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In reply to the discussion: Gaddafi must surrender power now, says Hillary Clinton [View all]mainer
(12,546 posts)Such short memories we have. In 2006, Libya was on the cusp of rejoining the Western world. Now we look back and call him Vlad the Impaler.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/11/world/africa/11laptop.html
SAN FRANCISCO, Oct. 10 The government of Libya reached an agreement on Tuesday with One Laptop Per Child, a nonprofit United States group developing an inexpensive, educational laptop computer, with the goal of supplying machines to all 1.2 million Libyan schoolchildren by June 2008.
The project, which is intended to supply computers broadly to children in developing nations, was conceived in 2005 by a computer researcher at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Nicholas Negroponte. His goal is to design a wireless-connected laptop that will cost about $100 after the machines go into mass production next year.
To date, Mr. Negroponte, the brother of the United States intelligence director, John D. Negroponte, has reached tentative purchase agreements with Brazil, Argentina, Nigeria and Thailand, and has struck a manufacturing deal with Quanta Computer Inc., a Taiwanese computer maker.
Mr. Negroponte, who was in Tripoli this week to meet with Libyan officials, said he discussed the project extensively with the Libyan leader, Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi, in August.