Exploring the possibilities of over 20 million online
Exploring the possibilities of over 20 million online
By Onno W. Purbo
JAKARTA (JP): Twenty million Indonesians online by 2004: Is it hype or reality?
At the moment, an estimated 1.5 million Indonesians surf the Internet by way of 130 Internet service provider (ISP) licenses issued by the government.
All information technology (IT) and cyber activities are supported by over two million PCs with approximately 10 million telephone lines in Indonesia.
To make it more difficult, only three million to four million Indonesians have postsecondary education that renders them able to play a major role in cyberspace.
It would, therefore, be a real challenge to hook 20 million Indonesians into the Internet, especially with minimal support from the World Bank (WB) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF).
Behind the formal activities performed by the government, an underground movement is currently underway to integrate more Indonesians into cyberspace.
There are 1,000 Internet cafes (warnet) and their numbers are increasing rapidly due to IT educational activities in terms of road shows, talk shows and seminars organized by many IT players.
Four to five IT seminars, workshops and talk shows a week are currently the normal rate.
Most young "cyberpreneurs" are spending time at the Indonesian Internet cafe mailing list asosiasi-warnet@egroups.com, which hosts a daily discussion among its over 800 members.
It is not surprising to learn that 60 percent to 70 percent of Indonesian Internet access is done through these warnet as reported by MarkPlus in SWA magazine.
All these activities are financed by the warnet and IT community with practically no support from the WB, the IMF, Asian Development Bank or from the government.
No money has been paid by our children or grandchildren in building a knowledge-based society, unlike the old regime.
An aggressive technological approach has to be taken by these warnet to overcome the high telecommunications costs involved.
For warnet applications, it is currently a bit difficult to get phone lines, especially high-speed (
Unfortunately, business cannot wait and technological solutions must be sought.
Kabelvision and LinkNet have taken extraordinary steps by installing Internet into their cable TV infrastructure. Anyone can access the Internet 24 hours a day at approximately Rp 330,000 per month, which is a good deal for most.
Some warnet have the luxury of being able to access this cable TV infrastructure. Some months ago, LinkNet offered their cable for use if the warnet community could organize a certain number of warnet to be connected.
Cable TV seems to be the most preferred infrastructure for broadband network.
Unfortunately, most infrastructure is currently located in Jakarta, Surabaya and a couple other large cities.
High-speed wireless and satellite technology merging with PC- based technology seems to be the consensus adopted.
Several satellite providers, such as Melesat (infokom.net), PalapaNet (Satelindo) and TurboNet (Telkom), are adopting one-way high-speed satellite access at approximately 1.5Mbps, which is fairly similar to direct video broadcasting (DVB) via satellite.
These companies must compete with international competitors in providing DVB service as satellite footprints do not recognize national borders.
A landing right from the Ministry of Transportation is the only permit needed by international operators prior to providing service.
Connected to a US$100 receive-only parabolic antenna, a low cost DVB card on a PC can be used to capture the broadcasted 1.5Mbps data transmitted via the satellite mostly on C Band (4- 6GHz).
The DVB card will cost $200 to $300 each. There is major difficulty in adopting the DVB technology by getting a request up to the ISP.
Most services are using the ordinary phone channel (33.6Kbps) to transmit data to the Internet.
Turbonet is experimenting with the possible use of 9,600bps packet radio technology to transmit the data to the Internet.
Unfortunately, it is either too expensive or too slow on the transmit (uplink) channel.
To overcome the low-speed transmitting channel via an ordinary phone line, ISPs such as Pacific Satellite Nusantara (PesatNet) and Rainbow2u.com are offering two-way satellite links.
These ISPs are currently using a high bandwidth of 512Kbps to 1.5 Mbps in downlink traffic and 64Kbps to 384Kbps in uplink traffic.
Therefore, it is much faster than an ordinary phone line. Pesatnet is using either a single channel per carrier (SCPC) technology or an advanced version of it.
Meanwhile Rainbow2u.com is using DVB-based technology similar to the three ISPs mentioned earlier for its downlink channel on the L-band Telkom-1 satellite.
Rainbow2u.com is using 384Kbps SCPC transmission for its uplink channels via the satellite.
In upcoming years, these ISPs, one-way satellite as well as two-way satellite services, are planning to open their satellite transponder for more bandwidth (
In heavy traffic, such as at a warnet, that would be approximately $5,000 to $6,000 a month for full 1.5 Mbps access.
Some sort of bandwidth sharing scheme must be implemented to lower the access cost.
A community of 15 warnet to 30 warnet in several cities is working on sharing satellite bandwidth. A good example is the warnet cooperative in Bandung, headed by Kang Aday, located at awaba@egroups.com
Other cities, such as Yogyakarta (warnetyogya@egroups.com), Malang and Surabaya are the next warnet communities working on bandwidth sharing schemes, which in the end will build their own wireless network without having to rely on slow Telco cables.
Most warnet prefer to use Wireless LAN IEE 802.11 technology for sharing bandwidth.
This wireless LAN IEEE 802.11 equipment, normally based on PCMCIA cards, can run at least 2Mbps topping at 11Mbps while the latest version to be released next year will run at over 50Mbps, is much faster than the technology offered by Telco.
To lower the cost, most of us are using a PC-based route distance coverage of up to seven km to 10 km between warnet.
Conceptually, these warnet are building their own high-speed metropolitan area network (MAN).
An investment of approximately Rp 20 million per Microwave LAN 2Mbps to 11Mbps pair with an additional Rp 2 million a year for permission to use the frequency is basically the cost needed to run such a high-speed microwave system.
These warnet pay about Rp 1.5 million to Rp 2 million a month for getting these 2Mbps to 11Mbps dedicated lines.
It is much cheaper than renting an xDSL technology from Telco which costs Rp 10 million a month, or Rp 120 million a year, for a dedicated 2Mbps line.
Having the ability to build a low-cost high-speed MAN, Bandung is currently well-known among warnet communities as the center of Microwave LAN with over 50 warnet connected at 2Mbps to 11Mbps.
Not to mention the breakthrough by Pointer warnet in Bandung, namely as Indonesia's first and only mobile warnet in a VW Combi at 2Mbps.
Having 200 to 300 members at a warnet is normal. Therefore, if carefully implemented, these warnet may offer a flat rate of Rp 20,000 to Rp 40,000 a month to each person for full service Internet access, including the notorious Internet Telephony (VoIP).
Can you imagine? A flat rate of Rp 20,000 to Rp 40,000 monthly per person to access the Internet, including all long-distance charges via Internet telephony.
In a high-density cyber community, such as schools and universities, the access rate can be pinned down to a monthly Rp 5,000 per student.
Using IntraNet and warnet technology, several universities, including the University of Parahyangan Bandung, charge their students about Rp 5,000 a month each for unlimited Internet access.
At SMKN 1, a vocational school in Ciamis, students only pay Rp 1,000 a month each for e-mail access. Internet is affordable, especially at most educational institutions.
Based on today's situation, there are 150,000 telecommunications outlets (wartel), with a potential three million to six million e-mail users; over 1,000 warnet with a potential 200,000 users to 400,000 users; 1,300 higher education institutions with a potential three million to five million users; 4,000 vocational schools with a potential three million to four million users; and 10,000 high schools with five million to seven million potential users.
With the Internet becoming affordable for most Indonesians, a projection of 20 million Internet users is not a far off figure; however, they would be concentrated in more populated communities. The key to making this a reality is technological education.