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## Computers and Technology Discussion

### [RANT] The Joojoo, or: "Why I Won't Waste $500 On This Crap" - Page 1

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#### [RANT] The Joojoo, or: "Why I Won't Waste $500 On This Crap"

Posted by: MissingNo
Date: 2009-12-12 12:17:56
[img]http://news.cnet.com/i/bto/20091207/chandra_showoff_270x247.jpg[/img]
This guy (other than looking like he just came off the set of a Geico Cavemen commercial), is part of a group named 'Fusion Garage', who is relaseing a device called the Joojoo. The story of Joojoo is long and hard and is currently in limbo with a lawsuit with another company - due to their involvement in this.
To sum it up in the beginning: TechCrunch, a webblog, had a post - they wanted help from the user community to build a fully open source Web tablet for approximately two hundred to three hundred dollars. It'd be the ultimate couch surfing machine.
TechCrunch partnered with Fusion Garage. This device was dubbed from the start the CrunchPad. Well, TechCrunch had their own issues that forced FG to work on their own to get the device to launch.
In essence, told from Fusion's side…

[li]"Unfortunately, Michael [Arrington, the guy behind TechCrunch and this CrunchPad idea] was unable to deliver at the project's date end, in February 2009… pictures of a birthday cake do not mean a contract is in place. If the project was to go forward, it was up to Fusion Garage."[/li]
[li]"There was never any agreement of any kind between the two companies. This was nothing more than a potential acquisition that didn't occur. Michael sat back while we took all the risk. The suggestion that Michael or TechCrunch owns anything is simply ludicrous."[/li]
[li]"TechCrunch didn't contribute a single line of code… As Michael wrote in his own April 2009 blog post, 'All credit should go to Fusion Garage.'"[/li]

But besides the legal disputes like an old married couple, the tablet itself is fairly nicely built. Turns on and boots to Linux in about 10 seconds, gets you where you want, handles HD flash video fairly well.
The key issue here is price of why I wouldn't personally buy it. $500 was deemed "unrealistic" - after all, FG's CEO Chandra Rathakrishnan says that an iPhone apparently costs $299 and a netbook $399 without a touch screen.
Netbooks I've seen recently are NOT $399. FAR from it.
And Joojoo's specs are not impressive, either:

[li]1.6 GHz… Intel Atom N270. (you guessed it)[/li]
[li]1 GB RAM[/li]
[li]Unknown graphics, possibly Ion[/li]
[li]4 GB SSD[/li]
[li]12" capacitive touchscreen[/li]

As such, I'd like to point out the other solution that I've happily named JewJew (no offence):

[li]$200 Eee from eBay[/li]
[li]$50 Aeeeris tablet kit[/li]
[li]$50 touch screen mod kit from eBay[/li]

Oh, hey, look! The "unrealistic" price point is realistic!
Oh, and one more thing: This tablet was supposed to be FULLY OPEN SOURCE. No information has been given from Fusion or TechCrunch about the open-ness of this device. TechCrunch's open source vision was to give full source code, schematics, bills of materials, and so on - so that in theory, someone could build one themselves or even modify the platform for their own needs.
Open-source has become a marketing gimmick.
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