-
The Latest News on the $100 Laptop
This fall more than 500 children in Thailand will be part of a pilot program for ?quality testing and debugging? of the $100 laptop.? The One Laptop Per Child program, which is supplying the computers, is the brainchild of tech guru Nicholas Negroponte, who has spent the last several years...
- Categories
- Uncategorized
-
Bikes That Power Laptops
I?ll come right out and say it: I have discovered a cure for childhood obesity.? But it?s not the kid?s meal equivalent of the Atkins or South Beach Diet.? Because serious problems require serious solutions, I suggest that we turn to Uganda and see how villagers power their cell phones,...
- Categories
- Uncategorized
-
What’s In a Word?
A great deal apparently. Throughout history we’ve seen that simple misunderstandings of words, or individual phrases out of context have had major effects from the absurd (JFK infamously calling himself a jelly doughnut), to the controversial (see David Howard’s 1999 gaffe) to...
- Categories
- Education
- Tags
- academia
-
India’s American Dream
In its latest issue, Business Week published an interesting article on the Ramanujan School of Mathematics, a preparatory academy that trains low-income students in the art of test taking: ?Every April, some 230,000 Indian youths sharpen their pencils and sit for the intensely competitive...
- Categories
- Uncategorized
-
Artisans and Open Source: PeopLink and CatGen
PEOPlink is a non-profit organization that trains and equips grassroots artisan organizations all over the world to market their goods directly to customers over the Internet ? thereby minimizing the impact of middlemen and maximizing return to the artisan. CatGen is a related open-source...
- Categories
- Education
- Tags
- academia, creative economy
-
Cuba: From Red to Green?
In 2001, during one of his excessively long speeches, Fidel Castro passed out at the lectern, an event which fueled serious speculation about the Cuban leader?s health. Three years later, after giving another drawn out speech, Castro tripped and fell, breaking his arm and shattering his knee...
- Categories
- Uncategorized
-
Micro Venture Capital: Nicaragua’s Agora
We?ve already profiled Aavishkaar, the Indian micro venture capital fund that works with entrepreneurs whose capital needs are between $50,000 and $500,000 ? too much for traditional microfinance but too small for commercial VCs. Now Aavishkaar has a counterpart in Nicaragua ? Agora...
- Categories
- Education
- Tags
- academia
-
Mobile Banking Hits Colombia
In an article published in last week?s La Republica, the Colombian equivalent of the Wall Street Journal, Jorge Barrios reports that Bancolombia, Colombia?s largest bank, is poised to launch a mobile banking service, which will allow the bank?s clients to make payments, money transfers,...
- Categories
- Uncategorized
