The fall of Suharto’s repressive era in 1998 sparked significant growth of online media industries and users, also the progress in advancing protection for the rights to freedom of expression and information. The progress of freedom of speech in the media is an enormously important element in the development of democracy. Nowadays, Indonesia is a country with one of the largest online populations in the world. Indonesia has been at the forefront of debates on information and communication technology (ICT) regionally and internationally (Article 19, 2012). The internet as a new form of the digital media has the possibility to promote greater public participation. These ideas are based on the characteristic of new media technologies more generally. The characteristics of new media promote more free and open communication rather than the traditional mass communication media, therefore the internet opens up more opportunities for freedom of speech than traditional media (such as newspapers, magazines, radio and television).
