From: GBurch1@aol.com
>This is something I've been thinking about for a long time. How
>do we help people like women in Afghanistan, or peasants in
>Indonesia, or all of the rest of the folks who are cut off from
>the information revolution? I've envisioned a technology that
>could help, something I call a "Brain Seed". Imagine a network
>terminal with an embedded satellite modem. The device is built
>simple and tough -- as much one piece of solid-state electronics
>as possible, and the hard-wired communications software is built
>to be maximally tamper-resistant. Also hard-wired into it is a
>curriculum of basic literacy, from the picture-book level on up.
>With the operation of Moore's Law and advancing material science,
>such devices could be made very cheaply in 15-20 years. Now, make
>billions of these things and make them available to any
>organization that wants to distribute them, at a minimal profit.
>Include them with aid packages. Smuggle them into any country
>that prohibits them. Air drop them -- hell, air drop them from
>robot aircraft . . . Better yet, eventually make them in a form
>that IS a robot aircraft so that they become self-delivering.
>Saturate the planet with them. Then see what happens. . .
Brian
Member,Extropy Institute
www.extropy.org