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The Sub-$100 Laptop?
Vollernurd writes "The BBC is carrying this article detailing Nick Negroponte's plans to deveop and distribute a sub-$100 notebook computer. It would be very basic and stripped down and be used in developing countries as a way of distributing school books and such. Interesting to see how they will cut costs. Yes, it does run Linux." You can read another slashdot story about this machine when it was discussed on Red Herring awhile ago.
You ignorant. Not all third world countries are the same. I live in one and Iknow lots of people who cannotcurrently afford a computer, but would be able to buy a 100$ one. We don't have intermitent power. In fact our third world power infrastructure is better than some parts of the first world (e.g. California not long ago). These computers would be perfect for a country like ours.
My heart is pure, but make no mistake, it's pure evil
These would be invaluable in things like health clinics, where a wealth of information could suddenly be made available, for much less than the cost of purchasing a set of books on medicine and diseases.
The point is that this technology is needed there; at the current price point, it's completely out of reach of the consumer. Offering these laptops at a reasonable price means that finally those who need these laptops can purchase them.
I sincerely doubt that these laptops will be used primarily for recreational purposes, so someone who really does need them might willingly take out a loan in order to purchase one.
NGOs, for one, will certainly be snapping these up. These notebooks will make their work so much easier.
Perhaps it might be useful to offer laptops to lower income westerners (I'm thinking particularly of urban and rural poor), but lower middle class westerners can suck it up and use a credit card if they really want a laptop. Even Apple has laptops starting for less than $1000.
The "intermittent power access" is why they're using laptops rather than desktops, which, if you think about it, would be much cheaper anyway. Laptops need less power overall, and you can plug them in during the 2-3 hours of scheduled "uptime" on the local grid. For clinics running off of generators, desktops, which would put a huge drain on the electricity, were probably just not possible (or, if they were, it might be one desktop computer for a dozen or more people). With laptops, they can now use several.
So there are a lot of benefits to offering these inexpensive laptops. While this is certainly a commercial offering and not a "donation" to developing countries, it is nevertheless a very beneficial thing being done. Although technology is not the "answer to the problem", it can be an invaluable tool for the real solutions. I believe that the available of inexpensive laptops just might transform developing countries as much as the introduction of wireless phones has.
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