Project Cauã: Increasing Technology in 2nd and 3rd World Countries
As a new blogger for The Tech Fire, I would like to start out my first post discussing a conference that I had the pleasure of attending last weekend at the University of Illinois. Out of the many interesting presentations I was able to listen in on, the one I found to be the most innovative and world-changing was that of Project Cauã.
Project Cauã is a humanitarian effort to improve living conditions by utilizing open-source technology in Latin American countries. Similar to the nonprofit organization One Laptop Per Child, Project Cauã aims to increase the use of technology in 2nd and 3rd world countries in the hope that increasing IT skills will have a positive impact on a country’s education and economy as a whole.
What are the goals of Project Cauã?
Project Cauã aims to make computers easier to use, reduce the amount of electricity usage, create gratis wireless bubbles over large urban areas, and allow for super-computing grids of extremely low cost. Best of all, this project will create millions of new high-tech jobs world-wide without costing the taxpayer a single penny.
A little about the man behind the project:
Jon Hall, nicknamed “Maddog” by his students, is the Executive Director of Linux International and has held many positions such as a programmer, systems designer, systems administrator, product manager, technical marketing manager, author and educator.
He has worked for such companies as Western Electric Corporation, Bell Laboratories, Aetna Life and Casualty, Digital Equipment Corporation, VA Linux Systems, and SGI. He currently works as an independent consultant, and is involved with bringing environmentally friendly computing to emerging marketplaces through Project Cauã
Visit www.projectcaua.org to find out more about how Project Cauã is helping change the world through Open-Source technology.
