“A Russian state company plans to start mass production next year of cheap plastic-based tablet computers for school students which it says will rival Apple Inc’s iPad,” Gleb Bryanski reports for Reuters.
“Anatoly Chubais, an architect of Russian market reform and a head of technology conglomerate Rosnano, told Prime Minister Vladimir Putin the new computer would cost about $420 compared with $670 for the cheapest iPad,” Bryanski reports.
MacDailyNews Note: Apple’s iPad starts at US$499.
“‘This tablet is lighter, there is no glass, even in the screen. Even if school students decide to fight each other with these tablets, they are absolutely injury-free,’ Chubais joked in an bid to promote the technology,” Bryanski reports. “The device would use plastic or organic electronics, developed at Cambridge University in the 1990s, rather than silicon conductors. Chubais sees the technology grabbing a 10 percent share of the global electronics market.”
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Bryanski reports, “Chubais said Rosnano will test the new tablet, pre-loaded with school books and education materials, in some schools for a year before launching mass production and targeting Russia’s 13.6 million school students.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Близо́к локото́к, да не уку́сишь. Бодли́вой коро́ве Бог рог не даёт. Ску́пой пла́тит два́жды.
You do know the iPad was invented in Russian. 😉
Russia designing a one-fits-all iPad killer is what you get in a Socialist country where someone makes a single decision for the whole country, regardless of whether it is right or possible or not.
iPads exist because of the OS & Apps & Integration. Low price doesn’t trump that; witness the latest from HP.
Russia will fail again.
Get over your Cold War paranoia. Russia isn’t Socialist any more – it is an oligarchy. Socialism, Soviet style, is dead. If you’ve watched the news videos of Putin in the Kremlin, it is obvious he is running the country like an old style Czar.
It is still the government running things, but it isn’t socialist – it is more honest now that they don’t put a veneer of “populism” over it. It is now simply the rich running the show for the benefit of the rich.
Kind of like the Republican idea of how they want this country to run!
“Russia isn’t Socialist any more – it is an oligarchy…. Kind of like the Republican idea of how they want this country to run!”
Too late. The US Corporate Oligarchy already mandates the behavior of BOTH the DemoCrap and RepubliTard parties. The only difference that the Russian Oligarchy is smarter and more blatant.
As Cagney said in One, Two, Three, it looks like a ’39 Nash.
Hey russkies,
If you drink enough vodka, it will really, really start to look like an iPad, yeah…….:-)
Actually, this is the Russian company that purchased the technology behind PLASTICLOGICS Q Tablet…
It is a very expensive but promising technology… using plastic as a foundation for semiconductors instead of silicon… it allows for a very thin and light weight plastic display that is virtually unbreakable.
This may be the future…
…or not.
The iVan-pad?
“Chubais said Rosnano will test the new tablet, pre-loaded with school books and education materials, in some schools for a year before launching mass production and targeting Russia’s 13.6 million school students.”
I see NOTHING ‘iPad Killer’ in the description. At best this sounds like expensive Kindle or Nook knockoff.
Questions:
– What OS is the ‘Killer’ running?
– How does a developer create apps for it?
– Are the apps vetted before distribution?
– Does it have ANY security?
– How much graft do you have to pay to get your app approved?
– Does the battery charging station use a hand crank?
Suspected Defective Features List:
– ‘No glass’ screen = EZ-Scratch plastic screen. Have pity on the kids who get these things secondhand.
– Slowest CPU and OS in the east, eastern Europe that is.
– Overheating circuit problems causing inadvertent shutdowns.
– No multitasking.
– Low battery life.
– Melting and burning batteries.
– Plays Flash at 4 frames a second.
– The Russian Mafia gets a 25% cut. (Yeah, I’m naive. More like a 50% cut).
– Meagre networking capability.
– Plastic has an odd odor and gives kids a rash.
– 5% or more dead pixels.
– Low screen brightness and pixel density causes rapid eye fatigue and myopia.
– No camera.
– Home button falls off.
– Clunky touch sensitivity.
– GUI directly ripped off from Apple.
– Banned from landfill disposal because of carcinogens.
– Releases cyanide gas when burned.
– Pregnant women warned not to touch it due to induced fetal miscarriages.
If you’d like to play along, please add your own defective features to the list! 😯
Operative word ….. Cheap!