That’s a picture of a prototype of a very tiny PC that a group called the Raspberry Pi Foundation hopes to turn into a real product that could be sold for about $25. It has 128MB of memory, which is enough to run some flavor of Linux, and would rely on an SD card for storage (presently they go up to 32GB). There’s only one USB port, but you could presumably connect a small hub so you could attach a keyboard and a mouse and maybe even a USB WiFi adapter (since there’s no built-in networking). It would be cool if they do end up being able to bring this to the market for such a small price point, but everything about it reminds me of the hype that went into the OLPC seven or eight years ago. Meanwhile, by the time they do get it to market, smartphones will have replaced PCs anyway.
While we’re talking about tiny tech, here’s a story from Singularity Hub about video cameras the size of a grain of salt that can be used for endoscopy (among other uses) and are intended to be disposable. They’ll probably end up embedded in so many different things your head will explode, but at least there will be plenty of pictures of that moment to share on Facebook.
Aaaand, speaking of ubiquitous cameras and their myriad uses…here’s ANOTHER Singularity Hub post that wonders why we STILL don’t like to engage in video chatting, even though it’s gotten to be essentially free and trivial to set up. If you figure it out, I’m sure the folks at MicroSkype would love to hear it.
Fast Company reports that PBS conducted a survey of iPad users with children as part of their effort to develop some iPad apps and discovered that 70% of them are willing to let their small children play with their iPads and regularly download apps specifically for the kids to play with. Like their headline implies, this really only reaffirms one of the main criticisms leveled at the iPad: that it is simply a toy, albeit a 500-dollar toy. The school board in my hometown might want to take notice of this.
Speaking of tablet computers (man, I am just FULL of segues today), next week Barnes & Noble are expected to announce the next generation of their Nook e-reader (since all of us left behind from the Rapture will have plenty of spare time to catch up on our reading), and Ars Technica recently speculated on what that announcement might entail. Their guess is that it’s a refresh of the original e-ink Nook and not the more advanced color Nook, which lately is everybody’s favorite cheap way to get a tablet computer.
Lastly, British tech news website The Register, who win the award for most frequent non-ironic use of the word “Boffin”, says that it looks like Cisco is going to unload the Linksys home router business as part of the same realignment strategy that saw them discontinue the Flip videocamera a couple of weeks ago. I know the home wireless router business isn’t what it used to be since the cable companies that provide Internet service to most American homes now incorporate wireless routers right into their cable modem devices, but you gotta think that somebody would pick that up.
