quick ‘n easy website for managing and sharing your short logs with your contacts.

In use:
Moodmill is a Twitter hybrid that combineds short messaging with social networking style mood statements. A professional service that has come to the attention of sites such as ReadWriteWeb.

Layartancap

What they say:

“Layartcancap.com is a video streaming website located in IIX (Indonesia Internet eXchange) so can be faster access for Indonesia users.”

In use:
Layartcancap is Indonesia’s version of YouTube. The site may not be as well designed as American services, but it serves the local community well.

Kronologger

Not available in English, Kronologger states on its logo “Indonesia’s microblogging service.” Simply this is an Indonesian Twitter with a smart design and decent local user base.

Fupei

An Indonesian social network similar to MySpace, but localized.

There are probably more Indonesian startups, and if you know of any, please feel free to comment. The last word from the English language Jakarta Post:

These new developments indicate that Indonesian local content has grown rapidly. And since all content is placed with local hosting providers, of course it can save Internet bandwidth significantly.

Despite the fact that the Indonesia’s Web 2.0 services are mostly cloned off international service models, the potential exists to develop and explore them for the local market.

It’s not easy to create truly original services in this field, and the real competition lies in creating an appropriate business model and in attracting the community.