Mr. Negroponte, I'm afraid you have company. According to Apple Insider, hip-hop star, 50 Cent is in talks with Apple's Steve Jobs to help put affordable computers in the hand of less wealthy inner city residents.
"I'm creating a foundation that will be around for a long time, because fame can come and go or get lost in the lifestyle and the splurging," 50 Cent told Forbes Magazine. "I never got into it for the music. I got into it for the business."
From Apple Insider:
"The negotiations between the rapper and Apple are for a 'branding deal.'
50 Cent ranks amongst the world's richest celebrities, raking in over $67 million in 2005 from record sales and branding deals that include a line of sneakers, a video game and his G-Unit clothing line.
'[Jobs] is setting a new standard in the music business,' said 50's manager, Chris Lighty. 'Let's just say we get each other.'"
It will be interesting to see how this effort, both domestic and using Apple computers, compares to Nicholas Negroponte's initiative to put $100 laptops in the hands of children in lesser developed countries.
I am fascinated by the similarities and differences between poverty in the U.S. and abroad, and by what I see as the artificial separation between efforts to improve lives within the U.S. and in other parts of the world. Now that we have two independent efforts to address the growing digital divide, we may gain a better understanding of which strategies are more promising. We may also gain insight into the complexities of poverty that are country specific and those that are prevalent throughout the world.
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