My friend show me a picture. The picture itself, a funny cartoon character, is not important (I like cartoons though). It is the texts that interest me. It says:
Remember the five simple rules to be happy:
- Free your heart from hatred
- Free your mind from worries
- Live simply
- Give more
- Expect less
This is a good reminder, indeed. Be happy, everyone. Give me a big smile :)
After lunch, I met with some people to do field work. Suddenly the cellphone of one of the worker beeping. There was an incoming short message. Guess what? It was a (unsolicited) message which the sender stated as “Presiden RI”, the President of the Republic of Indonesia. The message says
Stop penyalahgunaan dan kejahatan Narkoba sekarang. Mari kita selamatkan dan bangun bangsa kita, menjadi bangsa yang sehat, cerdas, dan maju.Stop drug’s misuse and crime now. Let’s save and build our country to become a healthty(?), smart(?), and advance(?) nation (thanks to Nana for forwarding that message to me; sorry for the rough translation; and for a screenshot of the message, you can see on Jay’s posting). It is true that a couple of days earlier, the President has announced the presidential number for short messaging so that people can send one directly to the President, or at least someone close enough to him. Questions: Are these messages that people receiving real? Are there no other more important messages than drug problem? And I wonder how much profit PT.Telkom made just by the President sending short messages. And can it be considered SMS spamming? No offense Mr. President, but sending short messages to other people randomly and unsolicitedly is not quite polite (except in case of emergency or national security?). So people, what will you do if you are the one receiving it? I, myself, maybe saving it to my memory since this may be a rare moment when the President sending me message. Thank you, Mr. President, but not too often please.
UPDATE: Well, it seems that it is really the presidential short message (should we call it, SMS One?) as you can read it in Kompas Cyber Media. And I’ve just chat with my friend. I get a new perspective from this case. That this (or maybe other things too) can be considered special case. Although by definition what the President doing may be categorized as spamming, but we must considered what most people feel upon receiving such message. Don’t you think most of the people will be happy receiving message from “Presiden RI”? What the President and his team need is a “little” thing that fair for ALL the receivers. Option. Whether we want it or not, should be the receivers choice, not the sender. That “little” thing would have made so much difference. But spam or no spam, I will stand by my word above. IF I receive such message, I will keep it. Happily, Mr. President, but not too often please :)
