Hugo Chavez, president of Venezuela, has announced that the Venezuelan government has teamed up with a firm to create a $14 phone complete with MP3 playback, FM Radio, and a camera. Called El Vergatario, the handset should launch in May.
We dug around a bit, but we’re having a hard time figuring out exactly what El Vergatario means in this context. It seems that Vergatario is everything from slang for “Great” to a few things that are, as Wired points out, a bit more offensive.
We’re still a bit torn on this one. The good side: Cheap cell phones for people who otherwise couldn’t get them. The bad side: Chances are, these things won’t be very ecologically friendly. Cheap phones means lots of phones sold, which means lots of phones in land fills within 4-5 years.