Make an account on BetterFly and then search through the listing of services. You may be looking for a musician for lessons or a therapist. From teachers to yoga instructors, the website claims to offer services from more than a thousand individuals. On finding one, you have the option to make transactions for services rendered through the website or you can get together and use any other method.

If you happen to use the service, do leave a feedback about the provider so that other people can benefit from it.

What they say about themselves

Betterfly is the first website of its kind to exclude companies, focusing on people instead. Its goal is to make it easy to find the best people to help you learn, look or feel better. Betterfly sets out to make that process easier and more efficient for its users. By catering to individuals instead of companies and by offering a broad but well-defined set of services, Betterfly enables users to compare apples to apples.

Why it could be a success

Finding the right professional can be difficult. Yellow pages are there, but you can’t be sure about the competence of a person unless you hear some positive feedback. All this is provided to you through BetterFly. The website is still beta so I’d give it some time to see how it fares.

It’s happened countless times in the startup world, which is why sites that are popular world wide tend to find it hard getting momentum in China as there is invariably a home grown Chinese copy (I can’t help but suspect this is somehow encouraged by the fiercely protectionist Chinese authtorities).

I’m open to having stereotypes contradicted but this article did nothing to do dispel my belief that China is an extremely efficient copying machine rather than a creative hub of innovative tech entrepreneurs.

The TechCrunch Article mentions BYD as being a shining example of innovation, with Western journalists supposedly agog at their R&D. I think R&D is Chinese for “Copy good ideas”.

For a start let’s take a look at their logo:

Not so innovative.

And some of their designs:

First the BYD S6 – A shameless copy of the Lexus RX

Next the BYD F6 and the spookily similar looking BMW 7:

I’m not so sure that we’ve seen the spark of innovation in China yet. A good start would be to tighten up software piracy laws and properly enforce intellectual property, perhaps then some truly innovative ideas might actually make some profit for their creators. Why spend all that time developing a great business or product when every Chinaman and his dog can create carbon copies faster than you can ship the originals?