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18 November 2005

$100 (lime green) laptop unveiled

100laptopMIT Media Lab Director Nicholas Negroponte unveiled the first working prototype of his famed $100 laptop yesterday at the UN Net Summit in Tunisia. UN Secretary General Kofi Annan called it an "expression of global solidarity," and the Linux-based, lime-green machine by all accounts stole the show. (Though it's not without detractors.) Other than the color — which was a surprise — it seems to match closely with the bold concept Negroponte's been pitching since the World Economic Forum in Davos last January: a simple, durable, cheap laptop, which can be placed in the hands of every child in the developing world. Electricity is supplied through a hand crank, and scarce Internet access can be shared through 'mesh networking'. Negroponte has created a new non-profit, One Laptop per Child, to manage the program, which plans to have millions of the laptops in production next year. [Full reports from the BBC and Wired News.]

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  • William Shipley – November 18 2005

    I think the $100 laptop is an incredibly noble thing and I'm totally behind it.



    But what a strange world, though. I mean, when I was growing up, *I* didn't have a laptop. Or a computer of any sort in my house. Or access to one at school, except on rare occasions.



    I guess I'm the last generation to say this.



    --



    My personal (untested, obviously) theory is that the information age has led to the decrease in wars that was noted in this blog; it's hard to kill or torture people with whom you are exchanging ideas on the internet. Well, hard for sane people, anyways.



    What stability might come to Africa with pervasive laptops and networks? Information is the enemy of ignorance, ignorance is the gateway to fear, fear leads to anger, anger leads to hate, and hate leads to suffering.


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