[jasonhanley]

I'm the CTO of an organization that has been delivering cheap tablets with educational content to rural areas for several years: http://www.rumie.org/

Some of the challenges: 1) Making sure the tablets actually make it to the people that need them and aren't repurposed/resold 2) Lack of internet so all content and apps need to be offline-friendly 3) Loading the tablets with content appropriate to the region (language, cultural)

[breakingcups]

I'm not sure if you include (or want to include) a maps-like app on your tablet. If you do, you've probably looked at this already, but just in case you haven't, have you looked at the OpenStreetMap project? You can preload mapping data on the device and oyu have your own choice in what data to include.