The chief technologist at K12, for instance, is one-time Unabomber target David Gelernter. He's better known as a Yale University computer science professor who specializes in artificial intelligence. So what if French President Jacques Chirac had to ask what a mouse was, and so what if Japanese Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori has, by his own admission, never touched a computer. Nor can the worst off plug them in. This year's Information Society Index from research firm IDC shows that most of Africa is not even on the map when it comes to technological preparedness.
Electricity is scarce, education is poor, and health is even worse.
Ironically, to those developing nations better equipped to accept and use modern technology, the West is eager to export its problematic products and troublesome technology habits. And they're bad habits. Consulting firm Software Productivity Research estimates that roughly 60 percent of American software engineers and programmers spend their time fixing errors. Of an engineer's approximately 200 working days each year, they will spend less than 50 developing or improving software apps. The rest is wiled away testing and fixing software and developing programs that never get the final green light.