I see no reason a computer cannot have a complete solid state memory of 10Gigs or so and still have full functionality. Not everyone needs all the MS bells and whistles.............
There's working $100 laptops all over Ebay right now.
"...and you're not sitting there cranking the thing while you're trying to type," Gates said.
This, from the seller of "crap in a box." Money sure doesn't buy character.
I don't really like this laptop idea, but Gates doesn't get the idea much. These are designed to automatically work in an ad-hoc mesh network when in proximity, and quality applications are already available for free. About the only point he has is support, but then he's used to an OS that requires massive support.
Yeah, I'm sure people who are busy dodging genocide have time to surf the net.
Yeah, I'm sure that people who can't seem to understand that when you live in a desert, there's bound to be drought, are smart enough to set up a nice little ethernet-backbone network for millions, free of charge.
Yeah, I'm certain that folks who eat the undigested seeds from an elephant's dung will be able to produce the infrastructure (electrical power, phone service, schools, etc) required to churn out top-notch software designers and electrical enggineers like yesterday, because they have a $100 laptop.
Yeah, I'm sure that some kid dying of malaria right now will have his lkife revolutionized because he can get e-mail, spam, internet porn, and a bright, shiny, neon advertizement screaming that he's won a free iPod, for the 13th time today.
Yeah, I'm positive that AOL will extend special "Third-world pis*pot rates" to sub-Saharan Africa and parts of Asia.
Yeah, I'm almost certain that Google will be avaialble in any one of 123 obscure dialects of Bantu any day now.
You know, I long to see the day when instead of hunting antelope, swatting flies all day or producing more unsupportable children, or whatever it is they do, the impoverished of the world are now devoting their time to writing blogs.
Yeah, I'm positive that bringing computers and the inexpensive computer and internet, to people who have barely digested the technology of the wheel, will vastly improve their lot in life.
I'm absolutely certain that repressive African and Asian governments will eagerly accept, and fairly distribute, these cheap PC's to everyone on the continent(s), and that such distribution will not be influenced by cultural, religious, racial or political motives, and positive that the UN can make sure it's all done on the up and up.
More power to them, but this project is doomed to failure. They mighjt actually succeed in creating the hardware, but the software, infrastructure, content and distribution are all open questions.
A $100 laptop is one thing. How will these customers afford phone tech support at $ 69/hour? How many will HAVE phones?
Dell offers $300 computers now. Has anybody ridiculed them?
Sheesh, that's how most people use their computer now...
"Why, we're creating new versions of Windows that will require $10,000 worth of RAM alone just to bring up the Blue Screen of Death! BWAAAHAHAHAHA!!!!"
He showed a model of the machine that does use a crank as one source of power.
This from the genius at Microsoft....and hardware costs continue to FALL...
The cost of computor hardware is a tiny fraction of what it used to be, while its capabilities are several orders of magnitude better than 10/15 years ago --- However, neither the cost, performace or reliability of software has shown an equivalent improvement...
Remember when the cost per megabyte on a hard drive was measured in DOLLARS per megabyte?
Now you can find Hard Disk Drives where the cost per megabyte is LESS than a penny....
You can now find Hard Drives where the cost per GIGABYTE is a dollar or less!
Curious folks might wonder, WHY?
Is the true cost of making CDs, really that high?
Semper Fi
Yeah Bill, we'll get them all Origami devices--the ones with the tiny screen and the laughable battery life and no keyboard--at a price point that requires 6-10 students to share one computer.
What a tool.
Mr. 'No home user will ever need more than 640K' ought to be a lot more careful when prognosticating.
The difference is that Gates is intending to make money here with a similar concept. And while I have no objections about his idea, he really should be laying off MIT's program at least until he decides to introduce a competing program.
I get the impression MIT seems to be aiming more towards a philanthropic nature--Petronski mentioned the prospect of selling these laptops in the U.S. with half the proceeds going to fund the program.
IMO, that would be necessary--otherwise how else do these small computers get to second and third-tier nations.
And in areas where even textbooks can be hard to come by, this seems to be a step to help educate the third-world.
ROTFLOL
Sounds as if Gates expects to be the center of attention all the time. Head too big for his hat syndrome.