Let's Keep the $100 Laptop Affordable
About a year ago, there was an initiative announced to bring technology to the third world with a $100 laptop. While this device gave new meaning to the term "bare bones," even a very basic computer could certainly enhance the access to information in these areas, and in turn, their educational opportunities. We take for granted our multi gigahertz processors and terabyte hard drives. However, while it is not nearly as necessary as food, clothing and shelter, access to email and word processing could certainly enhance a third world person's experience and improve their quality of life.Now I read this today, over at Technology Review:
At the World Economic Forum annual meeting in Davos, Switzerland, last week, a fissure appeared over what technology would be most effective in improving education in the third world. On one side: the highly-publicized One Laptop per Child Project (usually just called the "$100 laptop"), spearheaded by Nicholas Negroponte of MIT's Media Lab. On the other: a cell phone featuring PC capabilities, an idea that's being promoted by Microsoft.
Who asked Microsoft to hijack this idea for an affordable PC, and turn it into a cell phone? The original idea was for wireless access in the form of a "mesh network" where one PC transmitted the signal to the next. While not a formula for a quick network, it should penetrate well and have great range with minimal infrastructure. In case Microsoft didn't notice, they went with an open source operating system. Windows would have doubled the price tag for this ultra affordable PC. When was the last time that anyone did any real computing on their cell phone? I've never seen anyone do any serious word processing, or load software on a cell phone (games and ringtones don't count).
I don't see the point of trying to create an affordable product, if then the intended users can't afford to purchase the required service to use the product. I spent over $800 on my cell phone service last year, and I'm sure that in the third world the poor could have better spent that money on nutrition and housing than phone service.
I hope that this project can get back on track to its roots. There is a lot of potential here, but trying to sign up the destitute for a annual contract should be condemned.
Bill digresses: Um, Jonas.... Just what are these poor folk going to do with a $100 crank-up computer? Play games? Run educational software? Where will they get that software? Buy it? With what money? Someone will have to give it to them for free. Who? Why, thank you for volunteering.
Maybe they'll browse the Internet...? How? Through a dial-up service? The majority of these targeted individuals don't have phones. That would be a luxury item. How about they use WiFi? Whose going to pay for the WiFi? We're not talking San Francisco or Philadelphia. Better we should just ship them a crank-up laptop that plays music while they crank and pops the lid open after a while.
But look, up in the sky, is it a bird? Is it a plane? No! It's a comsat! They're up there already. The infrastructure is in place. If you hand these folk an el cheapo smart phone and charge them $100 per year for usage you've satisifed the computational basis for the device and you've put them in touch with the rest of the world via voice or Internet. And an under-utilized third-world comsat (or even a hot air ballon) suddenly becomes a revenue source and an access point for tens, if not hundreds of thousands.
This is one of the first smart ideas Microsoft has come up with. The very fact that it can tie into the existing infrastructure with a low commercial investment should make it highly appealing to corporate types looking for a tax break that will get them good publicity but not cost very much. It's one of the more original ideas of the fledgling century.
posted by digitaldoc at 2:16 PM
12 Comments:
Jonas answers:
-The laptops are coming with a preloaded open source operating system.
They can certainly come with basic open source software. A web browser
and word processor are really the only essentials besides the drivers
to run the thing. Open Office anyone?
-In the FAQ for the $100
notebook, they say that "We are also exploring ways to connect them to
the backbone of the Internet at very low cost." This is one of the
essential ingredients here, and equally important to the hardware
itself. If they say they are working on it, I'll believe them, for now.
-The goal here is education of children. A phone would not accomplish
that. Who are these people going to call? Everyone they ever knew
probably lives in their village anyway.
-Charge them $100 a year for access? They can't afford it anyway, might
as well be a hundred grand. For example, in Haiti,
the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere, the per capita income is
only $250. As much as I like the 'net, I wouldn't give up 40% of my
income for it!
-How are they going to charge the phone? And power the monitor that
Gates is talking about? The crank was a foolproof option for these
folks.
My 2 cents..
cell phones SUCK - no ifs, ands, nor butts!!
qualtiy is terrible, reception is terrible ( dont even say, oh in the city it is great..la dee da..go into a huge warehouse or other structure..oops..signal downgraded to horrible, what a shame.). you would not pay the ridiculous amounts that you are paying for your cell phone, for a landline that has service interuptions just for the hell of it..
why send the crappiest technology we have to the poor countries! at least let them have a computer that will power by hand cranking.
Mike
The views expressed are in no way wrong, they are of complete perfection, and have no way to be argued, unless you send money, then we may argue.
gotta love me
NOT DA MAMMA
If they can't afford $100/yr for access, how are they going to afford broadband?
I'm not sure how they are going to afford broadband...however, it will be a lot more cost effective than affording a cell phone if the pricing is similar to the US. One broadband connection can be shared through a WiFi network among many users. A cell phone can't be shared like that. This brings the cost of broadband, through sharing, to something more affordable.
So you'd have 20 or 100 or 1,000 people queuing up to use a single broadband registered device? Doesn't sound like a plan.
Why not? It works fine at my public library, the airport, the hotel lobby, or the local Starbucks.
And just where in a village of mud huts are you going to find a public library, an airport, a hotel lobby, or a Starbucks -local or otherwise? Who's going to pay for it?
You re not going to find these things in the village. My point is that several villagers can share one access point. They can't share one cell phone number. Clearly, someone, whether the UN, "Geek Without Borders," or the villagers themselves will have to put some money and infrastructure into this. It should be more cost effective long term than with wireless phone service.
On the other hand, a villager with a laptop and no internet still has some functionality. The cell phone without service is quite useless.
And a villager with no software and no internet access does not compute. What you're asking is for someone to stick their hand in my pocket yet again even though the infrastructure for the cell phone platform already exists. That doesn't compute either.
-They can use open source software, like Linux and Open Office.
-The infrastructure for the cell phone doesn't exist in most of these places. You'd have to build it from the ground up anyway.
The cell infrastructure is up in the sky. It feeds the needs of the more fortunate few and with balloon tech (see comment above) adding repeaters is beyond cheap.
We could use the balloon concept to set up WiFi as well. It should be considerably more affordable for the village.
There is no cell phone infrastructure in most of the rural developing world currently.
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