Who of us has never used the widely known Wikipedia? Either you are looking for a meaning, a biography or just a reference lookup Wikipedia is probably the first option of your search tools.  Now this whole process becomes handier with the use of the WikiReader device – a palm sized electronic encyclopaedia containing over three million articles of Wikipedia, which can be assessed anywhere, anytime without the need of an internet connection.

Over the last decade consumers of the technological sector are continuously being bombarded with numerous complicated gadgets and technologies, digital convergences and devices that sometimes are way too complicated for what they actually do. There are only few devices left today which are designed to be as simple as just for a single use whereas most of them are practical or entertaining rather than informational.

Openmoko, a Taiwanese technology company and producer of the first open source mobile phone recently came up with a new innovation – The Wikireader.

Before moving on to explain what the Wikireader is all about it worth granting a few lines to the producing company itself, as it constitutes an example of design culture.  As it becomes profound from their latest creation, Openmoko’s design culture is solely based upon the idea that ‘less is more’- which in this case refers to high-tech complications.  It seems that the company’s R&D processes are carried out in accordance to theories such as  J.Maeda’s ‘Laws of Simplicity’ and Dieter’s ‘ten simple rules for good design’ of which the underlying idea is that ‘Good design is as little design as possible’. For Openmoko the basic idea is that the less complicated a device is the more it enables you to focus on your activity – which becomes true when you wonder how many times you have caught yourself browsing through online pages and following through paths on the net, when you were initially searching for a single piece of information.

The Wikireader is an electronic device which carries over 3 million articles of the English Wikipedia and which can be browsed instantly with the use of only three buttons: ‘Search’, ‘History’ and ‘Random’. The articles are scrolled down with the stroke of your finger and the hyperlinks are selected with a single tap. With this simple design and functioning the Wikireader becomes suitable for all ages.  The Wikireader has also the capacity to be regularly updated with new articles provided quarterly or via free download from the home website.
Of course somebody could argue that this sort of function could also be done with an I-Phone, a Blackberry or even a notepad.  Yes indeed as long as you are near a cell tower, whereas the Wikireader could be used even in the most remote island or on an airplane without having to ‘wait for the good signal’.  Another important advantage of this device is its availability for parental control. The Wikireader constitutes a great gift for your kids as besides the fact that it operates offline you can also control the content of pages viewed by them.

Regarding the design specifications, the Wikireader carries the simplest technology so that it can be used by anyone. It was designed by Thomas Meyerhoffer, a former Apple designer who became widely known to the public by reshaping surf culture with his radically different to what we previously knew surfboards (www.thomasmeyerhoffer.com). The collaboration among Meyerhoffer and the rest of the Openmoko, diverse in backgrounds, design team, lead to the conception of this simple but simultaneously smart device.
Meyerhoffer incorporated a number of I-Phone-reminiscent technologies into the Wikireader such as the touch screen feature and the organic design but he also managed to make it more practical in terms of design simplicity and energy consumption. The Wikereader does not need charging as it operates with two standard AAA batteries for a maximum of twelve months of normal usage. This feature is perhaps the most advantageous of this device, as besides our beloved and widely known calculator I could not think of another handheld device that does not need daily charging.

Time goes fast.  Life standards evolve and change – Christmas is approaching - a few years ago parents used to buy us copies of the encyclopaedia Britannica. Times have changed though so as the presents.