By David Farrier
A New Zealand team has made it to the finals of a technology competition that challenges students to solve the world’s toughest problems.
Team OneBeep has designed a system that uses radio waves to send computer data – helping educate people who don’t have the internet.
“We thought education was the foundation to all other problems,” says team member Vinnie Jeet.
“Because if you educate a person to a certain level they can solve their own problems.”
Over 140 countries have taken part in the year’s Imagine Cup, a sort of nerd Olympics run by Microsoft.
The team of engineering students focussed on the 1-laptop-per-child scheme in third-world countries, realising a lack of internet in many places was stopping the laptops from doing their job – getting up-to-date educational material.
“So we can send any document, usually text but we can send pictures,” says team member Steve Ward.
Putting it simply; the software encodes electronic data into an audio file, this is then sent from a radio transmitter.
All you need to do receive it, is plug a radio into the audio-in on a laptop and tune in.
The team has already had interest from places like Rwanda, Vanuatu, and the Solomon Islands.
“The technical advisor there told us this would be a miracle,” says Mr Jeet.
“You just need one transmitter to send information out.”
The grand winner of the Imagine Cup will be decided in Warsaw on July 8.
Meanwhile, OneBeep is vying for the People’s Choice Award, and urging New Zealanders to vote for them on the official website.
3 News