public PCs for the PRC?

[Norbert Radd]

Free computers placed where children play could help bring basic education to India's 200 million boys and girls under age 15. That's the hope of the man behind an Internet learning experiment called Hole-in-the-Wall.
Sugata Mitra, physicist and chief scientist with India's international software giant NIIT Ltd., launched the experiment in 1999 by embedding a kiosk housing a high-speed touch-screen computer into the wall that separates the company's headquarters from New Delhi's biggest slum. Dr. Mitra was surprised to see how quickly the children had mastered navigating the Internet - within hours.

Since then, Mitra has installed more than 150 computers - with keyboards, touch pads, and Web cameras - in some 50 locations from New Delhi slums to points in rural India. In each location, with no supervision or instruction, the children "download and play audio and video, send and receive e-mail, chat, and so on," he says. They quickly move on to learn some English from English-language websites, read Indian newspapers, and even "look for jobs for their fathers," Mitra says.

Widespread implementation could bridge gaps between India's 600,000 primary schools and the 1 million it needs, observers say

[con's fly is open]

What a fantastic idea!

[Mr Nobody]

Well, in india often the only problem is keeping it working, since they aren't edible. Here, the problem would be stopping people selling them for parts. Or selling the porn they downloaded.

[Pashley]

There's also the MIT media lab's hundred dollar laptop project, with similar goals: laptop.org/