MIT Is Crafting Cheap -- But Invaluable -- Laptops
MIT Is Crafting Cheap -- But Invaluable -- Laptops:
Kids in Poor Nations Would Benefit
By David A. Fahrenthold
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, November 16, 2005; Page A03
CAMBRIDGE, Mass., Nov. 15 -- A riddle: What has the durability of a sneaker, the smarts of a computer, the color scheme of a lunchbox and the potential to alter almost everything about the way schoolchildren in the developing world learn?
The answer: well, nothing yet.
The prototype of the $100 laptop has a hand crank, for students in developing countries. (Getty Images)
But now, scientists at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology say they're close to creating a device that would fulfill this ambitious vision -- a tough, kid-friendly laptop that could be sold to poor countries for $100.
A prototype of this computer will be unveiled Wednesday at a U.N. conference in Tunisia. Its designers concede that the prototype is still missing some crucial features, such as a cheap display screen and a hand crank that would provide power.
But high expectations are already standard.
"It will change . . . the way children everywhere think about themselves in relation to the world," said Seymour Papert, a professor emeritus of education and media technology at MIT, believing that the result may be less violence and dissension as kids plug into education and international culture.
The laptop project has garnered some doubters, who wonder how useful its wireless connections will be in villages where access to the Internet is expensive or nonexistent. Some have also expressed concern about whether, despite their distinctive coloring, millions of the laptops will really get to and remain in the hands of children.
The leaders of the "$100 Laptop Initiative" said they wanted a machine that would substitute -- at one stroke -- for computers, textbooks, libraries, maps and movies that may be missing from poor children's lives.