India's $20 Tablet--A Game Changer

[John F Kennedy III]

It's pretty cool, but the commercial (unsubsidized) price seems to be somewhere between $60 and $80 depending on what story you read. Still seems to be a great deal.

I'm a big fan of the Raspberry Pi which retails for $35. It doesn't have a touch screen or GPRS radio included, but a hacker could definitely add those on if desired.

A hacker can make something touchscreen?

[jmdrake]

A hacker can make something touchscreen?

Sure. It's called "plugging it into the touchscreen".

See: http://www.chalk-elec.com/?p=1553

[2young2vote]

There are certain goods that actually lose sales because they are too cheap. People expect Tablets to be a certain price and this one being less than half the cost of most competitors could have a negative perception.

[ZenBowman]

There are certain goods that actually lose sales because they are too cheap. People expect Tablets to be a certain price and this one being less than half the cost of most competitors could have a negative perception.

Its made for the Indian market though. A lot of things that make sense there don't make sense here.

For example, not so long ago it was very common to find Rs 1/- (2 cents) shampoo in tiny packs. The people who bought it were not travelers, they were just people who couldn't afford a full bottle. Many people lived hand to mouth so buying shampoo once a week for 2 cents was what they did, even though they could have bought a larger bottle and paid less per ounce.

Its hard to imagine that if you've lived all your life in the US, very eye opening experience.

[jmdrake]

There are certain goods that actually lose sales because they are too cheap. People expect Tablets to be a certain price and this one being less than half the cost of most competitors could have a negative perception.

Its made for the Indian market though. A lot of things that make sense there don't make sense here.

For example, not so long ago it was very common to find Rs 1/- (2 cents) shampoo in tiny packs. The people who bought it were not travelers, they were just people who couldn't afford a full bottle. Many people lived hand to mouth so buying shampoo once a week for 2 cents was what they did, even though they could have bought a larger bottle and paid less per ounce.

Its hard to imagine that if you've lived all your life in the US, very eye opening experience.

You both make good points. Some months ago I bought a sub $100 tablet. I've been somewhat disappointed with it. To be fair, it did have fewer options than did the OP. (No way to plug in a keyboard, no camera etc). But I would be wary if this new Indian laptop had other limitations. How good is the screen resolution? How limited is the software? (The software on mine sucks). I want something I can readily re-program and not something that I'm stuck with canned software. The one I have, while running Android, is still rather limited.

[Tpoints]

does that mean they have $5 phones too? holy crap!

I have seen very cheap Android tablets for $70, or maybe even $50, but not $40.

[tttppp]

I'm guessing because Indians are that poor. Remember this is the country where scooters are more common than cars, and the cars are glorified scooters.

True, but it doesn't have to be subsidized to be sold here. Either way, that's a game changer whererever its sold regardless of subsidies.

[awake]

Cue the tariff and patent infringement gang. This needs to have a $300 dollar tariff on it (for dumping) and be tied up in patent court for ten years or so...Oh, and its possibly a terrorist enabling device in some way too.

[helmuth_hubener]

I am right now in India. Here is the report from the ground I got from a boy I asked. All the schools could order the Aakash while back (last year?), all the kids at the schools, and he asked his dad to order one, but he didn't. Lucky thing, because he has a friend who did order it (many kids did, of course) for the 300 rp downpayment, and never got it. Because no one ever got it. Everyone just lost their 300 rupees.

So now you can order it again. But no one really wants one. He listed off various technical shortcomings of the Aakash (and he's not super-technical, so clearly these are well and popularly known) such as it has no wireless, the memory is too low ("so if you load Google and some other pages, it will come up very slow"), etc., etc.

Having none of these shortcomings and being very much better in every way is the Micromax. It has 4 gigs memory, he told me, and anyway, is pretty good. That's the one the kids in India want. At first, people were skeptical of Micromax, thinking it was a Chinese company, bad quality, etc., but it turns out they are made in India and they have gained a good reputation. Their tablet is 6000 rps and the Aakash is 4000. So not much more. And the Aakash is junk. And will it ship, or just rip people off again?

In short: to put the gov't in charge of electronics production will lead to stupendously bad results. It should never be done. Free market pwns all.

Cheers from India! Fear me leegay (see you later)!