NewsDude
07-08-2008, 03:50 PM
When I first read about the computer designed for the One Laptop Per Child project, I wanted one. Not because it was adorable, cheap, or a means of doing good [to buy one you had to buy a second for a child in a poor country]. I coveted its screen, designed for use in full daylight. Even my Apple MacBook Pro, with all its clever tricks, can't manage that.
Add the LifeStraw water filtration system to the list of do-gooder objects I crave. This little wonder, a water filter outfitted with a straw, made the cover of the Design for the Other 90 percent show catalog at the Cooper-Hewitt Museum last year. It could as easily have graced the cover of an REI mailer.
How about a windup flashlight crossed with a cell-phone charger? It's low tech meets high tech with rugged, toylike charm. Or charcoal made from plant waste instead of wood, developed for Haiti by MIT's D-Lab? Talk about a greener way to barbecue. [The technology might also help save endangered African gorillas. A new study published in Science links organized crime rings cutting trees for charcoal in Congo with a spate of recent gorilla murders.]
Doing Good Is Smart Business
The qualities that make a product good for the developing world -- sturdy, cheap, adaptable, modular, energy-efficient, environmentally sound, computer platform-neutral, and bandwidth-savvy -- make it a good product, period. Suddenly "less is more" goes from abstract design ideal to the only viable option. This is why some of the most innovative ideas today are coming from efforts to address the needs of those most in need.
In 2006, I saw this up close at Strong Angel III [SA3], a sprawling disaster-preparedness exercise that drew together civilians and the military to test technologies for humanitarian work.
For the better part of a week,...
More... (http://www.toptechnews.com/story.xhtml?story_id=60627)
Add the LifeStraw water filtration system to the list of do-gooder objects I crave. This little wonder, a water filter outfitted with a straw, made the cover of the Design for the Other 90 percent show catalog at the Cooper-Hewitt Museum last year. It could as easily have graced the cover of an REI mailer.
How about a windup flashlight crossed with a cell-phone charger? It's low tech meets high tech with rugged, toylike charm. Or charcoal made from plant waste instead of wood, developed for Haiti by MIT's D-Lab? Talk about a greener way to barbecue. [The technology might also help save endangered African gorillas. A new study published in Science links organized crime rings cutting trees for charcoal in Congo with a spate of recent gorilla murders.]
Doing Good Is Smart Business
The qualities that make a product good for the developing world -- sturdy, cheap, adaptable, modular, energy-efficient, environmentally sound, computer platform-neutral, and bandwidth-savvy -- make it a good product, period. Suddenly "less is more" goes from abstract design ideal to the only viable option. This is why some of the most innovative ideas today are coming from efforts to address the needs of those most in need.
In 2006, I saw this up close at Strong Angel III [SA3], a sprawling disaster-preparedness exercise that drew together civilians and the military to test technologies for humanitarian work.
For the better part of a week,...
More... (http://www.toptechnews.com/story.xhtml?story_id=60627)