With the
unfortunate downfall of the company's phone business,
OpenMoko is looking for some slightly greener pastures. Its first new device hardly seems to hail from the same high-end Linux places that spawned the FreeRunner, and in fact you could say the $99 WikiReader is the antitheses of a high-end smartphone. It's a single purpose device with a monochrome screen and a simplistic touch interface and on the inside is an 8GB microSD card loaded up with three million of Wikipedia's finest hypertexts. The device can be searched or just browsed through clicking through interlinked articles, and there are even some parental controls to keep the chilluns away from Wikipedia's racier side. OpenMoko will have a subscription model of sorts available where folks can receive a new microSD card in the mail on a regular basis with the recent updates to the Wiki, though "power users" can update their cards themselves. The device is also relatively open to hackability thanks to its well known processor (similar to a Franklin dictionary) and easy access to the memory, but clearly OpenMoko is pointing this at people who don't even own a smartphone, not people who want to hack themselves another one. The device is available as of today.
posted Oct 13th 2009 10:04AM
Look... I'm sorry.
How do you actually search for the first entry? Is there a virtual keyboard?
Look at photographs + use brain = answer
What pim said.
Also, this device gets a +5 in my book for using standard batteries. You could have seen that in the screenshots as well. When will companies learn how awesome that is?!
I'd even be happy with a bulge out of the back of the device to allow me to use slightly higher capacity AA cells.
Oh.
"Slightly: higher capacity!? AAs have about 2.5x the capacity of AAAs and cost exactly the same. Products that use AAAs are a crime against nature. I avoid them whenever possible.
It runs for a year on one set of aaa batteries. Who needs aa's?
Now all they need to do is inscribe the words "Don't Panic" on the front in reassuring letters and they might have a best seller on their hands.
Add narration of every article by Stephen Fry and everyone will want one! (whether Stephen Fry will agree to narrating the whole of Wikipedia is another matter...)
Peter Jones
Morgan Freeman
Jeremy Irons
That's bizarre. Bizarre in a way that kind of makes me want one. I must use that site twice a day and it would be kind of funny to bust that thing out in public.
Is it just me or does this appear to be practically useless?
That's what she said.
This is perfect for younger kids who don't have access to teh itnernet like my nephew.
But think of how much reading-on-the-crapper you'd get out of your $99!
It's good for when you're surgery and you forget which vein to cut, but you can't really use your phone because it interferes with the machinery.
I would like to hack it and provide online dictionary too. Good for kids as well as adults interested in trivia
an after thought, with wifi would have been great
It is just funny for me.... hehehe... moko means mucus, snot in Spanish.
actually its moco.
Yes, even if the word in spanish is "moco" it really doesn't matter if there's a "k" instead "c", when you say it, it's the same word... moreover, there's people who writes ka, ko, ku instead ca, co, cu just because they want (teenagers speacially use this way of typing on chats)
Who was the genious who named it? It sounds like spanish-speaking punk/ska band name. They should change it. I'd never buy something called "moko" (moco=snot) or "kaka" (caca=shit) or things like that!
- ¿Qué es eso?
- Un moko
o_O
Hehehehe. It is not just snot, it is open snot. I guess it is hard to name products without being funny in whatever language.
tooo late......*press button*
Offline browsing? Small font/screen? No backlight? Emm....
Might not look like much, but before long the functionality will surely branch out to other usages. E-reader, contacts, calendar, text editor, whatever.
If it had a lower price, I'd get it.
Also, it would make a fine translation aid. Dictionary + Live translate = win.
E-Book reader with that kind of screen? Forget it, unless you fancy going blind.
And text editor with a teensy-tiny on-screen keyboard? Useless.
This might have been interesting...well, roughly ten years ago, when mobile internet access was simply out of reach for most people. Nowadays? Not really. For twice the price you can get a low-end netbook that is practically infinitely more capable, and since reading Wikipedia isn't really something that relies a lot on being super-portable there's really no reason for this to exist.
I'm sorry for the OpenMoko guys, but this thing is even more niche than their ill-fated smartphone...
Hitchhiker's Guide, Hitchhiker's Guide, Hitchhiker's Guide!
It runs on AAAs too. I think I'm in love.
All those who say phones can do this. You obviously don't frequent the uncharted backwaters of the unfashionable end of the western spiral arm of the Galaxy where they don't have network connection or plug sockets.
Why not just get an iPod Touch 8G? Does masses more too for not that much difference in price - in particular if you pick one up used.
It costs twice as much, and will last about as tenth as long on a charge.
The Ipod Touch would require a constant internet connection to use wikipedia, this thing has Wikipedia hypertexts on an internal storage flash card.
If the interface on this is good, useful, and quick, I would totally buy one. I use wikipedia alot, especially more now that i can just type wiki into Chrome, hit tab, and enter my search term directly without having to go to the wikipedia site first.
If this device had similar quickness of use and simplicity, I think it would be extremely useful, especially for people like students or people doing some research work out in the field, that way you don't have to lug your laptop with an expensive data connection, nor do you have to deal with a smartphone's coverage issues and high data fees. It is a second device to carry, but it's a small one and if it did it's job well, it could be like an mp3 player, most people carry their phone and an mp3 player, because most phones (except a few like iPhone, maybe some other flashy ones like the Pre or a Sony Ericsson phone) have crappy music players with awful interfaces. Most people don't have smartphones, so a device like this puts the power and usefullness of Wikipedia in their hands as well. Granted, it costs almost as much if not more as many smartphones, but then they don't have a contract and $99/mo for data that they may not even use that much.
I say this is awesome, especially good for kids, students, anybody on the go who doesn't have, doesn't need, or doesn't want, a smartphone with expensive data.
Why need to read wiki on the go? Just go home and read it or use WiFi hotspot. I just don't get it. Who is going to get this device? Even a college student won't waste $99 on one purpose device except their cell phones. They rather spend $99 more to get something a lot more in return, or simply don't even get it and stick with their notebook PCs and wifi hotspots for wiki.
Again, a device that has extremely narrow direction. Back in 2000 when I was in college, I paid $60 to buy a Handspring that came with Email modem. $99 for offline 8GB card? 8GB cost $16 most today and it can't even play music nor displaying color pictures. This is just epic fail!
Those crappy Chinese phones in China nowdays are all color touch screens and how much are they selling for? Around $100 or less. Maybe $50 to $70.
I would only partially buy one.
LMAO! In Spanish slang MOKO means nose Boogers ;^0...
The worst part is that "moco" is not slang... "moko" maybe... but as it sounds exactly the same, who cares? it's still the same green sticky thing >_
so, this is how the hitchhickers guide to the galaxy really looks like! :-) it could be great with e-ink display
there is no point to this device, especially at this price.
Well, I think I know what I'm getting my relatives in Nebraska for Christmas...
Moko sounds like the Spanish word for Booger.
Sadly, this device has "OK, we're broke, let's get all the tools we have remaining in the shed, and fabricate something out of it to sell it in the open street for food" written all over it. Pretty much useless - maybe for 3rd world countries, but 100$ is just too pricey for them.
I'm assuming the internal database of articles can be updated, probably via USB?
It reads it from a microSD, so yes it can be
If Random pulled threads from /b/, i'd be thrilled!
If you were that desperate for such a device, you'd just buy an old palm PDA off ebay and run wikipedia locally off that.
Offline Wikipedia on PalmOS doesn't work that well
Also, some of us don't like to buy used things
or you can buy a Ben Nanonote http://www.qi-hardware.com/products/ben-nanonote/
:-)
Well, in my language, "OpenMoko" means "Go open me!"
Looks like a Palm from 10 years ago. Who is going to buy this when there are PMP, iPod Touches and iPhones everywhere. $99 is very expensive. Maybe give it $30. Also any cell phone that can go online can access Wiki too. I just don't get it. This market is niche to a point that maybe 100 people who are very uninformed might buy, just like Peek but worse.
Sorry for my rant but this is the reality.
I had this idea first :)
http://hackaday.com/2009/05/02/wikibrowser/
Put a voice search on there and they may have a winner.
Then again, it's already available (google search) on a $99 Android phone.
I have a Freerunner (which is going on ebay shortly)and it has/had so much potential aside from not having 3G, but OM never took advantage of its other merits and firms like Koolu have to clean up the mess (by getting Android to work on it). This product adds to the final conclusion that openmoko == FAIL. Talk about KIRF--at least the chinese knock offs work.
A tiny device with small screen for reading, that doesn't have a e-ink? Man...this is a must have device. Where is it? I'm going to run out and buy one right away!
Looks like a lot of folks don't get it. 1 set of aaa's runs for a year. No wireless required, so runs anywhere (I'm looking at you, IPhone users). Hackable. How much cellular service does $100 buy anyway? 2 months? You can use this in the middle of the woods, On an airplane, in a cave, etc.
This is what the Peek should have had.
Well, I think they might have another unfortunate downfall with this device as well.
Can we have the phone back if we buy this?