A few weeks ago I wrote something on the need for positivity and was bombarded with emails and comments from readers saying, ‘Give me one example from real life in Pakistan today’ and ‘How can you say this when there are bomb blasts in some part of the country every other day?’

Understandably, these are all logical responses but at the same time it is our frame of mind that can change our outlook. Before we begin to paint doomsday scenarios about our country, we need to sit up and take notice of certain individuals who are still trying and improvising – who are not just doing well for themselves through entrepreneurship but have also carved a niche for their products in the competitive market. Their success stories, though limited in scale, are proof that Pakistanis are still working hard to introduce new products and are still innovating.

One such person is Faraz Khan, who after working with Emergen Consulting (an open source software business), is the brains behind the first online DVD rental in Pakistan. DVD Direct is an online portal which allows the user to peruse through various genres of movies and TV series, watch trailers and buy DVDs at the click of a button, which are then delivered right to your doorstep. How did it all start? Faraz Khan and Mustufa Hashmi decided to set up an online store after they realised that an actual shop adds zero value to the movies; that consumers often have to drive through traffic and, in a city like Karachi which is frequently impaired due to violence and strikes and shops shut down – this would be a great venture. Although they currently just deliver in DHA, Karachi (unless you buy 5 or more dvds) and their venture has been around for just a few months, they have over 1,100 users, selling an average of 200-250 DVDs per day. Once the sales pick up further, they do plan on delivering their product to other parts of the city.

Another such example of successful e-commerce is The Readers Club in Karachi. Founded by two Purdue graduates, Usman Siddiqui and Jawaid Yousuf, who wanted to encourage the culture of reading in their country. The books are delivered to the members at their doorstep each month at a flat rate. You know how people in Karachi have always complained about the lack of public libraries and the rising cost of buying books each month? Well, the people at The Readers Club have heard your complaints and after an over-whelming response to their first venture, they set-up an online trading hub called Kitabain. Here sellers can list their old or new books for sale and buyers can peruse them online, and pay via check or cash deposited in the company’s account. With quite an impressive inventory which includes classics, comics, textbooks and more – for an avid book lover like me, they are a dream come true! Their network includes a searchable database of thousands of listed titles and provides an opportunity for the smallest of bookstores or even a person sitting at home to sell the extra books one has lying around.

Are any of these two services revolutionary in the constantly-connected and emerging markets of today? Obviously not, so why the attention? Well, it is because these entrepreneurs are seeds of hope in a nation such as ours. While DVD Direct and Kitabain differ in terms of one being a commercial venture and the other being closer to a non-profit, they both share one thing in common: a desire to actually take an initiative rather than  pass time in idealistic dreaming. With this spirit they are providing us all with a very convenient service and giving us an alternative to the numerous news channels that mostly air negative news. These individuals may not bring about a revolution but if a few more children read or a few more adults watch a movie instead of stressing out over talk shows, we can persevere as a community of people?

The views expressed by this blogger and in the following reader comments do not necessarily reflect the views and policies of the Dawn Media Group.