The Indonesian Gadget Law And Manuals
July 2, 2011 by Remco | 1 Comment
Two friends, Dian and Randy, were in for a surprise when on Nov. 24 at City Walk mall in Central Jakarta they tried to sell two iPads which they previously purchased in Singapore. According to Dian and Randy they regretted their purchase after returning to Indonesia and posted the two iPads on an Indonesian online classified site. After they were contacted they met with the potential buyers who then appeared to be undercover police agents.
According to the Jakarta Post “A House legislator urged the National Police on Saturday to explain how two friends were arrested for selling two iPads they regretted buying on vacation in Singapore.” It seems to be pretty bad PR for the police to arrest two ordinary guys that maybe want to monetize a little on their trip to Singapore.
Now it is allowed according to the Indonesian law to import a gadget within certain limits from a foreign country and as far as I understand it’s not illegal to later sell the item. No, the reason they are still in prison is that they sold a gadget without an Indonesian manual. Yes siree, you’re reading this well, and here it comes, selling a gadget without an Indonesian manual can get you a maximum sentence of 5 YEARS IN PRISON.
Foxconn city, a.k.a. iPhone city, a nice little factory in China that produces all your favorite gadgets the iPhone 4G and the by myself much desired iPad2 but also produces or have produced stuff for Acer, Amazon.com, Asus, HP, Nokia, Sony, Samsung and may others. In order to keep all their customers happy they build the Longhua Science & Technology Park, which currently is their largest operation and house an estimted 450.000 happy-da-pappy Chinese workers.
Angry birds has become my main source of entertainment in airports, the waiting room at the dentist and during boring meetings (sound of). And even though the birds are angry and on a rampage, who would have thought all the fluffy birds are in fact spying on you and me?