State Of The Simputer

2br02b writes "Readers might recall the Simputer (Simple, Inexpensive, Multilingual Computer) whose story Slashdot has been following over the past few years, including its release in October 2002 and most recently the Scientific American article in November. Rediff.com has an informative overview on the status of what was introduced as a low-cost computer for the poor to be sold for under Rs 10000 ($200). Of the two companies that have been given licences, one has yet to put the product on the market while the other is only looking at bulk sales at prices from Rs 12000 to Rs 20000 ($400). Only between 1500 and 2000 Simputers are out on the market."

Computer for the poor?

HOw about we concentrate on basic human needs like food, clean, running water and shelter before we go doling out handhelds to people?

I'm not at all against technology education and maximizing its use wherever possible, but there truly are some things that must take priority here.

Re:argueable, but...

I think quite possibly what he meant is that they can use the computers to learn about ways of improving their farming, to learn to dig wells, etc.

Knowledge is power, as they say...

Daniel

The 35 cent solution.

>>They can use the computers to learn about ways of improving their farming...

So what's wrong with a photocopied pamphlet or even a book? Hundreds, perhaps thousands of booklets could be printed for the cost of one of these computers.

If the goal is the distribution of information, this is the wrong tool for the job.

Re:argueable, but...

For example: If you give poor farmers in Africa, India, ... computers, they could use them to improve there farming and harvest more food or to make a better profit selling their harvest.

3rd world farmers suffer more from trade barriers, dumping by the US and Europe, beauracracy and wars than a lack of efficiency

Re:argueable, but...

The most efficient farming techniques available to most third world farmers still cannot compete with intensive farming from the U.S and Europe

You forgot the word "subsidised".

Re:Computer for the poor?

This is such an age old troll that it is not funny. You can actually post it to every article and slashdot and be on topic. Why buy a new iBook when we could stop world hunger? Why upgrade your kernel when you could be in Africa building houses? There is always something better than we can be doing with our time. If you are so altruistic then what are you doing posting on slashdot?

This is a device that is meant to help close the digital divide. You take for granted how much information is at your fingertips and what advantages there are to having that information. If you are looking for a job where are you going to start? Probably on Monster or HotJobs or some other site. Send out some resumes by email that you typed in your word processor. Now take away your computer and try to do the old fashioned way. Type your resume on a typewriter, pay to have it photocopied, flip through a newspaper and walk door to door only to have them reject you because you don't have computer experience.

Not everything is about helping the poorest of the poor. There are a lot more people out there who need some help too.

computer for the poor?

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I guess 200-400$ aren't that little for a poor Indian. Apart from that fact that I have to wonder whatfor people living in some fuckin slum need a computer!

Re: computer for the poor?

Apart from that fact that I have to wonder whatfor people living in some fuckin slum need a computer!
How about to educate themselves and get out of the slum. I came from a poor rural area not realy a slum. My parents overextended their budget buing a C64 for us when I was in junior high. Many people saw that as a waste of money. My parents saw that as an investment. It paid off. I'm a programmer now.

Re: computer for the poor?

"Poor people are generally poor because they are either dumb, lazy, or both"

What a clueless moron you are. That may well be true in the affluent west where if you work hard
you can better yourself but in some countries the children don't get a chance to be educated before they're out in the fields helping their parents
grow food or even supporting their brothers and sisters after their parents have died from disease or war!

"They just want the government to hand them welfare and be done with it. "

Yeah , the welfare systems in africa and india are known to be the best in the world right!
Jesus , get a clue you insular dick!

Comparitive Soscio-Economics

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I guess 200-400$ aren't that little for a poor Indian. Apart from that fact that I have to wonder whatfor people living in some **** slum need a computer!

I'm not sure how it works in India, but it is probably (please correct me if I'm wrong) similar to the Philippines where the average college graduate makes about $300 / month.

If you assume that the average college graduate in the US makes $3k - $4k / month, then a fair comparison would be a $3500 computer in the U.S. to a $300 computer in the Philippines (or perhaps, India). From an expense point of view, it is likely to be affordable (although certainly a luxury).

But to imagine that these people do not wish to communicate, learn and reach out to the world through the Internet is fairly ignorant. In my experience with families from the third world, a computer (and even a broadband connection, which can be had for pennies on our dollars) is more desirable than a telephone or television.

My conclusion? The simputer may not fit the bill, but the need and economics are right on.

Re: computer for the poor?

What's the point when for $200 the "poor" could by a Linux pc from Wal-Mart [walmart.com].

Let's not discount the fact that the per capita GDP in India is $2,540, which would make a $200 PC in India worth $2960.63 in US dollars (US per capita GDP = $37,600).

Some help that is...

Re: computer for the poor?

so you mean that indians would be paying the same relative part of their salary on a computer now that boomers spent in the 70s and 80s?

i would say its pretty clear that many gen-X-ers got quite a bit of a technological leg-up from their boomer parents overextending their salary similarly.

the sale of cheap computing to underdeveloped countries is a Good Thing (tm).

sure, they need improvements in other basic areas too - but not everyone who wants to help can work on the same project (too many cooks), and some people just don't have expertise or experience in providing and distributing clean water, replenishing spent soil, or extending the electrical infrastructure.

does it make it a less noble goal to bring computing prices down? to provide an educational and informational medium to these people?

indians in particular living in the world's oldest democracy, would certainly tangibly benefit from being more educated voters.
the broader online marketplace also provides tangible benefits, even for the underprivileged (who benefit more from better prices/competition).

if anything, that money makes more sense for them now than it did when the boomers bought into it for X-ers. The internet adds exponentially to the value of a home computer.

not all of their children will grow up to be programmers or engineers, but there are tangible benefits to be had. yes, it requires some proactivity, and yes - not everyone in india (or any other underdeveloped nation) needs/would actually benefit from a PC.

but if only a dozen, or a hundred take the opportunity and turn it to their will - that'd make it a worthwhile cause.

how do they expect it to sell?

So now pricing it up there with laptops and high end handhelds will get it selling? Wasn't the whole point of the simputer as computing for the masses and not the uber-rich? (Yes kiddies, you are considered Uber rich to 4/5ths the worlds' population.)

Another great idea tanked by a bunch of PHB's

I'm going to go into direct competition

with my Automated Bead Array Computational Unit System. This can be made much more cheaply, the batteries alst forever, and it never crashes!

just donate your old ones

isn't there a better way to provide computing technology to the third-world masses? perhaps someone should start a program for donating old, outdated computers for the good of poorer nations. (if there isn't already one)

Aren't we all poor to some extent?

In the reverse of many of the comments on here, who wouldn't want a less expensive computer, provided it still did the functions they need? I agree that gamers need the latest hardware, etc. but shouldn't these machines first go to replace the expensive desktops here in the U.S., and perhaps some of our excess food supply could go over there? A poor person would probably prefer numerous free lunches to a free laptop.

What a shame

To be so close to having a computer accessible by all. It is hard to estimate what the implications could have been if everyone, every where had access to a computer. But of course the inventors yet again failed to factor in corporate greed.

Utopian ideals...

An idea like this sounds fantastic - but is riddled with potential problems.

If they produce something with low capabilities, but a low, low price, then they will be accused of producing underpowered rubbish.

As soon as you start to increase the potential of the platform, the costs start to rise until you have an elitist product that the intended market cannot afford.

There *may* be a happy medium somewhere, but the edvil is in the details of finding it. In the consumerist marketplace we have in the West, production prices are already pushed as low as possible. Squeezing out extra pennies in production is almost impossible. The potential is there though to reduce prices through the marketing and adminitration side of things (pay no fat-cat salaries to the sales & management departments), but then again the product quickly becomes unfashionable and therefore undesirable.

I would love to see such a product to succeed, but it's a hell of an uphill stuggle!

Those well-paid Indians

If that's where our tech support and software development jobs are going, then their wages will go up, and an increasing number of them will be able to afford the simputer, right? As for those knee-jerkers who say, "let's provide food, water, etc. first" please remember that this is being marketed and sold by a private company that has no obligation to address those sorts of social problems. If anything, increasing a country's tech literacy helps increase the general prosperity

What it all comes down to is

They fucked up. $400 is way too expensive for a poor indian person to afford.

"Well, it's not a cheap computer.

Its proponents have since discarded the buzzword -- 'cheap computer' -- that brought the Simputer into the limelight.

"We are not making a cheap computer. We are making a sophisticated device that will make computing possible for everyone," declares Professor Manohar."

What a crock of bull. How is computing possible for "everyone" when "most" Indians can't afford to spend $400 on a PDA?

Um...

>people were interchanging polarities while inserting batteries and battery contacts were coming loose due to rough handling.

The UI interface better be really really simple.

And yes I think this is a dumb idea. Just give them old desktop computers. There is no reason for portability to be simple, inexpensive or multilingual.

Why a special product?

One can already but desktops (with monitors) for less than $300. They are not what is needed but the price is there.
I also am aware that any computer for 3rd world must have batteries and solar capability, AND be dirt/water resistant. But with lower prices for smaller (12in.) flat screens and integration, why is it so hard? As an afterthought, ever wondered what these computers would use for printers? Do they come with a roll of 5-inch "cash register" paper and a few spares for an internal printer?

Needs a few changes

1. AA batteries, not AAA or fixed rechargeable Li-ION. AAA have a terribly low capacity (~450mAh compared to up to 1900mAh for AA).

2. Cheap and robust external power supply. Batteries are expensive.

2. B&W screen, for godsake. Color is luxury, make a high-contrast large, protected B&W screen that can show decent amounts of information.

3. Little chiclet keyboard that plugs in to a mini-USB slot. Something like the old Spectrum keyboards, cheap, nasty, unbreakable.

That would make it cheaper and more useful. Imagine a computer you'd happily give to an 10-year old, no matter if it breaks.

Lastly, I'd add bluetooth because it's a tiny extra cost, only a few $, and provides unbreakable networking and connectivity better than any physical connection, and make the whole thing run on a stripped-down embedded Linux.

$400 is much too expensive

Considering the fact that 16% of the planet doesn't even make $400 a year [globalrichlist.com], this is still ridiculously expensive.

Intention and Commercialism

Views subject to media-frenzied hype and/or misunderstanding, as pointed out in the article, but nevertheless...

"We are fairly clear that commercial success has to go with our development goals,"

I seem to remember, when the Simputer first hit the backpages of IT newspaper supplements, that the point of the simputer was to provide a set of designs that could be produced cheaply, the idea being that this production would then be available to anyone with the right resources/motivation, rather than just those who wanted to sell it for profit to geeky businessmen. When I signed onto the Simputer mailing list, there was a lot of talk about this, and the method in which a charge would only be entailed for mass-producers - everybody else, wanting to produce less than a certain number of units, was free to take the designs (and the software, IIRC) and use them.

Casting an eye over the Simputer site [simputer.org] reveals an interesting addition - the SGPL [simputer.org], or Simputer General Public License. There are then TWO separate licenses (the SDML [simputer.org] and the, uh, SDML [simputer.org] to manufacture it. Alas, I have no time at the moment to work out precisely what the differences are, though judging by the title ("Simputer" versus "Simputerised"), this is something to do with which components you intend to use.

Nevertheless, it would seem that the original intention to roll out a technology for the common good has slipped a little, though the reasons for this I can only speculate on, and would be wrong to do so... Alas, I think that the most practical way to achieve the original goals, to promote the use of communication technologies (as this is the essential bit) in the same way that radio technology spread, is to make it truly owned by nobody, veritably public domain. To achieve it alongside commercial interests means something usually has to give on one side or the other.

On a different note, perhaps the EU could gleam some advice on patents from the SGPL too...

The High Cost of Software

It's strange how SimCity, SimCoaster, SimSafari and the Sims all were priced normally, and yet SimPuter appears to be behind schedule and way overpriced.

Perhaps moving development offshore isn't the cost saver it's been promoted as.

:)

What is so special about that?

I dunno, but at Price.Ru [price.ru] you can find plenty of PCs for $200+ and plenty of monitors for $100+. That's $300-350 for a new off-the-shelf computer and you don't even need a new name for that. There surely must be a way to make a functional computer for $200. That would be worth mentioning, not a $400 low-end PC.

obsolete before released

Commodity computers are still on "Internet time". The design-to-distribution cycle of a Dell, Gateway etc. is less than sic months. Their performance-per-price nearly doubles annually. Custom computers cannot keep up. Silicon Valley is littered with the wreckage of scientific computing companies and PDAs who fell off this relentless developement trajectory.

Simputer became expensive because..

... it was loaded with goodies. Quoting from the article- "Our Simputer comes with a smart card reader. It has a USB master that can host different kind of peripherals. It has an in-built modem, GSM/CDMA data interface, GPS receiver and the equivalent of a 400 MHZ Celeron [comment: its a SA proc]. It is a power packed machine," says Samyeer Metrani, group manager (embedded systems), Encore Technologies. Probably they needed to include the goodies for special purposes, but somehow they got in the "basic" model where many of these weren't even needed. Comeon... even Palm and Zaurus don't have GPS receiver and CDMA+GSM interface, buildin modem and a 400(!) MHz processor. The cost can surely be brought down, but then they would be competing with established players. So they chose the alternative route to play in niche markets with feature packed versions... and its very well known that benefits of economies of scale are usually not available to niche players!

Simputer "became" expensive because...

[sorry for HTML submission previously.] ... it was loaded with goodies. Quoting from the article-

"Our Simputer comes with a smart card reader. It has a USB master that can host different kind of peripherals. It has an in-built modem, GSM/CDMA data interface, GPS receiver and the equivalent of a 400 MHZ Celeron [comment: its a SA proc]. It is a power packed machine," says Samyeer Metrani, group manager (embedded systems), Encore Technologies.

Probably they needed to include the goodies for special purposes, but somehow they got in the "basic" model where many of these weren't even needed. Comeon... even Palm and Zaurus don't have GPS receiver and CDMA+GSM interface, buildin modem and a 400(!) MHz processor.

The cost can surely be brought down, but then they would be competing with established players. So they chose the alternative route to play in niche markets with feature packed versions... and its very well known that benefits of economies of scale are usually not available to niche players!

Cheaper than the Simputer

The Simputer is a neat idea
but who is going to buy them
if you can already get something cheaper/faster
with more storage?

Here is a 1.2 Duron with a 20 gig drive for $200 US.
[walmart.com]
http://www.walmart.com/catalog/product.gsp?product _id=2138700&cat=86796&type=19&dept=3944&path=0%3A3 944%3A3951%3A41937%3A86796

Of course if you have no place to plug it in
then you're hosed.

Deceptive Marketing

I think this whole Simputer deal was all about deceptive marketing by a company to get their name out. They touted a cheap computer for the poor and got a lot of media attention. They came up with an expensive PDA and their name got quite well publicized in the bargain

Tired of Patronizing Attitude of Slasdotters

Why does everyone keep saying "poor Indian" again and again. It ain't all that poor at all. India is the largest consumer of gold in the world. Indian programmers are among the best in the world (no offence to others). If you visit India you will see that the social system is very strong. Relatives help others, and strangers help others too. That is the reason that we do not have any social security system. Kids take care of their parents, unlike here where they go and dump them in an old-age home. People are overall a lot happy than they are in the west. IMHO.

more tech details about the simputer

Not long ago, the guys from encore gave a talk at our local lug on the simputer and from what i could gleam, they now seem to be moving towards customizing the simputer for special sectors like Manufacturing cos., etc., instead of relying too much on it's original purpose to fund themselves. You can find slides from the talks here. [linux-bangalore.org]

I think we're missing the point....

IIRC the whole point of the simputer, was to produce a cheap multi-language system that would work reliably in third world conditions i.e. areas with unreliable or no local power, high levels of dust etc. for sale to poor governments, NGA's etc. for use in educational programs. The ideal setting is one set up in the "mud hut" one room school in a small rural village. The teacher uses it for classes, both for the village children and adults. Yes our obsolete systems could be donated, but if they sit unused because of overheating and dust or a burned out power supply, due to the poor local electrical system etc., then all we have done, is save space in our own landfill.

This product makes sense in India.

I have seen all the previous responses - provide them food, not computers.. provide them clothing and health facilities .. not computers.. blah blah blah..
But obviously who ever was posting it didnt have even the vaguest idea about India or for that matter any third world over populated nation.
Firstly, this is not for personal ownership. I dont think that marketing people in India expect to sell $400 product to Bhole Ram (equivalent of Joe Consumer) who earns $500 annually. This product would be for collective use - like those internet cafes- most people in developed countries use internet cafes(if at all) because they cannot lug their pc/laptop around. But its a different story in developing countries - people use them because they cant afford to buy a pc and have regular internet connection. So it makes perfect sense for a village governing body to buy one of these and provide some kind of access scheme to the villagers to use it. Why a simputer? why not a pc? firstly cost.. secondly size... last but not the least usability and maintanance.
Cellphone networks are easier to get access to than regular phone lines in india and it makes perfect sense to make provision for wireless internet access in the simputer.

Now I want to address the "why computers to the hungry?" part. Its about information dissemenation.
1. Natural disasters - floods, cyclones, forest fires.. earth quakes.
2. accidents...
3. pestilences and animal diseases.
4. Information about governance

Time and again the above have proved to be major problems in India and they took large toll because of the lack of information. In a 1977 storm surge 20k people died in coastal Andhra villages and the reason is that they never knew about the impending cyclone.

plant and animal pestilences usually sweep across the nation.. nothing much can be done about it if people are not informed in advance.

proper medical care never reaches accident victims in villages because the nearest phone is 20 miles away and the nearest doctor is 50 miles away.

Redtape is a way of life in India. If you dont know the rules of the red tape, you are so screwed. poor uninformed villagers are the ones who usually fall prey to these practises.

Now - coming to the hungry and starving part of things, people in one part of the country can die of starvation without any help reaching them - only due to the lack of information.
yes - there are millions of people under the poverty line in India. many of them can get only 1 meal a day with difficulty.. the only way to empower these people is by providing them access to information and letting them decide what they want to with their own lives.
now all you booers and nay sayers can take ur crock and shove it... u know where.
they got no food.. why give them clothes? they got no clothes.. why give them houses? they got no houses.. why freedom of speech?... you all are mary antoinettes...

Why?

With devices like the Palm Zire at $99 why do you invent a "low cost" device at $400??? The Zire 71 has colour, integrated camera, lots of memory, memory card (SD/MMC), 320x320 screen what else do people need? Startup hardware companies just don't make sense anymore buy a standard platform or have some far east company (China, Singapore, Taiwain, Malayasia ....) build a standard or copy a standard, write some custom software for you're app and you are done. These guys had some blue sky idea that they could become rich selling to the poor, and then got over confident and suffered from the old standard featue creap and instead of getting rich they will be looking for a new job. They were supposed to be going low cost, but they have obviously failed. There are plenty of $400 devices on the market already I think there are PocketPC devices below $300 what is missing is the India specific stuff, and thats what they should be concentating on!!!

cheap linux pc

Currently in india, as soon as a community gets electric power, the first thing they buy is a TV.
The tv becomes their gateway to the rest of the world-- a one way feed.
if you really want, you should build a computer that costs 150$ linux machine and uses the tv as a monitor-- i think that would be a more ideal solution. Basically, if walmart can make linux machines and sell them at $200, it shouldn't be that much harder to bring the price down by 50.
in cost in rupees, that would be 7500/- cheaper than the simputer.

Pictures

I know ya'll like pictures and here are some (before the final outer design):

More recent picture [jetro.go.jp]
Picture 1 [jetro.go.jp]

Picture 2 [jetro.go.jp]

Picture 3 [jetro.go.jp]

Picture 4 [jetro.go.jp]

Picture 5 [jetro.go.jp]

Use of Simputer for Spot Billing of Electricity Metering [picopeta.com]

More Case [picopeta.com]

Studies

See Simputer in action in the Bay Area

The Peninsula Linux Users Group (PenLUG [penlug.rog]) will be hosting a talk on the Simputer at their September 25th meeting down near Redwood City, in the SF Bay Area.

The same speaker will be visiting the Linux Users' Group of Davis (LUGOD [lugod.org]) on October 20th [lugod.org], near Sacramento, Calif.

Re:Yeah, but...

I must be tired today... i fell for that link twice!

I can't seem to find..

I can't seem to find the machine in your second link. Would you mind pointing it out to me?

Re:Not much point

> I don't think there is much point in this.. a mobile phone could encapsulate most of this functionality for a quater the price. Simon.

That's true for us rich westerners.

Fancy smartphones are sold to us at a loss by the telcos because they assume (and it's a risk) that they'll recoup the cost as we use data services
over a fixed term contract with inclusive rental charges.

Ask Vodafone how much a P800 would cost with no contract and you might find the Simputer starts looking like good value for money.

And let's not assume that its only value is in the hands of random end users - who obviously can't afford it.

Take a nationwide census as an example. Put one of these in the hands of the (thousands of) census takers on the ground and they'll (hopefully) gather more accurate data faster. With this information it's possible to spend development money more wisely on those who are never going to see a computer in their lives.

Another example would be stock control of perishable foodstuffs, each employee in the warehouses would have one, the benefits are obvious.

Yes its "expensive" technology and beyond the reach of most, but that doesn't mean it can't be a worthwhile investment in the right circumstances. It may well be the cheapest (real) solution if the right apps get written.

I guess we'll have to wait and see...