Yogyakarta’s Perspective on Media and Locality
Yogyakarta is located in the heart of Java Island and is believed as the origin of Javanese. This city is famous for its cultural history and its role as a city of education and city of tourism. Yogyakarta is also well known for its multicultural communities and its openness to diversity. Divided into five regions: City of Yogyakarta, Sleman, Bantul, Gunungkidul, and Kulonprogo, the implication of multiculturalism and diversity in Yogyakarta in terms of gender, media, and social policies is unquestionable. This leads to certain perspective, which highlights the locality of Yogyakarta’s media.
To get better understanding of Yogyakarta’s media and locality, we need to explore the characteristic of local media in terms of media production, media distribution and media consumption. Media in Yogyakarta range from printed and conventional media to interactive and social media. As a culturally rich city, Yogyakarta has some media, which concern on Javanese culture. Even some of them are written or broadcasted in Javanese, such as Djaka Lodang, Jogja TV and JIZ FM.
In terms of new media, Facebook remains as the most popular social media in Indonesia with 70 million active users (Meryana, 2014), which “put it a close third behind India and the U.S” (Abud, 2012). There are two provinces in Indonesia that “stand-out” in terms of social media users’ number. Jakarta, the capital city of Indonesia is the highest one with 42,8% and Yogyakarta special province placed second with 41,5% (Penetrasi internet, 21 August 2014). Famous social media accounts in Yogyakarta include @infojogja @JogjaUpdate @Jogja24jam and https://www.facebook.com/jogya.