Campaign Raises Funds To Send Wikipedia Readers To Kids Without Internet 97
Eloquence writes "Remember the WikiReader? It was pitched as a device that would contain the text of the entire English Wikipedia, and run on two AAA batteries for months. Unfortunately it was sold to the wrong audience: people who already have smartphones, tablets and laptops. At a cost of $20 per device, Aislinn Dewey and Victor Grigas (who works for Wikimedia) are trying to raise funds to buy up the company's inventory and ship WikiReaders to kids in places without Internet connectivity."
.. and why .. (Score:2)
.. aren't they opening up the software stack on it too?
I bet some of those same kids would hack at the software. It's a general purpose computer, after all, just running an ugly looking renderer.
Re:.. and why .. (Score:5, Informative)
Source code is available here:
https://github.com/wikireader [github.com]
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Cool, and can you modify, upload and run a replacement image?
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Apparently so - http://toddbot.blogspot.com/2010/05/wikireader-forth-and-hacking.html [blogspot.com] .. FORTH? Wow. Amusing. :)
Re:.. I wonder how people learned programming.. (Score:1)
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Nope, I just grew up hacking on computers that came with a "hack me! i dare you!" manual. If you're going to hand out lots of single purpose devices like this, why not let the kids decide what to do with them when they don't need/want a wikipedia-only reader anymore.
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That's a part of why I mentioned that I'd take five of these devices when the first listing of this article went by earlier today. I'd give a few out to friends but I'd keep something like that in my car or my bathroom to play with. Eventually I'd get bored and want to hack at it. Either way, I'm on board to buy five of them right now if they'll make them and sell them at that price. I'll even pay for ten of them and get five like the OLPC BOGO deal from the past.
I'd probably give three away and keep two so
Re: .. and why .. (Score:2)
Amazon has them for $10/ea
You can easily load your own content, you start by loading it into MediaWiki, then take an XML dump, then upload it to the reader.
You can also easily load 33K Project Gutenberg books, you just need to upgrade the microSDHC card.
Google it...
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If MediaWiki blew less that would be cool. Like, if you could import things into it without external tools which also blow.
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Not all kids in the world need vaccines (do yours?) some have vaccines & red cross already and don't want a lifetime of dependency. You realize that there is a range of wealth in the world, right? Some people are poor, but not starving.
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So they can read wiki and invent their own vaccines.
Well not quite, but you get the point. Lowering the requirements to such a vast repository of knowledge is always an admirable goal. My biggest concern is that it's a dump of the English wiki. What languages do they use in the poorest countries? Not English, as far as I know...
Same kids (Score:3)
There is a good chance that those WikiReaders have probably been assembled by those same kids.
Re:Same kids (Score:4, Informative)
And who are also likely illiterate... problems problems.
Very unlikely. Most electronic assembly is done in China or Vietnam, both of which have 95% literacy rates.
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Why do people on slashdot feel the need to make points about things of which they have no information?
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Why do people on slashdot feel the need to make points about things of which they have no information?
It's a web forum.
Re:Same kids (Score:4, Informative)
Why do people on slashdot feel the need to make points about things of which they have no information?
Here is some information: List of Countries by Literacy Rate [wikipedia.org]
By default the list is sorted in alphabetical order, but you can click on the headers to sort by literacy rate, or by gender-specific literacy rate. Although illiteracy is correlated with poverty, it is even more strongly correlated with religion: Ten of the bottom ten are Muslim. Much of this is because they don't educate many of their girls.
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Why do people on slashdot feel the need to make points about things of which they have no information?
Although illiteracy is correlated with poverty, it is even more strongly correlated with religion: Ten of the bottom ten are Muslim. Much of this is because they don't educate many of their girls.
Lol. Way to prove the OP's point.
Some of the countries with the highest female literacy rates are also predominately muslim, for example:
.... 89% muslim / 98.3% female literacy ...... 93% muslim / 99.9% ...... 88% muslim / 99.6% ...... 70% muslim / 99.3% ...... 90% muslim / 99.8%
Turkmenistan
Azerbaijan
Uzbekistan
Kazakhstan
Tajikistan
While some of the countries with the lowest female literacy rates have significantly smaller muslim populations:
... 60% muslim / 15.2% female literacy ..........
Burkina Faso
Chad
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Turkmenistan
Azerbaijan
Uzbekistan
Kazakhstan
Tajikistan
All five of these countries were once part of the Soviet Union. They all inherited the Soviet educational system, and the cycle of illiteracy was already broken before they became independent. Literate mothers don't raise illiterate children.
Burkina Faso
Chad
Sierra Leone
South Sudan
Only South Sudan is not majority Muslim, but it was part of a Muslim majority country up until less than two years ago.
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All five of these countries were once part of the Soviet Union. They all inherited the Soviet educational system, and the cycle of illiteracy was already broken before they became independent. Literate mothers don't raise illiterate children.
OK, still doesn't change the fact that religion is not a determining factor.
Only South Sudan is not majority Muslim, but it was part of a Muslim majority country up until less than two years ago.
So? The female illiteracy rates in those countries is far greater than the percentage of muslims. That means within their own communities, the non-muslims are pretty illiterate too.
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To follow up I looked into the ratio of female to male literacy.
Of the top five countries, 2 of them are primarily muslim:
.............. 96% muslim 1.074 ratio female:male literacy ........ 100% muslim 1.018
#3 UAE
#4 Maldives
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All five of these countries were once part of the Soviet Union. They all inherited the Soviet educational system, and the cycle of illiteracy was already broken before they became independent. Literate mothers don't raise illiterate children.
That would depend on when the Muslims immigrated to those countries, would it not? Were those countries predominantly Muslim under Soviet rule or did that occur post Soviet rule? If I recall, the Soviets were not fond of letting religion flourish.
Indonesia, which has the highest concentration of Muslims, has a female literacy rate of 99.38 (2008), and they were not part of the Soviet Union.
It is far more likely that the poor literacy rates in the countries you mention (Burkina Faso, Chad, Sierra Leone, Sou
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What the heck does that have to do with literacy rates in vietnam and china?
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Why do people on slashdot feel the need to make points about things of which they have no information?
'Cause they don't have wikireaders
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Thanks asshole. Now I have to have a conversation with my son that I didn't want to have :(
"I wanted to buy a cheapo device so now I had to look at the goatse guy?"? did you at least tell him about tubgirl and a movie featuring a certain cup..
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The link is a legitimate link and a valuable link. You really can buy them for $10 on Amazon - new. This whole thing is starting to reek of a scam or, at least, a waste of money. They'd be paying $15 more for the product than they'd be able to buy it for on Amazon if what they're claiming is true. Amazon has free two day shipping (IIRC) on the product. They'd get more for just collecting the money and then sending the people gift cards for the ten bucks so that they could order their own. They'd get 2.5 pro
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Hi guys - Victor Grigas here (im the guy in the video), we plan to buy whatever is most cost effective, if they come from amazon or the manufacturer - in each case there are technical considerations. The $25 is a ballpark estimate. The benefits from the manufacturer are that he will pre load whichever language we need and that the microSD card can be 8gb. I found out about this by shopping on amazon myself for one (for like $15 a month ago) and when i got it it had a 4gb card with a 3 year old copy of .en w
Re:WARING: GOATSE LINK (Score:5, Interesting)
LOL Now that was clever. Anyhow, thanks OP for the post. I think I'm going to grab one to play with. I'd have to donate $250 to get one through the link in the summary. Actually, I'm going to get two of them at that price.
It makes me wonder if maybe these folks are scamming?
They say, in the video, that they contacted the manufacturer and that they would be able to get them in bulk for $25 with a "maybe less" caveat.
The company, themselves it appears, sell that same device for $10 on Amazon and that is buying them one at a time, not in bulk. It would likely be less than $10 if they were buying them in bulk.
So why are the prices so different? It makes me wonder if they're scamming. It would be unfortunate if they were.
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And, in order to leave a public comment on the donation site you have to have made a donation.
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they don't speak English
Wikipedia is available in many languages besides English.
live a subsistence life
People don't choose to live a subsistence life. Information technology can give them other options. Few things have changed life in poor countries more than cellphones. Farmers can check global or regional prices, and know if a village cartel of buyers is ripping them off. They can get information about the weather, crop diseases, fertilizer usage, etc.
don't have easy access to batteries
Batteries are available anywhere, and there is a single global standard. A rechargable AAA batt
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People don't choose to live a subsistence life.
Not true, in many cultures people DO choose a subsistence life style. For a variety of reasons.
Its not common in the US, other than Alaska. But northern Canada and parts of Norway, Russia, South Pacific, and South America all have cultures that choose a subsistence life style.
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don't have easy access to batteries
Batteries are available anywhere, and there is a single global standard. A rechargable AAA battery is good for 500 cycles at a cost of less than a cent per cycle.
Not true, I'm afraid. Well, not true in the sense that people where I live (about 20% of the population are on the power grid) don't find themselves doing without. Cost is the major factor, though availability is often limited.
I work in IT policy, and one of the biggest things we've had to accomplish in recent years is to convince the government that access to electrical power has to be factored into their ICT policy. It may seem obvious to you and me, but it actually took a bit of work. Curiously, it was
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I don't think offline devices are nearly as useful as online ones are, and by the time you've found a place that's capable of using them, you'd really be better off lobbying government and local telcos to build a tower as well. I'm not just speculating about this, by the way, I've spent the last decade working in the developing world on exactly these sort of problems.
I'm not quite clear on the above -- do you mean that:
A. it would be more reasonable to wait years for the telecom infrastructure to become available and then go straight to Internet-capable devices (as opposed to offline devices right away)
B. Internet-capable devices are preloaded (e.g. with Wikipedia), so it's better to get them now as it will eventually be possible to fully utilize their abilities, as opposed to spending on a wave of offline devices followed by online ones
C. Internet-capable devices aren'
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I'm not quite clear on the above -- do you mean that:
A. it would be more reasonable to wait years for the telecom infrastructure to become available and then go straight to Internet-capable devices (as opposed to offline devices right away)
B. Internet-capable devices are preloaded (e.g. with Wikipedia), so it's better to get them now as it will eventually be possible to fully utilize their abilities, as opposed to spending on a wave of offline devices followed by online ones
C. Internet-capable devices aren't preloaded, but better to get them for the features they do have as they'll be more useful down the road
I defer to your experience, but was wondering because in cases A & C, it seems to me like any substantial delay would harm the educational & skills development of the kids left waiting, and "A" would result in some kids reaching adulthood without getting their chance.
I like B most, with C as a viable option if B isn't possible.
But emphatically: No, I don't ever advise waiting. What I meant to say is that when someone comes to me with a proposal like this (i.e. to give offline wikipedia devices to students) I suggest that they push harder to get internet into their target schools as well. In my experience, having internet connectivity makes computers many times more attractive to people of all ages in the developing world. Besides, a VSAT dish with generating capacity an
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I agree the English aspect is likely to limit its usefulness. Although it's getting somewhat more common for kids around the world to be able to read a bit of English.
There are, in any case, already large Wikipedia versions in some other languages, so they wouldn't have to be translated from scratch. And some of them overlap with languages widely spoken in countries with poor internet access, such as French and Spanish.
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And some of them overlap with languages widely spoken in countries with poor internet access, such as French and Spanish.
True, but to avoid any misunderstanding it's probably best to point out that some areas of France are quite well developed - in Paris you could easily think you were in a modern country.
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I had in mind mostly these French speakers [wikipedia.org], but point taken. :P
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I agree the English aspect is likely to limit its usefulness. Although it's getting somewhat more common for kids around the world to be able to read a bit of English.
There are, in any case, already large Wikipedia versions in some other languages, so they wouldn't have to be translated from scratch. And some of them overlap with languages widely spoken in countries with poor internet access, such as French and Spanish.
A bigger limit to the usefulness is the amount of inaccurate information on Wikipedia. While the concept is great, there is a lot to be desired given the implimentation.
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Hi! when we contacted the manufacturer, he said that any language version thats already available for the WikiReader will be able to be pre-installed, There's several available: http://dev.thewikireader.com/language-packs/ he was interested in putting effort into getting any other languages needed as well, including one developed by the UK specifically for classroom education: http://schools-wikipedia.org/
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Why are you paying 2.5 times the price for the same device listed on Amazon?
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or gingerbread
This does work (Score:5, Insightful)
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actually in most intelligent circles to consider something as TRUTH (about an event) it takes N independent sources (where N is greater than 3 in most cases).
Wikipedia is good for 3 things mostly
1 to get the keywords on a subject
2 to get a quick "dance through" a subject
3 REFERENCES (you know that buncha links at the bottom??)
Re:Yes, spread the false information. (Score:4, Insightful)
Exactly. People who dismiss Wikipedia because of its inaccuracies often forget about what we usually did *before* Wikipedia existed: We made stuff up based on our intuitions, *maybe* talked about it at a coffee shop with a small number of our friends, and believed it as fact. Sure, if we were doing academic research, we were more rigorous (and that's improved, too, IMHO), but how often did that happen? Now, with portable devices that can access the WWW, our first reponse when we're not sure about something is often to look it up.
I can't emphasize this enough: Instant access to the web is resulting in a culture shift from making stuff up to looking it up, and Wikipedia is the most important place where people go to do that.
So, yes, even though Wikipedia is a repository of groupthink (and the critics are right that we mustn't forget that), it's groupthink that takes into account the views of a much larger number of contributors, and is much more accurate than the groupthink of a small, isolated group of people.
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Instant access to the web is resulting in a culture shift from making stuff up to looking it up, and Wikipedia is the most important place where people go to do that.
So, yes, even though Wikipedia is a repository of groupthink (and the critics are right that we mustn't forget that), it's groupthink that takes into account the views of a much larger number of contributors, and is much more accurate than the groupthink of a small, isolated group of people.
Unless you are reading a subject which is "owned" by one individual, who furiously defends it against changes they don't agree with. You don't even have to get to an obscure subject to find this, just a non-controversial subject that might not be that much fun to write about for most people. If you come across this, it isn't groupthink- it is just people "making stuff up".
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If it is at all political, historical or religious, ... people are highly biased one way or the other about it and anything read has to be read with a grain of salt.
There; FTFY. ;-)
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Wikipedia is pretty accurate (Score:2)
...if you allow that the inaccuracies which do appear rarely stay there for long and vandalism is often repaired within 5 minutes.
I use my wikireader regularly (Score:4, Interesting)
When I just need some text from wikipedia, I pick up the wikireader and stab at it and lo, I get it very quickly. I also have wiktionary installed so it does that as well. And I own a mobile phone with wifi and multitouch, so I could use full wikipedia. I can get results from my wikireader while I'm still waiting for the browser to load, in little more time than it takes to wake my phone up and unlock it. It's far and away faster than waking up a netbook and doing the same thing, since the ones I'm using now lack SSD...
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you clearly need a better phone.
I don't deny it, but I'm less than $100 into my unlocked Xperia Play including the 32GB memory card and the dock. I actually play games on it when I'm out places, like the tire shop — three of them came with the dock which I got on eBay for $12, two came with the phone, and it plays [some] playstation games. It's adequate as a PDA and is actually quite excellent as a phone, in that the reception seems okay (better than the other phones I've tried here at home in the sticks) and the face detection feat
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In a way. If you don't mind ordering a ton of them, various manufacturers will brand and often allow you to customize software for a variety of products, e-ink readers included.
A quick search turns up a few manufactures with e-ink reader products for you to brand and/or otherwise customize: Tomstar, Sim-Tek, APEC, Win-Win, Penel, and a host of others. Products vary, though a quick check shows at least one with a 9.7" display.
Not exactly DIY, but a pretty cheap option (well under 100k) if you really need t
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have you checked the prices on encyclopedias, like, ever? never mind one in swahili.
do you have any kind of idea how fucking much shipping them would cost?
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Since wikipedia is open source you just ship one and allow free copying. Either electronically or manually.
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I already did the hack to the wikireader a few years ago.
https://sites.google.com/site/sporkinum/ [google.com]
Questions, questions. (Score:2)
At a cost of $20 per device, Aislinn Dewey and Victor Grigas (who works for Wikimedia) are trying to raise funds to buy up the company's inventory and ship WikiReaders to kids in places without Internet connectivity.
Will the reader stand up to the physical abuse it will receive?
Rapid attrition translates into much higher costs and limited availability. I don't altogether trust the geek's affection for dirt-cheap gadgets,
Is the Wikipedia written at a grade school reading level?
How closely is the English language Wikipedia tied to the third world curricula and classroom?
Significant deployments of the OLPC laptop are almost unknown outside of Hispanic speaking Central and South America.
There has to be a reason for tha
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A whole world of knowledge for new readers (Score:1)
Do these wikireaders display graphics? If so, kids are in for a treat of both real pictures and hand-drawn illustrations at the above links.
Orville Redenbacher (Score:1)