A computer programmer who just wants to help
August 24, 2009
A computer programmer from Santa Cruz, Jon Bjornstad, flew to the town of Sibenik in Croatia last month to install one of his programs to help a quadriplegic woman.
The woman, Stanka Karadole, was paralyzed in a car accident 15 years ago and is now able to play music, upload photos, create documents and use Skype just by moving a small reflective dot on her forehead in front of a camera on her computer.
Bjornstad says that whereas this sort of technology is not new, the fact that he is flying around the world to install it for free is.
He said: “Being able to do this gives meaning to my life. If I could be of service to someone, especially in a way that improves their lives, that’s why we’re here.”
Having read an article about Bjornstad’s program ‘Sue Centre’ in the press, Ana Cook, a Croatian immigrant to the U.S. immediately thought that it could benefit her friend back home. She made a phone call to Bjornstad and that’s all it took.
Bjornstad said that I took a bit of work to translate his program but says that “the next language should be much easier. I’m going to translate the program into Spanish next.”
He already has plans to visit India to install his program there.
“It’s not about how many users I have really, but how people’s lives are changed,” he said.
Thanks to www.santacruzsentinal.com for the above quotes, for more information on this article please visit their website.
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