Reflections on Semantic Web and Alipi

2011 Oct 6

This week Steve Jobs passed away at the far-too-young-for-anyone-to-die age of 56, and India launched Aakash, a tablet computer seen by many as the ipad-killer, the restoftheworld's rejoinder to OLPC's xo laptop. Steve Jobs was truly brilliant, and had a unique, rarecombination of geek and design talent. His work represents some of the best moves in technology of our age. Will the next age be even better, with brilliantly designed technology being accessible not only to elites in the rich North, but to the many millions of the rising South?

Telecoms and Education Minister Kapil Sibal said today: "The rich have access to the digital world, the poor and ordinary have been excluded. Aakash will end that digital divide." India has a long history of appropriate-technology design: e.g., the creators of the simputer should also be remembered as precursors to this moment. Even if their design did not directly make it to the commercial market, it is experiments such as theirs that made other steps forward become possible.

OK, something more to add to this week's commentary: 2011 Oct 7 is Ada Lovelace Day.

http://mindshift.kqed.org/2011/10/ada-lovelace-day-celebrates-women-in-stem/ says:

"many have never heard of Ada Lovelace, even though she’s credited with writing the first computer program.

If you haven’t heard of her, here’s some background.

Born in 1815, Ada Lovelace was the daughter of the poet Lord Byron, although he had no relationship with her and died when she was only nine. Ada pursued her interests in mathematics, studying with some of the best-known mathematicians of her time. In 1833, she was introduced to Charles Babbage, with whom she worked and corresponded about his early computing machines. She also translated the Italian mathematician Luigi Menabrea’s memoir on Babbage’s proposed machine, the Analytical Engine, and in doing so added her own notes to the translation. These notes included an algorithm designed to be processed by the machine — the first computer program."