OCT 27 DECLARED NATIONAL BLOGGERS DAY IN INDONESIA BY MOHD NASIR YUSOFF

JAKARTA, Nov 22 (Bernama) -- In line with its aim to bring its people up to
speed in the digital age, Indonesia has declared Oct 27 as National Bloggers
Day, the republic's Information and Communications Ministry announced in
conjunction with the Bloggers Carnival 2008 here Saturday.

The ministry's director-general for applications, Cahyana Ahmadijaya said
blogs in Indonesia were mushrooming not only for fun (blogfun) but also for
business (blogpreneurs) and that the trend would continue exponentially in
future.

Indonesia's Culture and Tourism Ministry also wanted bloggers help promote
tourism to the country.

"This carnival provides and excellent networking opportunity to promote
tourism effectively," said its minister Jero Wacik. The text of his speech was
read out by the ministry's director-general for tourism destinations
development, Firmansyah Rahim.

Meanwhile, Research and Technology Minister Kusmayanto Kadiman assured
bloggers that government would not restrict their freedom but they must not
flout the republic's laws.

Some 1,000 bloggers turned up for the carnival including Jeff Ooi of
Malaysia , who is also the Member of Parliament for Jelutong in northern
Penang-state, and Singapore's Mr Brown.

-- BERNAMA