Aakash! The World's Cheapest Tablet

On Wednesday October 5^th India launched the world’s cheapest tablet, the Aakash.  The government will be giving away 100,000 tablets for free to students and the first 500 given to the launch attendees.  Once it goes on sale students will receive a subsidized price of $35 and the rest of India will pay only $60.

The new device will have 2 USB ports, support video conferencing and have a three-hour battery life.  The first 500 testers had mix responses to the device; with some saying it was slow.  Most people would agree that the speed of the device will not affect their decision to purchase.  Most will be going from no technology to the Aakash so they feel it’s already an improvement.

Suneet Singh, DataWind CEO, has discussed that in future versions of the tablet they would include a mobile phone connection which will make it even more useful in rural areas.  When this is implemented people in rural India will now have access to more of the world than ever before.

StanaCard wants to help celebrate this fantastic jump in technology for India, so we have lowered our rates.  Now you can call India for 1.89 cents per minute.  That means that $5 gives you 265 minutes.  So take advantage of our no fees policy and great voice quality, Sign up today!

Young Expats Bring Their Partying Ways to the East

When many people think of expats to Eastern countries such as India, China, or Japan, they often think of older, upper-management business people. Because of the struggling economy in countries like the USA , UK, Italy, Spain, Greece and many others in the Western world, the average expat to the East is becoming quite different than most people think.

A recent article in The Times of India covered this transformation of the typical expat from an older, upper-management family man to a young, single, lower- or middle-management employee. Since jobs are becoming more and more non-existent for the recent graduate in the US and many countries across Europe, young workers are taking their degrees and heading to cities like Mumbai, where the economy is booming and there are a plethora of jobs. Unlike the expat of the past, these workers aren’t working for lucrative salaries with unbelievable benefits. Instead, they are taking regular salaries, often comparable with the locally born employees.

So what’s the benefit of traveling thousands of miles to a country with a completely foreign culture to you? Well, according to The Times of India, one thing that young expats love the most is the social life. Local clubs are finding it easier than ever to attract customers, as word of a deal or party can get out to hundreds of customers in a matter of minutes through the social networking websites that most of the young expats belong to. Once Facebook group administrator claimed that in Mumbai, about 4,000 expats are invited to parties at least once a month. Most expats say that their social life is far more active than it would be at home, because the foreign communities form social groups and seek entertainment at the local clubs quite often.

Bars and stores are even beginning to cater to these expats by offering local favorites such as home-country beers and foods. One grocery chain in India even offers Butterball turkeys for young American’s craving the turkey they grew up on around the holidays. With the thriving social life and availability of jobs, it’s not hard to see why young people are willing to travel across the world for work, especially with the lack of jobs in so many Western countries.

Plus, with StanaCard it is cheap and easy to stay in touch with family and friends back home when living abroad. You can use our service from one of our many countries with access numbers, or you can call to and from anywhere in the world with our SIP service. And why not make money by taking advantage of our referral bonus by telling friends in your international community about our service?

India's Traveling Cinemas In Danger of Going Under

When American’s think of movies, our minds automatically go to Hollywood, and the American film industry. Surprisingly to many though, is the fact that India is actually the largest producer of film in the world each year, with its “Bollywood” productions leading the way in film output in the country. In America, we tend to take many things for granted; one of these things being the easy access to movie theaters across the country. In the U.S., most people don’t have to travel far to get to their local cinema, and even most rural towns have some type of movie theater nearby.
In India, this is not the case at all. Though India puts out the most films out of any county, the amount of movie theaters per capita is much smaller than that in the U.S. This has opened the market for touring cinemas or “talkies”, which are cinemas that travel around to rural Indian towns, allowing people to see the biggest movies of the year.

Credit: http://photoblog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2011/02/17/6072197
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These tent talkies, or “tambu” as they are referred to in India, have been thriving for decades, but have recently come upon some hard times. As the rural towns began to get a hold of cable TV and pirated DVD’s, the attendance to the annual talkies has been severely lacking. The owner of one company, called Anup Talkies, explains that “People used to like touring cinemas a lot, but after these new modes of entertainment only about 10 percent of the people come here to watch films.”

Many of the companies have already shut down – out of about 50 that used to come to the Satara district just 10 years ago, only about seven or eight are still remaining. The talkies are important because they provide entertainment to women who rarely are able to leave the house, and they showcase not only the blockbusters, but also regional, local-language films that would otherwise not be distributed.

Many people would have to travel distances upwards of 50 miles just to see a movie without the traveling talkies, making it virtually impossible to see any films in theaters. Many people have started even more mobile cinemas, such as one farmer who shows films in an old truck which he pulls by tractor.

For any of you with friends or family in India , why not give them a call to chat about the latest films or to see if they have seen any traveling talkies lately? With StanaCard, you don’t always need an important reason to call home, as we are currently giving our customers who call India up to 40% free credit on each re-charge!

India Enables Nationwide Mobile Number Portability

Today in India, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh launched nationwide Mobile Number Portability (MNP) by making the service’s inaugural call from a ported number to Shri Kapil Sibal, India’s Communications and IT Minister. Mobile Number Portability refers to the service that allows users to switch mobile service providers while being able to keep their cell phone number.
To start, the service will only cost users 19 (about 42 cents USD), and Sibal has stated his intention for the price to drop even further. Also, as the service is still very new, it will take 7 days for the number to be switched to a new provider, but Sibal believes that the transfer time will also shrink drastically once all the service gets up-and-running.

In a press conference earlier today, Sibal stated, “It is a historic moment, we have demonstrated the customer is king.” This service was first introduced in the Indian state of Haryana in November, 2010, and since then mobile providers such as Idea Cellular and Vodafone had begun advertising campaigns to prepare for the upcoming MNP program.

CEO of Shyam TeleServices Vsevolod Rozanov stated that he believes this service will also lead to a decrease in tariffs in the future, explaining, “I think tariffs will go down further, especially, if we speak about the post-paid customer base that is where we are likely to see the average revenue per user (ARPU) going down.”

Switching services is now simpler than ever, as you can most of it right on your cell phone. To switch users using the MNP service, you just have to type PORT, leave a space, type your mobile number and text it to 1900. You will get a message back from “1901” with a code and a date. After this, you submit proof of identity and the code to the new service provider that you want by the date that you received in the text. Within a week, your number will be switched to the new provider automatically as long as you have no outstanding bills with your old provider.

This is a good month for Indian telecommunications, as here at StanaCard we are currently running a promotion where frequent callers to India can save up to 40% on their calls. Of course, instead of saving 40% on your calls, you can always just make calls for FREE by referring a friend. So be sure to give your family and friends back in India a call and tell them about the new MNP service, and don’t forget to use StanaCard when you do!