Happy Ramadhan 2008 1429

Happy Ramadhan 2008 AC / 1429 AH for all Muslims around the world who perform thirty-day long fasting. The starting day of Ramadhan this year most probably on Monday 1st of September or Tuesday 2nd of September 2008.
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Export Import in Blogger Blogspot

Update February 21, 2009: All export/import and embedded below-post-comment are now out of beta. So, you can directly login to blogger.com, instead of draft.blogger.com, and do export /import or setting below-post comment. ***

Google’s Blogger / blogspot doesn’t want to be lagged far behind its competitor. It seems willing and trying hard to improve its performance as per the end-users feedback. The embedded-below-post comment inbox is now on the trial–not officially released yet, though you’re encouraged to try it.
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Blogger Indonesia of the Week (85): Hendro Darsono

I wrote somewhere about English teaching in Indonesia thus:

Despite English language teaching starts from the junior high school (Class VII) in Indonesia educational system, and is supposed to be the second language after Bahasa Indonesia, instead of Dutch, the students are hardly conversant to this language unless they join a special Englsih course or having experience to study or stay abroad. The methodology of teaching and the quality of English teachers are probably two main reasons if we want to fingerpoint the major culprit.

Americans Racists if Obama Loses

If Barack Obama loses in the coming election meaning white Americans are predominantly racists. That’s what Jacob Weisberg of Slate brilliantly concluded:

…the reason Obama isn’t ahead right now is that he trails badly among one group, older white voters. He does so for a simple reason: the color of his skin. … Much evidence points to racial prejudice as a factor that could be large enough to cost Obama the election. That warning is written all over last month’s CBS/New York Times poll, which is worth examining in detail if you want a quick grasp of white America’s curious sense of racial grievance.

Forbes’ World Richest Royals

The royals, kings and queen, in this 21st century may not enjoy the luxury of unreserved admiration, adulation and loyalty from their subjects like it used to be not so long ago. But certainly they still enjoy the luxury of “unlimited” wealth to enjoy the extravagant lives money can buy. In its 20th August edition, Forbes magazine published the list of richest existing royals, not the richest ordinary people, two of whom are coming from South East Asian countries, Thailand and Brunei. Surprisingly, King Bumiphol of Thailand got the “gold medal.” Please watch carefully the list below, who knows you are among those top list kings and queens.
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An Indonesian Among 153 Killed in Spain Plane Crash

A Spanish airliner bound for the Canary Islands at the height of the vacation season crashed, burned and broke into pieces Wednesday while trying to take off from Madrid, killing 153 people on board, officials said. There were only 19 survivors of the mid-afternoon crash, Development Minister Magdalena Alvarez said.[....]

An Indonesian named NGUNI TOKA RONDONUWU (written RONDONUWU/NGUNI TOKA in the list below) was among those who were killed in Spain worst crash since 1983.
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Indonesia Richest Government officials 2008

State officials

Below is the list of the names of Indonesia’s 12 richest state officials and how much money they have.

Name	Title	Wealth
Aburizal Bakrie	Indonesian Coordinating Minister for People’s Welfare	$1.05 billion
Hamengkubuwono X	Sultan of Yogyakarta	$140 million
Fadel Muhammad	Governor of Gorontalo	$16, 638, 186
Fahmi Idris	Indonesian Minister of Industry	$9, 423, 488
Zaulkifli Nurdin	Governor of Jambi	$6, 543, 216
Bun Bunan EJ Hutapea	Deputy Governor of Bank of Indonesia	$5, 927, 470
Fauzi Bowo	Governor of Jakarta	$4, 410, 803
Meutia F. Hatta	Indonesian State Minister for Women’s Empowerment	$4, 271, 758
Ginandjar Kartasasminata	Indonesian Chairman of Regional Parliament	$3, 246, 939
Budiarsa S.	Member of Indonesian House of Representatives	$2, 147, 909
Ratu Atut Chosiyah	Governor Banten	$1, 978, 968

Source: Wikipedia.com

The Richest Indonesians 2008

2008 Indonesia’s Billionaires

Rank	Name	Net worth (US Dollars)	Age
1	Aburizal Bakrie & family	9.2 Billion	61
2	Robert Budi Hartono & family	6.8 Billion	67
3	Eka Tjipta Widjaja & family	3.8 Billion	85
4	Sudono Salim & family	3.04 Billion	93
5	Putra Sampoerna & family	2.42 Billion	60
6	Rachman Halim & family	2 Billion	61
7	Sukanto Tanoto & family	1.43 Billion	58
8	Eddie William Katuari	1.21 Billion	57
9	Prajogo Pangestu	1.2 Billion	57
10	Murdaya poo & family	1.1 Biliion	67
11	Hary taniesoedibjo & family	1.1 Billion	43
12	Martua Sitorus	1.1 Billion	48
13	Arifin & Hilmi Panigoro	1.05 Billion	63/53
14	Hashim Djojohadikusumo	1.05 Billion	54
15	Peter Sondakh	1 Billion	56

Source: Globe Asia (2008).

AdSense for Feeds has Begun

The news that many bloggers or AdSense publishers to be precise are waiting for has arrived: now you can put AdSense in your feeds. What the system? Does AdSense apply PPC type of ads?

Our salesforce will sell cost-per-impression (CPM) ads directly to the largest advertisers, while the rest of your inventory will be filled with contextually targeted cost-per-click (CPC) and CPM ads.

Google faces defamation lawsuit in India

Bloggers who were being detained for their criticism to some individuals in the establishment in undemocratic countries such as in China and Egypt are common phenomena. But it’s really a big news when a blogger posting makes someone angry in a democratic country. We in Indonesia used to face such experience when an Indonesian blogger investigated by police for allegedly “insulting” President Yudhoyono. Similar case seems happening now in India, the largest democratic country in the world, in which Google who owns Blogger.com are forced to disclose the identity of a particular blogger and take down his blog.
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