Tuesday, April 17, 2007

One Laptop per child

Check out this and other TED talks (Technology, Education & Design.)
About this Talk
Nicholas Negroponte lays out the details of his nonprofit One Laptop Per Child project. Speaking just days after relinquishing his post as director of the MIT Media Lab, he announces that he'll pursue this venture for the rest of his life. He takes us inside the strategy for building the "$100 laptop," and explains why and how the project plans to launch "at scale," with millions of units distributed in the first seven countries. "This is not a laptop project; it's an education project," he says.
About Nicholas Negroponte
As founder of the MIT Media Lab, Nicholas Negroponte pushed the edge of the information revolution as an inventor, thinker and angel investor. Now he's the driving force behind One Laptop Per Child, building computers for children in the developing world.
Why you should listen to him:
A pioneer in the field of computer-aided design, Negroponte is perhaps best known for founding and directing MIT's Media Lab, which helped drive the multimedia revolution and now houses more than 500 researchers and staff. An original investor in WIRED (and the magazine’s "patron saint"), for five years he penned a column exploring the frontiers of technology -- ideas that he expanded into his 1995 best-selling book Being Digital. An angel investor extraordinaire, he's funded more than 40 startups, and served on the boards of companies such as Motorola and Ambient Devices.
But his latest effort, the One Laptop Per Child project, may prove his most ambitious. The organization is manufacturing the XO (the "$100 laptop"), a wireless Internet-enabled, pedal-powered computer costing roughly $100. Negroponte hopes to put the first devices in the hands of the children in the developing world by the end of 2007, expanding to millions more by 2010.
"If Nicholas Negroponte can achieve his ambition of distributing $100 laptops to the world's disadvantaged children, he will help redefine philanthropy and see his name added to a list alongside the likes of Carnegie, Ford and Rockefeller."Technology Review