On 16th March, Bill Gates attacked the idea that Nicholas Negroponte had, meaning the $100 laptop by saying:

“The last thing you want to do for a shared use computer is have it be something without a disk … and with a tiny little screen,”, “If you are going to go have people share the computer, get a broadband connection and have somebody there who can help support the user, geez, get a decent computer where you can actually read the text and you’re not sitting there cranking the thing while you’re trying to type,”.

Sure, Bill Gates and Microsoft can say whatever they want, but not doing anything about it. Why buy a laptop which costs $100, when you can buy theirs for a lot more.

“Why criticize me in public,” Negroponte asked rhetorically of Gates’ recent criticism. “It’s not about a weak computer. It’s about a thin, slim, trim, fast computer.”

Powered by an AMD 500MHz x86 processor, the laptop will have 128MB DRAM, 512MB flash memory, and Wi-Fi mesh capability for wireless communications. And don’t’ forget the crank.

Next thing Negroponte talked is about the OS that will come up with this laptop. He talked about both solutions (Windows and Linux), but he asked both firms to create a “slimmer” version, because Windows and Linux got too “fat”, and they need to lose some weight.

The laptop will likely cost $135 when it is initially released next year, although the price will drop to $100 in the following year.

Hoping that everything will come up and make this project a viable one, because not all can afford a laptop for hundreds and thousand of dollars.