IT and Society: Kindle e-Readers donated to children of developing countries

The non-profit organization Worldreader.org has launched a pilot project aimed at providing children of developing countries with Amazon e-Readers Kindle. The first devices will be given to pupils of the village of Ayenyah, Ghana.

Kindle offers access to over 400,000 books, however its most part is in English. According to Worldreader.org, English-speaking developing countries will be the first to get e-Readers. The non-profit says Amazon has donated an unspecified number of Kindles for the project, and says its donors will "help subsidize the gap between the cost of the e-readers and the price local governments are willing to pay." By the way, the standard-version Kindles have a retail price of $259.

According to Worldreader.org, e-readers will eventually be cheaper than books purchasing. Kindle e-Readers will be available with several downloaded books, whereas donors will be ready to subsidize purchasing of other books. To provide an access to Amazon schools will be equipped with Internet service and an electric generator.

Worldreader.org has a strong connection with the online shop Amazon. One of its co-founders is David Risher, a former Amazon senior vice president of product and platform development.

Worldreader.org project has lots in common with OLPC initiative, whose mission is to provide every child worldwide with a laptop. Within the framework of the OLPC program a special extremely cheap notebook computer was developed, which is adapted to hard conditions of developing countries, such as for instance, frequent power cuts.