Jakarta. “Don’t forget to send me postcards.”

Not so long ago we often heard those words from our friends and families whenever we would go traveling. At that time, sending postcards to our loved ones was a gesture which showed we remembered them during our travels and would like to share with them the wonderful moments we were experiencing in new cities.

And yet today, those words are rarely, if ever, heard again.

In this digital era, sharing pics, sounds and even videos across the world would take only seconds on the internet. Only a few still find it necessary to go hunting for beautiful postcards, scribble sweet nothings on the back, drop by the post office and send them to loved ones at home.

But the romanticism of sending postcards is not quite lost with graphic designer and technopreneur, Punyo Sakharet.

“Every time I go traveling, I’ll be sending postcards to all my friends,” said Sakharet.

“[The postcard rack] gives you like the whole idea of what you can expect to discover [at the destination],” he said.

Sakharet, who was born in the Philippines, graduated from the London College of Printing in London with a degree in graphic and media design. He then worked in various digital agencies in London, Dubai, Bangkok and Hong Kong.

A couple of years ago, Sakharet came up with the idea of creating his own “digital postcard rack.”

With his former work colleague, Ruth Naderer, he developed a social media platform that allows users to create their own digital postcards from their travels and share them to their friends and families by email, as well as on their other social media platforms, such as Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Google+ and Pinterest.

The social media platform “Postcard & Tag” was recently launched in the Mega Kuningan, Jakarta.

“There’s no better way to share insights into a destination than through imagery,” said the technopreneur.

“Our aim is to establish a vibrant and visual travel community completely dedicated to uncovering the most up-to-date and unique finds, whether it’s a trendy new hotel, up-and-coming restaurant, or a largely unexplored cultural experience,” Sakharet continued.

Sakharet and Naderer chose Indonesia for the global launch of their platform as they consider Indonesia the world’s social media capital.

“Indonesia has one of the largest populations in the world,” said Ruth Naderer. “And it’s also the social media capital of the world with the second largest Facebook users and the fourth largest Twitter users.”

According to the co-founder, there are currently more than 300 million mobile devices in Indonesia, and most of them are used to access the Internet.

“The archipelago has more than 17,000 islands to travel to,” said Naderer. “And Indonesia has a target of 20 million visitors by 2019. We want to share with the rest of the world how much beauty and diversity [Indonesia] has to offer.”

After entering personal details to create an account with postcardandtag.com users are asked about their favourite holiday destinations, favourite cuisines, as well as hobbies and interests.

After completing the profile, it is easy to start uploading photos and begin creating postcards.

“Our postcards are unique,” said the technopreneur. “Each one is made of a photo, description, budget and maps.”

By uploading digital postcards to the website, users can notify their social circles of their destinations, as well as share interesting details.

Visitors to the website can also gain information of the new places they are planning to visit by searching cities or countries on the website.

The visitors can then browse all the pictures available of the city or country, click on each of them and gain insight from other travelers.

“Postcard & Tag is your awesome social travel directory,” said Sakharet. “It’s a place to discover, plan and share online your travel experiences.”

Currently, there are more than 750 registered users on the website and most of them are Indonesians.

“We now have 13,000 postcards covering all the top cities in the world,” said Sakharet. “And we already have 1,500 postcards on Indonesia alone and [the collection] is still growing.”

The more postcards you upload to the website, the more followers to be gained and the more “stamps” to be collected.

Particularly active users, who often upload photographs of their city, can be appointed “locals.”

“Locals are those who love their cities,” said Sakharet. “Locals are here to guide you with their insider’s knowledge of their cities.”

Postcard & Tag is currently working with the local Ministry of Tourism in supporting the Wonderful Indonesia campaign.

“If someone uploads a postcard [of a destination in Indonesia] and tags it ‘WonderfulIndonesia,’ it will be featured on the homepage of the website,” said the technopreneur.

The Peak

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Source: The Jakarta Globe