Keepod: Can a $7 stick provide billions computer access?

The USB flash drive is one of the most simple, everyday pieces of technology that many people take for granted.

Now it's being eyed as a possible solution to bridging the digital divide, by two colourful entrepreneurs behind the start-up Keepod.

Nissan Bahar and Franky Imbesi aim to combat the lack of access to computers by providing what amounts to an operating-system-on-a-stick.

In six weeks, their idea managed to raise more than $40,000 (£23,750) on fundraising site Indiegogo, providing the cash to begin a campaign to offer low-cost computing to the two-thirds of the globe's population that currently has little or no access.

The test bed for the project is the slums of Nairobi in Kenya.

The typical income for the half a million people in the city's Mathare district is about $2 (£1.20) a day.

Very few people here use a computer or have access to the net.

But Mr Bahar and Mr Imbesi want to change that with their Keepod USB stick.

- BBC.com