Ang Kape Ni LaTtEX

I came across a very commendable project on the net in the form of Massachusets Institute of Technology Media Lab’s quest to produce $100 laptops. They envision it alongside another, more daunting but every bit as commendable quest: One Laptop per Child, where they seek being able to provide one laptop per child in every single third world country.

I myself am skeptical of the idea at first, but many of my questions like, why not use refurbished desktop machines, and how the cost of production of these machines could be kept so low, are amply answered in their FAQ.

I was even surprised at their innovative solution to a dillemma most of us associate with third-world rural areas; that of the lack or absence of electricity. Their solution is to provide a hand-crank generator to the package; it’s a device used in many African nations to power transistor radios when batteries are not available (and they often aren’t).

I just don’t want to imagine how many times you’d have to crank the thing to fully charge it.

One of the reasons why they believe they can do it, however, is an eye-opener. As a person who’s supposed to be a techie, I’m a bit surprised that I failed to realize it myself:

Today’s laptops have become obese. Two-thirds of their software is used to manage the other third, which mostly does the same functions nine different ways.

So there IS a way to cheapen mainstream laptops, and that is by removing all the excess proprietary software. And to think that I’ve been itching to get myself one but has had to refrain for the longest time due to budget considerations.

Their target release is either late 2006 or early 2007. Wish them (and the poor children of our world) luck.

Tags: Edukasyon · Ekonomiya · Kabataan · Teknolohiya