The Internet in Asia

Singapore's Inteligent Nation 2015 plan

Intelligent Nation 2015 is the Singapore government's 10 year infocomm development master plan aimed at transforming Singapore into a totally wireless, intelligent, economically enriching and competitive nation for Singaporeans from all walks of life. Broadband penetration is expected to increase to 90 % by then to help meet these objectives.  It also aims to  create 80,000 new jobs and double the infocomm industry's contribution to Gross Domestic Product to $26 billion, tripling the country's export  revenue to SGD 60 billion.

Also part of the transformation will be building the Next Generation National Infocomm Infrastructure for a high-speed wired network of up to 1 Gigabit per second islandwide.
33 local and international companies have indicated their interest in the contract to be awarded next year and which will be rolled out by 2012.

Bullies post videos online

Six student bullies were remanded by Malaysian police after they posted a video of them beating up their school mate on-line. The attack received worldwide attention when the footage – purportedly showing the entire incident, which lasted four minutes – was uploaded onto an Internet site and received thousands of hits. The boys are aged between 13 and 15. Although police have not yet determined the motive behind the attack, they have not ruled out the possibility that the bullies were angered when the victim refused to join a secret society.  The bullies have been expelled from school and will be released on bail to their parents.

Such occurrences are becoming more frequent now. A similar incident occur ed in Singapore a few weeks ago, and received the same amount of coverage as people from both countries are asking why are such incidents are so common today?

Malaysian police nab net-gambling ring

Gambling may be banned in Muslim-Malaysia, but this small obstacle has never stopped punters and bookies from doing so. Analyst estimate that more than RM 5 billion exchange hands through illegal betting on the English Premier League and other games annually. The police have stepped up operations during this World Cup season and as a result nabbed 18 illegal bookies operating an on-line gambling operation out of a pig sty. Police suspect that they could have raked in over RM 30 million during the World Cup season so far.

Oman to start e-gov network

As part of the government's plans to realize the Digital Oman initiative and e-governance, senior Omani officials have signed an agreement to set up and implement the Unified e-Government Network. If the project takes of, it will allow electronic transactions to occur between departments. It is expected that the project will take about 18 months to be up and running.

Blogging in the gulf

Blogs are giving those in the Middle East a new way to express themselves, thereby creating a new breed of on-line activists who choose to blog on politics to the social situation there.  According to Haitham Sabbah, a Bahrain-based blogger and Middle East editor for Global Voices, a program launched last year by the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard Law School, there are now about 1,000 Gulf Arab bloggers-- up five times from 2004.

Saudi Arabia has one of the highest Internet penetration rates in the area, and is also home to  the Gulf's biggest blogging community with about 300 bloggers, more than half of them women according to Omran.  Many women here also regularly post to their blogs on topics such as the social expectations of women there. As a result, some blogs such as Saudi Eve have been blocked by the government for immoral content.

Blogger investigated under Sedition Act in Singapore

Singaporean blogger Char was brought in for questioning after under the Sedition Act publishing pictures on his blog that were thought to depict Jesus Christ in an offensive manner after finding the cartoons on-line in January. The cartoon depicted Jesus as a zombie biting a boy's head in January.  One month after first posting this cartoon on-line, he received complaints from readers but instead of removing it, he chose to irk the reader further by posting other similar cartoons.

He was called in for questioning in March after police received complaints. After being brought in for questioning, Char announced it via email to around 300 Singaporeans himself, and then removed the cartoon from his blog. When contacted by the press, he said that he made an unwise decision, and he did not think that anyone would lodge a police complaint. He also  requested to keep his identity secret as he is afraid of losing his job that he would like to keep before he enters a local university in August.

On a slightly different note, Singaporean Station Inspector Mohamed Zulnizan Mohamed Arsis  received an award for tracking down the blogger who posted racist remarks against Malays in October last year. The blogger was sentenced to a two-year probation sentence, to go for counselling, to get a psychological evaluation and perform 180 hours of community service at a Malay voluntary welfare organisation under a volunteer Malay probation officer.

World Cup fever goes digital

World Cup fever has definitely hit us -- over the past  12 years, more and more people are turning to the Internet to search for the latest news related to the game. Official World Cup websites were cited as the most likely destinations in Singapore (67%), Malaysia (71%), Thailand (46%) and Australia (57%), but Chinese fans are most likely to head to other sport websites (84%). Many have also turned to their mobile phones to get the latest, which thanks to the help of may mobile operators is something that they can now have access to on the go.

Cambodia bans 3G services to stop porn

Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen has urged the country's Ministry of Communication to ban the use of 'certain mobile phones', allegedly after his wife and some of her friends received pornographic material over their mobile phones. Two reasons were cited - firstly, to preserve the morality of Cambodians and secondly because its too technologically advanced for them.  It is unknown whether this suggestion will turn to law, but it is highly likely as his legislation are often unchallenged.  Currently, out of Cambodia's population of 13 million, it is estimated that around 10% have mobile access. CamGSM, one of the larger mobile phone operators in Cambodia is already operating a 3G network.

Industry observers have question if it was necessary to implement such drastic measure, or whether the same effect could have been achieved by allowing mobile users to practice individual discretion or to use networking technology to filter pornographic material on their networks.  Other countries have also tried to regulate material made available through this and other new media services. For example. Singapore that's known for its strict censorship laws has implemented "a light-touch regulatory framework" through its Class License scheme that specifies minimum standards for content delivered over the Internet and other new media services such as 3G. 

World Cup increases online sales revenue

Online consumption of sports information has increased significantly in India over the past 4 years. The 2006 World Cup in Germany has contributed to a further 15% increase in online ad revenues.  Indian Yahoo! Sales Director expects  an estimated 32 million unique users to consume over 4 billion pages of the 2006 official FIFA world cup site.  Yahoo! hosts the official World Cup site.

T-gov to be introduced in South Korea soon

South Korea long touted as one of the most technologically advanced nations in the world is set to introduce T-gov, which will enable two-way communication  through television sets -- putting a twist on e-gov buzz word.  They hope that by introducing this system, to less educated, affluent and older generation will also be able to benefit from the "e-government system" making "ubiquitous government"   much more possible. For example, this system would make it possible for an ailing old man to call emergency services by just pressing a red emergency button on his television remote controller.

On May 6, the Ministry of Government Administration and Home Affairs gave a preview of the future of the new method of government services with some 200 people from provincial offices nationwide. The government is expected to launch its test site in Kangnam-gu in southern Seoul, the area considered to have the most developed information network. by the end of the year.