Monday, December 24, 2007 Training at Internet cafes
THE world’s largest software company is helping Internet café operators in the Philippines boost consumer traffic by making them authorized mini-training centers, which can provide accessible basic information technology (IT) education to the public.
Microsoft Philippines managing director Rafael Rollan said Internet cafes in Cebu will soon become authorized training centers for users who want to be acquainted with Microsoft products.
“Any consumer can go to an Internet café and get trained on different Microsoft products,” he said in an interview during his recent Cebu visit.
He said Microsoft is going to build an online network access for authorized Internet cafés so consumers can avail themselves of the online training.
Since the program is a computer-based training, Rollan said Internet cafés will be providing the personal computers “dedicated for this purpose.”
He said the program will be another income generating activity for Internet cafés, in addition to games and Web browsing. It will also benefit users, regardless of age, as it provides easy training access to different Microsoft programs, he added.
Rollan said the concept will be presented by Microsoft to the Provincial Government and different local government units in Cebu starting next year.
Digital divide
“This is something we want to explore with the Provincial Government here, to introduce IT education through iCafes. This is another form of learning access,” he said.
Rollan said one of Microsoft’s advocacies is to help bridge the digital divide, through Internet cafés and easy eLearning access in Cebu and in the entire southern Philippines.
With Microsoft’s partnership with the government, Rollan said he hopes that more Internet cafes will be interested in the new business concept, and “become a non-formal educational training center arm” of Microsoft.
Last year, Microsoft started partnering with Internet café operators who were interested to convert their establishments into call centers at night.
There are over 2,000 registered Internet cafés in the Visayas and Mindanao. In Cebu, there are 600 Internet cafes.
Microsoft also continues to encourage Internet café owners to use only licensed software. (MMM)
