Nicholas Negroponte On Tablets And The Future Of Reading

12:48

October 12, 2010

Nicholas Negroponte, the former director of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Media Lab who now heads the nonprofit One Laptop Per Child project, discusses his effort to provide $100 laptops to children in the developing world. (AP) — Nicholas Negroponte discusses his effort to provide $100 laptops to children in the developing world. (AP)

MIT Media Lab founder Nicholas Negroponte's One Laptop Per Child association may have to re-christen itself "One Tablet Per Child."

Negroponte's organization has deployed about 2 million of its $100 XO-1 laptops in developing nations. But last week it received a $5.6 million grant to develop the XO-3, a tablet-style computer that could replace the bulky green-and-white boxes that children are using from Colombia to Kenya.

Negroponte has been arguing for decades that screens are the future of reading, something he'll be talking about more at the second annual Boston Book Festival.

But first, he joins us to talk about tablets and the future of the written word.

Guest:

Nicholas Negroponte, founder, One Laptop Per Child

This program aired on October 12, 2010.