JP/J. Adiguna
I love this kind of stuff, and wish these kinds of initiatives got better support from government, NGOs and companies:
Harun checks the blood pressure and weight of a customer in a park in Menteng, Central Jakarta, on Wednesday. He has offered the mobile service for the past 10 years, charging Rp 5,000 (about 60 US cents) per checkup.
We found dozens of these kinds of businesses in a pretty small patch of south Jakarta, and there are probably hundreds more, from guys renting out their cellphones to doing tailored alterations to clothes. Cellphones have improved their business a lot, but imaginative use of technology could help them a lot more, I suspect. But most of these guys fly under the radar of those who might be able to offer support and help.
i’m always really wary when govts and higher ups extoll the virtues of tech as some kind of panacea — look at schools in the US, PCs in every classroom has (i suspect) lowered standards…
what i like about the examples you gave of tech use in jkt is that it’s a grass roots thing, which comes about because the using mobiles for their business is a no-brainer.
i wonder what it’d take for other info technologies to become no brainers?