Used computers going to South America
One of the things I offered to do for Via Libre is search for a potential source in the United States of used equipment donations. The Alameda County Computer Resource Center is probably the best known such source, and today Salon ran an article about it.
Seems anti-globalization protesters are gearing up to cause trouble at the next meeting of delegates for the Free Trade Area of the Americas, which essentially seeks to extend the NAFTA free trade area to the rest of the Americas, in Ecuador. And the guy who started protest.net plans to blanket the area with Linux-based computers to assist the effort.
As a side note, I find myself increasingly in agreement with the spirit of anti-globalization insofar as “neo-liberal” economic model appears to have a negative impact on attempts by nations in the developing world to achieve a reasonable measure of self-determination.
I always get a little queasy, however, when I browse lefty clearinghouse Websites like protest.net, and click on links like this that suggest perspectives (in this case “religious and spiritual”) that I ought to share with other globalization opponents. Yikes.