Looking Out Indonesian Books
When visiting book stores in Jakarta, I recall the first impression to think why the hell Indonesian book title are such pathetic?!
One of favorite titles on computer book are “Panduan Lengkap“ or Complete Guide for particular subject. It is great having complete guide for the subject, and it usual. But when you open the book, and trying to figuring out several detailed topics, the books lost many of them. And, when you are mastering a particular topic, you’ll easily give a damn to the author, stating the book is complete. It’s far from being complete! And, looking how thick the pages, I look into Photoshop Complete Guide (Indonesian authoring it), it only 336, compare it to Photoshop Classroom from Adobe, it count 496 pages, and it’s just a book for beginner (they do not called it complete guide at all)! Why the hell Indonesian author genuinely said complete guide?!
Let’s look another kind of titles, oh great, you’ll have to find a lot of books about little or tiny subject, like Yahoo! Messenger, Google Gadget and Yahoo Widget, 3G Internet Guide, and so on. Wow, they just a little topics. Why the hell they wrote it for a book? The book usually goes 100+ pages. If they intend to help people, just create a website and bring Indonesian manual. Write book for sophisticated topic. That’ll help to people. And wonder how the publisher get the return on investment on such topic which fastly changing. But, I also wonder, why the hell such titles are published, and it became usual. Are Indonesian people lazy to read (english) manual? Those apps usually have great manual. Why they do not read it first?
That are my first impression of Indonesian book for computer subject. Great and ambitious titles, shallow explanation, bad research, for programming book—lot of code example seem badly written (no technical reviewer?), much written for application (manual/documentation) not the technology itself, and thin book—and so it cheap (yeah thick books [and so it expensive] doesn’t mean always a good book, but that make sense that the writer do their job). And, when you try to find speciality topic (try to find XHTML/CSS and web standard on web design and web development category), it would be harder to find Indonesian writer on paper. What if we going more to another topic, are they going to be same pattern?
Several times ago, when I recall to asked myself, why I loved to read English language book than waiting for Indonesian author written for the particular subject. I think I got the answer today.
shuck, 16/04/08 10:27 PM:
Man, your english shucks hard! That explains everything, I guess.
Arif Widianto, 17/04/08 12:47 AM:
Haha, I forget to add that too as a reason/result :-)
Hardjono, 17/04/08 01:09 AM:
I also had difficulty finding Indonesian classics from the likes of Mochtar Lubis, NH Dini and Chairil Anwar. Even at Gramedia. I guess its more profitable for bookshops to seel other “trinkets” instead of books :)
Salam kenal.
[TH]
ak, 17/04/08 07:13 AM:
I very much agree. Sorry to the authors, but browsing Gramedia for computer books are a waste of time these days.
I am afraid I have to say the same as with other books in Indonesia. The subjects are often sensationalist in nature. Now I only visit Kinokunia and Periplus (well since PS is near) for Books. Their collection (albeit most are imported) are much much better.
devie, 17/04/08 09:15 AM:
nyari buku Indonesia cuman sebatas buku2 non-teknik. kalo dah soal teknik mending download PDF atau buka2 manual. :D
dktrooper, 17/04/08 10:10 AM:
Sorry oot bro, if you did not hear about job opportunity at Google yet, you better check this out http://www.stuff.web.id/2008/04/google-is-hiring.html
Google looking for a rapid prototyper too which, I believe, would interest you as well ;)
Noka, 17/04/08 02:51 PM:
ehm…too many ‘hell’ in this article. at least that’s a sign that computer’s technology is expanding and more accessible to Indonesian. it’s not mature yet, it takes time I guess and I think we need smart people like you to write better and sellable books for Indonesian. how about that?
Sigit Adinugroho, 19/04/08 03:07 PM:
When you want something out of a book and you can’t find it, you should write the book!
Arif Widianto, 21/04/08 10:02 PM:
Sorry for my frustation. Those hell and my bad writing style (I hoped on this only post) completely postraying the situation we may have.
It is ironic that the “crowd” of books and its passionate lovers are seems increasing year after year, by knowing how much new titles shown on book stores rack. But, it is sad that the quality of it, sorry if I am being too generalistics, like we had in film, it was probably hard to face.
Writing a book? Oh man, please introduce me to some publishers, may be we can chat and talk about new opportunities, hahaha. Can I? That’s a question.
Another thing, I am either (do not know which is correct) too lazy or too stupid whatever in self management and knowledge to do such things, even in maintaining this blog is felt like crazy! Thanks anyway.