
Vahan (YC S19) is helping low-skilled workers in India find jobs on WhatsApp - jmsflknr
https://techcrunch.com/2019/07/29/vahan-yc-india/
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amrrs
On a different note, this everyone-jumping into the gig-economy of
driving/riding for these services seem to be scary for their personal growth.
Assume, I'm a bike-driver for Uber Eats (Today @ 2019), What would be I'm if i
continue doing this after 5 years? It's the same Uber Eats driver. But if in a
corporate set up, At least I can become something like a junior Accountant to
Account or there's a career growth.

This growth seems completely invisible in this gig economy and during my
conversation with a lot of recently joined Uber Drivers (in Bangalore, India)
pretty much many are frustrated and trying to get into a different business
that offers growth and stability.

Will this gig-economy destabilize global economy? I don't know. But I don't
think a full-time Uber Eats driver is getting any benefit in long term.

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xmprt
I think the way that a lot of these companies (at least Uber, Doordash,
Fiverr, ...) are positioning themselves is that this isn't supposed to be a
full time job. It's either a side gig that can give you a bit of extra money
to save/spend, or a launchpad to help get you to the next stage of your life.
That's why I can't really empathize with everyone asking for better employee
benefits and full time employment status because a gig is not supposed to be a
job.

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agentdrtran
...but it is. For a lot of people it's the only job they _can_ get. They don't
have other options.

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amrrs
It's a fallacy. A lot of people who fall into this finds it lucrative. They
are left-behind in the time of upskilling which they might have otherwise done
had they weren't delivering food / driving uber. This way, they aren't up for
the next game when this fails them (like Drones / Automated Cars). And I think
that'll hit the economy.

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iamgopal
Indian talents attracting foreign investors since last decade, combined with
Jio reign to grow internet consumer by ten fold make me so much hopeful for
success of startups of India. There were tons of talented "web era startups"
10 to 15 years ago that failed because of lack of affordable internet. Not
now. I hope someday these startups go deeper to database, OS and hardware
technology to make indigenous solutions.

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fareesh
Do WhatsApp's Terms of Service allow companies to build "unofficial" chatbots
like this? Or is there an undocumented API available for select customers? How
does one get access to this?

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traek
Yes, via the WhatsApp Business API explicitly mentioned in the article.

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fareesh
It looks like WhatsApp is providing APIs via these companies:

[https://www.facebook.com/business/partner-
directory/search?p...](https://www.facebook.com/business/partner-
directory/search?platforms=whatsapp&solution_type=messaging#)

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totaldude87
one has to wonder why whatsapp is not following a "wechat" model in India and
take control over the Internet based services industry. Yes they are touting
their "Payment" options, but a catalog of services all inside Whatsapp should
be possible right?!

Also to note that whatsapp has around 400 million users in India which is like
80-90% of Indian internet population which gives them enormous opportunity to
become market leaders ...

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xmprt
If they can't find a foothold in the payment option, how can they expect
people to use it for anything else? I don't think the shotgun approach is
right or efficient in this case.

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totaldude87
yeah, my question is more about , why being lethargic in the approach..

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captn3m0
Their payments offering needs to roll out better before they can try anything
more.

It just got cleared by the RBI and will take another year of adoption (my
prediction) before WhatsApp gets more serious about businesses and apps.

Their E2E promise also bites them a lot (So thankful that Bryan did this
before getting acquired).

