From National Geographic:

Sumberharjo, Indonesia, May 8, 2007—A neighborhood of new earthquake-proof dome houses has risen in Sumberharjo village, which was devastated by a 6.3-magnitude quake in 2006.

The temblor killed more than 5,800 people and displaced hundreds of thousands in the densely populated region around the ancient city of Yogyakarta, on the Indonesian island of Java.

U.S.-based charity Domes for the World donated 71 domes, as well as a mosque, a kindergarten, and six lavatories, to the town.

The concrete structures have permanent roofs, are fireproof, and can withstand winds as powerful as 186 miles an hour (300 kilometers an hour). The domes will purportedly last for centuries.

The article doesn't provide a link to The Domes For the World Foundation, but we can forgive National Geographic that, since I'm ripping off their content, and also, none of the internal links on the DFTW web site seem to be working.

Anyway, people have a right to decent housing, and if we can build them nigh invulnerable houses, it makes sense to do so.

In fact, I think we should all be relocated by force to dome houses in vast dome complexes, where we will wear special mind-control dome helmets and do the bidding of our dome-headed overlords.

Okay, maybe not, but what would you think about living in a dome house such as the ones in the pic above? Can you think of ways to make them more palatable to rich Westerners? Would you be willing to trade invulnerability for the luxury of space?

Housing is currently much on my mind (not that I'm thinking about buying property at the moment) and I'll probably have more to say about that tomorrow.