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Negroponte's Talk at Emerging Technology Conference
xacting writes "The video of Nicholas Negroponte's talk about MIT's One Laptop per Child (OLPC) research initiative was just posted to MIT World. In it, he discusses the challenges of tripling the world's laptop production, dealing with China's policies towards free speech and the problems of grey markets." From the article: "The key to churning out these cheap educational devices is volume -- and the more countries that join the bandwagon, the sleeker and less expensive the computers are likely to be. Negroponte casts a wary eye on the potential grey market appeal of the machines, and is determined to make them so distinctive as a government-distributed, educational tool that taking one would 'be like stealing a post office truck.' Negroponte concludes, 'Changing education on the planet is a monumental challenge,' taking decades. But OLPC will 'seed the change,' and help 'invent the future.'"
Why is everyone so sure that putting a laptop in a kids hand will help them that much? I'm sure it's a great idea on some level but what about starving illiterate kids, wouldn't food and teachers be a better investment?
I'll happily pay for at least one 3rd world child's $100 laptop if I can buy another one for MY kids!
Time and time again, we have been shown that trying to deny people access to things they want leads to one thing only: black market, with all the niceties that usually follow it.
So why is Negroponte so keen on preventing everybody who's not a starving child from getting the 100$-laptop? Especially since he seems so worried that they might not be in enough demand to grant them the best prices for components etc.
I say, why limit distribution and *force* this to be a government-sponsored program?
Global warming is a cube.
Wouldn't it be a whole lot better to first develop and distribute a "thin client" laptop that is not much more than a browser, screen, keyboard, and Wifi connection, along with substantial enough (and presumably pricier) servers that act as access portals, and then second, a more advanced laptop that can store useful data and other programs usable by more advanced students that qualify for them?
Secondarily, I would think that the first and/or second laptops could be sold as an entry level laptop in the first world countries with a sufficient profit margin (and the ability of educational systems like rural school districts, etc. to purchase a limited number of machines without the profit margin built in) to underwrite the distribution of many more machines to the third world? After all, if the whole thing is done under a non-profit framework, there isn't shareholder bottom line to worry about. What think ye all?
...Open Source isn't the only answer -- but it's almost always a better value than the alternatives...
This is the problem--that there is not really much useful media to put on these machines.
For the most part, "the Internet" in itself is not directly useful in a lower-grade classroom, unless you want to teach kids about porn. What electronic media is available is usually only optional, and designed to complement the printed books.
What really needs to be created is MEDIA, electronic versions of suitable textbooks. And a database of quiz and test questions, organized by book sections, and a program to automatically check those answers. If the hardware had a way to do very-short-range networking (I'm thinking IR here, it only needs to work inside one room and not cause interference in adjoining rooms) then the ability to push file content over it and a way to check quiz answers in real-time would be a good thing too.
But you really don't need a whole laptop to do this. A laptop is really just adding a whole bunch more problems. A simnple e-book type device with a few input buttons would work. You wouldn't even really need a multi-tasking OS; this greatly cuts down on the speed and memory requirements of the hardware.
And finally, the thing's got to be drop-proof, water-proof, crayon-proof, ect. It needs to run off of regular disposeable (or possibly rechargeable) batteries, not $150 li-ion jobs. A laptop is NOT what will work for this.
And really--e-textbooks would/should be priced far lower than printed copies. There's no incentive for any school to even consider going to e-book use, if they are going to have to pay a bunch of money for hardware, and then pay a bunch more for "e-book licenses". If they just go with the printed books, they only pay a bunch once.
~
I'm guessing there are a couple billion people in the world that would rather have clean drinking water instead of a goddamn $100 laptop.
Particularly since $100 is probably a half to a third of their yearly income...
There's nothing like connectivity to information, and there's nothing like getting accurate information, and there's nothing in the world that can provide this link between people and data like the internet. Kids learning languages and merging languages. Kids learning about cultures and merging them. Kids identifying problems and solving them. Kids exploring their world with the wisdom of others at thier fingertips. These laptops could be a major step!
"like stealing a post office truck"
It's not stealing. Isn't this more like BUYING a used, surplus truck from the postal service? You give someone a laptop-- what's wrong with them selling the laptop?
What would be the disadvantage in selling these laptops to people in wealthy nations as a commodity? That is precisely what the Freeplay Foundation does with their "Lifeline Radio", which is a robust, windup/solar powered, AM/FM/SW radio designed for people who live in areas without power. You can buy one radio through CCrane and they'll donate a second one to someone in need.
"Can of worms? The can is open... the worms are everywhere."
14 years ago, I was given a used x86 machine with no hard drive, and floppies for DOS, MS Word, and two computer games. I had never touched a computer or typewriter before. No one taught me how to use it, I just started playing around with it, and two years later graduated to a 486, and so on and so forth. Now, I run IT for a small company.
Much of the negative feedback for this project seems misplaced to me. I suspect that just because we don't know how these laptops will be used doesn't mean that they won't be used. I don't believe that there is "alot more that could be done with this money." I think this is similar to the argument against desktop computers back in the day - no one could imagine how they would be used, so it seemed like a big waste of time.
Here's my simple formulation of an argument: every little bit helps.
there expensive to ship.
A 100 dollar laptop that can connect to the internet is FAR more valuble, and is a less expensice. Becasue one device can get you a lot more information then the same weight in books.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
tell them that they are cynical asshole who would let a child continue to be dependant on handout becasue someone might abuse a tools they could use to learn how to take care of themselves?
There are many, many cases where rich people, large corporation and companies have done something becasue they thoughyt it was right?
However, you could tell them that it is in the corporation best interest to have an educated self-suffciant population. You need to to have a strong market base to sell things to.
I guess you could say "It's better to have people be fed and educated with disposable income that companies will try to get, then it is to have people starving to death with no way to help themselves that companies don't care about"
Your friends would rather give a man a fish, instead of the fishing pole.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
These are crayon & water proof.
These don't require a $150 LiOn battery, they use a hand-crank.
They're not just intended to be dumb reader devices but links to the larger world. Online encyclopedias, newspapers, updated textbooks, communicate with other kids in their native languages (IM shorthand in Urdu), get their assignments from the regional school, etc.
Lots of kids schools aren't like your wealthy western ones. They're shorter days, breaks for plantings & harvests, don't have libraries, indeed lots of these kids don't have electricity in their homes (why these laptops are often the brightest thing at night in their houses.) They have to be able to take them home, use them at night, etc.
Govt's like China allocate the equivalent of US$20/year for each kid's printed school books. With these laptops they can offer those gov't text supplied texts, a coupla thousand others, the latest news, access to encyclopedias, etc. all for negligible cost over the laptops.
Oh, and media? With a standard cheap platform lots of that can be developed quickly, by interested individuals, by non-profits, by governments, by the communities themselves. Once the 1st batches are out there the next set will find a set of tools to build further on, etc.
But, you'd know all this if you watched the videos or read any of the articles on this before rushing to post your under-informed argument against what you (incorrectly) assumed it was...
I don't read ACs: If a post isn't worth so much as a nom de plume to its author then I wont bother either.
Oh wait, you didn't bother to actually watch or look up any of this before posting, huh?
'Cause if you did you'd know that they're actually pretty attractive little boxes. Their 'unattractiveness' will be in the sense of "You're using a device my community paid for, you're not a kid, not a school-teacher, what kind of jerk are you and have you met the business end of my hoe?!" unattractive.
Regarding capitalism, yes Quantas, Nortel, Intel, Redhat, etc. are all in this entirely for altruism... NOT.
Quentas gets to sell the design commercially (they guesstimate that model will cost around US$200.) Nortel gets real-world experience in mesh networking. Redhat gets their name and OS out on hundreds of millions of devices. Intel gets to expand their market with all of those Intel-friendly applications and follow-on laptop versions.
If that's not "taking advantage of capitalism" then I dunno what is.
I don't read ACs: If a post isn't worth so much as a nom de plume to its author then I wont bother either.
You all seem to assume they are going to use these laptops for surfing ? ... or electricity.
Getting fast Internet anywhere besides North America, Europe or Far East is almost impossible. Are they going to use one dial-up connection for the whole class ? That is, if school has a phone line
I realize most /.'ers have no training in education, so let me...um...educate you.
.ppt-type aids with every lesson, which can be instantly transfered to the student's laptops, or emailed to absent students. What am I saying...if you can't see how much these would benefit the education process, just put a bullet in your head, you nazi cow...
This is not about creating a utopia, feeding the hungry, etc. Most of the anti-$100-laptop posts here focus on those red herrings.
Bottom line, this is about the digital divide. The internet provides access to more information than has ever been collectd in the history of humankind (wiki, etc). Right now, only those with a certain level of wealth have ready access to the internet. Now, don't you say 'they can go the library' or some other lame counterpoint cabal BS...we all know how important using the internet in your time and space is, and telling poor people to just go to the library or whatever is a joke and lame.
As far as the uses in the classroom...what a joke of a counterpoint! There are inifinite possibilities, use your damned imagination. I am a teacher, adn I envision a classroom with
Thank you Dave Raggett
"...he is also a liberal so, since his lips are moving he is lying."
I guess this "liberal" thing you speak of must be kinda like a "Conservative".
You know, like the guy who said "Iraq has Weapons of Mass Destruction and is directly supporting the 9-11 Terrorists"; his butcher bill is now on the order of 2000 American and allied military and -in his own words "thirty thousand Iraqies".
I guess they ALL lie...., but, as the say "when Clinton lied no-one died!"
Yeah, sure, the other old, tired, meme: people in poor countries live in refugee camps. I made a comment on this earlier in this story. What you should realize is that CNN does *not* paint an accurate picture of the world outside of the USA, Canada, Japan, and Western Europe. If there isn't a civil war going on, CNN doesn't send a team to report.
If you want to have an idea on how the poorest people of the world live, think about Inglewood in LA or Brooklyn in NY, only poorer. They have more or less the same "western" culture. They listen to Britney Spears on the radio, they watch Harrison Ford on TV. If they are over 18, most of them can drive a car, they know what a remote control is, many have a TV, maybe a VCR too, but they probably can't afford a DVD yet.
If you can't think of the poorest people other than in refugee camp terms, then you are one of the reasons why some refugee camps exist. It's the absence of alternatives that lead to the civil wars that cause refugees to exist. Give cheap laptops to the poor and there will be no more refugee camps.
Y'know, if you'd actually bothered to find out what you're talking about first...
Thank you for posting. This topic seems to be a veritable magnet for people with strong opinions and a complete inability to read or even just watch a video. There also seems to be an assumption that this non-profit effort is taking money out of some of these commentators pockets. Hey, if you have another idea that you think is better then go for it! No one is holding you back. Negroponte has been pursuing this goal for years and there is nothing naive about his effort. I hope more people read about the mesh network architecture that has been built into these laptops and stop parroting the fashionable dismissal of the internet.
Possibly the best aspect of this effort is the chance to avoid the usual corruption that fungible aid has always created. A grey market in these devices needs to be kept in check by treating those with diverted laptops as social pariahs.