Yesterday was the year of e-commerce in Indonesia, but it’s not over, Tokone went live yesterday. Backed by Bank Mandiri, second largest bank in Indonesia, Tokone is prepared to go up against all the big ecommerce giants currently fighting for marketshare in the country.

Tokone’s basic concept is still the same with other e-commerce / online marketplace websites. They’re gathering merchants to sell items online, and the marketplace will get a nice small cut from each transaction. The competition now relies on the experience they give for both merchant and buyers, and of course the transaction process itself and branding.

I tried to register myself for an account on Tokone, and to be honest I feel like remeniscing the good old days of the internet in early 2000, so many forms to fill. It’s not a pleasant experience especially with the not-so-modern look and feel, it really looks old and so different from the rest of the ecommerce sites these days.

But, behind the ugliness, Tokone is keeping its secret weapon deep inside. That secret weapon is the payment system. Tokone uses One Time Password (OTP) system for securing the transaction, which is normal. But instead of using physical token device, Tokone uses OTP method using text messages via your phone number. I find this method of paying very-very comfortable and secure, regardless of the actual security system behind it, I feel secure already.

So. Not-so-good-looking user interface versus the super-convenient payment system compared to competitors. If you could only have one, which one would you choose?