“Ghosts go through walls.”

[Alyssa]

One of my friends from college had an Electronic Frontier Foundation sticker on his laptop bearing the legend "Information Wants to Be Free." One of the coolest examples of that sentiment I've seen in recent years is this joint Israeli-Palestinian venture to build a no-cost virtual computer, called G.ho.st, by integrating functions from services like Google Documents and Flickr.

This is hardly the first project in recent years to try to address the problem of computer access in under served communities, particularly for children without steady computer access. On the hardware end, probably the most elegant solution is the One Laptop Per Child project, which combines tough, portable technology with simple functionality. Obviously, G.ho.st won't produce hardware that individuals can keep and access any time, but it also can't fall prey to hardware breakdown or lack of maintenance.

Leaving the Israeli-Palestinian cooperation element aside, which the project leaders acknowledge is an important byproduct, if not the main point, of their collaboration, G.ho.st seems to represent another step forward in thinking about what you really need for personal computing. It seems to me like Apple went in the wrong direction in creating the MacBook Air; the product is both utilitarian and elegant, but its hefty price tag for the power makes it less accessible than other computers that can do more. While people who can afford it will probably continue to want increasing bang for the buck in their computing purchases, projects like G.ho.st and One Laptop Per Child, or really for that matter Google Documents, raise good questions about what we actually need and want out of our computers. G.ho.st's primary purpose will probably be to provide computing services to people who wouldn't be able to save documents and access them again later otherwise, but I know I'd be interested in some kind of effective services integrator simply because it's convenient.

And hey, G.ho.st even has sense of humor about itself. The official launch is slated for Halloween.

Comments

Thanks for bringing attention to this, Alyssa.

I'll admit I'm a little wary of the project, given the privacy/ datamining possibilities brought into the picture by using google docs, etc. While the end goal is noble, there are huge risks for anyone using the service, given that Google and other providers may at some point allow governments to access that data.

Posted by Justin | May 29, 2008 10:44 AM

Another route for the 'children w.o. steady computer access' are the new netbooks - the Asus Eee PC has sold over 6 million units since its introduction, and Asian manufacturers are tooling up to make similar devices; small screens (8 to 9 inches), Linux operating systems (to save money), good/easy wireless connectivity, etc. By Xmas you'll be able to have lots of choices, w. a price point from $250-$500.

There's something else that needs to be factored in, though...affordable internet access. $15 a month for DSL may not sound like much, but that's on top of having to have a phone line at something like $25 a month; when the poor can get a phone for less than $5 through the aggregators, cheap internet access is lost.

Posted by PW | May 29, 2008 12:24 PM

Ubiquitous wireless - whether ad-supported, community supported, or simply "everybody has a sharable access point" - would aid in the cheap internet access need. We're not quite there yet. Being tethered to a landline for Net access is a problem.

And there's some people who say the upcoming WiMax won't get us there either, since it's capabilities appear to be over-hyped.

That would also solve the phone problem in general - everybody switches to VoIP. There are open source cell phone plans growing up in the OSS community that might make that more feasible.

As for privacy concerns using Google, well, learn to use encryption - and hope that the government doesn't develop quantum decryption computers that theoretically could decrypt any form of encryption. OTOH, if they do, very likely the government's own secrets will end up getting spilled once that genie is out of the bottle.

A society in which nobody controls:

1) the communications spectrum;
2) the hardware and software needed to access that spectrum;
3) the ability to access the information sent across that spectrum;

would be a much more secure, robust, reliable - and free - society.

Posted by Richard Steven Hack | May 29, 2008 9:12 PM