Jakarta Globe asked for my views on the banning of Vimeo in Indonesia which started on Sunday, May 11 2014. Globe reporter Benjamin Soloway wanted to know what the effects might be to tech and innovation in this country, whether it would lead to other actions of the same magnitude, and what is going on with the inconsistency in its implementation. The following is my response.

Hi Benjamin, I actually wrote a piece about this a couple of days ago and some of my thoughts are already in that article, feel free to quote it.

The reasoning behind the decision to ban Vimeo, which isn’t the first time, is a slippery slope that I hope is going to come to a halt once his term as minister expires and a new, more progressive, more technologically sensitive government is installed.

The fact that a small range of nudity and sexually suggestive videos exist on a public service that does not actually promote such themes should not form the basis of a blanket censorship that involves the banning of the entire service.

It’s entirely possible that the very logic and reason that drove this decision will be used to block other services such as Twitter, YouTube, Tumblr, Facebook, Instagram, or even Google. You can easily discover porn and nudity on any of those services if you know the terms. These are content platforms for the public to use and the public will use them in any way they like.

Banning Vimeo entirely is affecting people whose livelihoods depend on having access to the service such as advertising professionals, students, educators, journalists, filmmakers, animators, and so on. We’ve seen agencies complain that their portfolios are now inaccessible. There’s a video going around of an Al Jazeera cameraman complaining that he cannot complete his task because the instructions were posted on Vimeo.

This decision to ban Vimeo entirely is akin to banning DVD players because there’s porn on DVD.

If Tifatul Sembiring or someone like him maintains the position as the highest authority on technology regulations in this country we are facing a brick wall with regards to tech progress and innovation

Back in 2008 when current education minister Mumammad Nuh was the communications minister he moved to ban YouTube because it had insisted on not removing Fitna, a movie that was deemed as offensive to Muslims.

In 2010 Sembiring threatened to shut down access to BlackBerry services because it’s possible to access porn using the device. How much more absurd can you get?

In 2012 he asked what would people do with a 4Mbps internet connection 

He asked a similar question in January of this year 

The tone that he used to ask the questions seemed so mocking and condescending that it was a shock that someone of his position would even pose them to begin with.

Back to the Vimeo situation, the inconsistency within the situation, the fact that APJII wasn’t included in the mailer, that not all ISPs and carriers received the instructions at the same time, that the implementation even within Telkom’s own network is extremely inconsistent speaks volumes of the quality of the organization and personnel.

The fact that a Kominfo director general was contradicted by the ministry’s newly appointed spokesperson within 24 hours says a lot about the coordination within the ministry.

I can only hope that the next government has no such people holding key positions.

Sorry it’s taken a while to form my reply, I’m trying hard to be civil. The very fact that the last two communications ministers have enraged me with their decisions makes it very difficult not to get emotional.

It’s almost like they have no interest in catching up with the best in the world as quickly as they can with regards to technological progress. When South Korea is already rolling out Advanced LTE and developing 5G wireless connection, we only just completed settling the 3G band allocations.