Throughout 2014 the Rumah Bahasa story has provided an interesting counterpoint to the story of TBI. Before a brave teacher came forward and exposed the illegal shenanigans at Rumah Bahasa, this blog had focused exclusively on TBI (The British Institute), a school with its own sorry history of illegal and immoral behavior, all of it…
As we have long suggested. the TEFL industry is evolving very rapidly in Jakarta and laggards like TBI who are stuck in the 1990s are going to be left rapidly behind. TBI’s ‘no frills’ approach to TEFL worked well enough when Indonesia was an immature market but it is now looking incredibly dated and low-end.…
Have you ever complained online about the service you received from a business? Have you ever liked a comment on Facebook which was critical of a politician or other public figure? Have you ever signed an online petition that might have offended the ‘dignity’ of a powerful person or their business interests? If you said yes to…
Free speech in Indonesia is seriously threatened by the Electronic Information and Transmissions Law (2008), often known simply as the ITE Law, which makes it a criminal offense to “defame” people. Inevitably, this law has become a tool of oppression of the ruling elite. Cases brought under this law typically involve a powerful and wealthy…
One of the most salient features of TBI’s legal letter to WordPress was the way that they fell into their favorite role when dealing with 3rd parties. As always, they start playing the victim and alleging that the person telling the truth about them is a vicious bully. Look at the legal document they sent…
Over the past few weeks there have been occasional news reports about a clash between Indomaret (a local chain of mini-mart) and the administration of Banyumas, a regency in Central Java. While the fate of 19 condemned Indomaret stores in Banyumas might not appear to be of great interest in and of itself, the case…
The screenshot above is taken from the TBI website. It has the bland, same-old-same-old look that one associates with everything they do: a splash of maroon, a few stale boasts about former glories and, last of all, a string of dull bullet points. You’ve seen the same tired format every time they’ve produced anything since…
This week we brought you the story of how the first ever “TBI” online learning course, “Islands”, was in fact copyrighted to Pearson-Longman, the respected British publisher who is also the owner of Wall Street English. We also revealed that TBI, with typical duplicity, has been claiming in their “Islands” blurb that they “have been…
Ashley Platts directly intervened at TBI Kelapa Gading just as he did at TBI Bogor, arguing that expat managers were too expensive and that I ought to be replaced by an Indonesian. (By late 2011 I was the last expat franchise school manager in the entire company. According to Platts, it was such an outrage…
On Monday we showed how by May Dave’s ESL Cafe user “Sun Shan” had become disillusioned with TBI, complaining of its pretentiousness, its typo-ridden letters and its poor diligence in corresponding with people on the CELTA course. According to this CELTA candidate, all other candidates for the TBI CELTA course had complained of TBI’s errors…
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