If you have loved ones living alone somewhere in a different city or maybe even in a whole different country, you might feel anxious about their well-being at times. When you feel like something might be wrong, you’d naturally try to reach out to them via phone call or maybe via text. If you’re a parent, for example, you might feel very uneasy until you finally heard back from your kids and know they are alright.
I moved out with 18 myself and went to a larger city to get work. I know this kind of situation from the other end of things. Of course, you don’t want to upset anyone by taking a long time to reply to texts or not returning calls, but it can be that a young person is overwhelmed with work and/or studies and that they are indeed ok, but just can’t activate the energy for chatter. Yadda yadda ya – but that’s how it is.
What does the “Are You Okay?” app do?
Now Rick Cassani, A/V professional and photographer from Texas, is working on an exciting new app for exactly this. The “Are You Okay?” app is lightweight and not intended to be a communications tool. It’s a recurring pop-up notification that you simply hit with “I’m Okay” and it will go away for another day, or however you set the intervals up.
For as long the users keep hitting “I’m Okay” the other party (e.g. the parents) know that you’re fine. And if you don’t respond to the trigger anymore, they are alarmed and likely to jump into the car and make a personal check on you.
What could go wrong?
It could be that you hurt yourself in a way that immobilizes you and if you live alone, even a small incident can lead to something more serious if you can’t help yourself.
If you have your phone close by and you’re conscious you could call an ambulance, but what if your phone is in another room or broke? What if you’re simply unconscious because of an injury. Nobody will know for days and help might come too late.
With the “Are You Okay?” app this could be prevented. It might not be a perfect fit for everyone, but there are a lot of situations where this would help people. It’s not made to call an ambulance, it’s designed to provide peace of mind. If you’ve ever been in either one of these situations, you’ll know what I am talking about, and you’ll see the value in this app.
Current status of the app
The app is currently an idea only. Rick Cassani has now created a Kickstarter campaign to find people who share his concern. He is looking for a minimum funding of $5.000 to cover development costs of the app. The app is planned to be available in the iTunes app store first for 99 cents with an Android version getting worked on later.
As of now, nobody has backed the project yet. The project is still open until the 16th of August. If you know anyone who could be interested in this idea becoming a reality, feel invited to share this article and the project link with them. This is an interesting idea.
Photo credit: Barney Moss / Rick Cassani
