One Laptop Per Child Gets 4 Million Laptop Order

An anonymous reader writes "DesktopLinux.com is reporting that four countries have together ordered 4 million low-cost, Linux-based laptops from the One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) project. The countries of Nigeria, Brazil, Argentina, and Thailand have each placed the 1 million unit orders."

Comments

This makes more sense than India

[jeffsenter]

Well this follows the /. story on skepticism for OLPC in India. Brazil, Argentina, Thailand, and Nigeria are all substantially more wealthy than India on a per capita basis. India (with a lot more help from the industrialized world than it is presently getting) needs to focus on providing things like basic vaccines for all children. Laptops don't help children who are dieing from measels for lack of vaccination. Brazil, Argentina, Thailand, and Nigeria all have enough money to provide some basics like vaccines. These are not countries where large scale famine is a great threat. These four countries have a substantial level of economic development and government services. This is not to say the implementation of public health strategies and other much-needed services in these four countries is ideal.

Re:my guess

[rolfwind]

What I think most people are missing is this little thing called the internet. These things can make their own network and I suppose connect to the internet. For many people who had their computer ever disconnected from the net, hasn't it (computer) felt 100x less valuable? That's probably because it was, in a sense.

We don't need to count on future Einsteins, that's a plus. Don't underestimated the power of normal people with access to information. It's empowering. See the two USA Today articles below to understand my point (the ones with cell phones). A network is a useful thing indeed.

My guess is that for 99% of the children in these countries, the laptops will be totally useless, because what those kids really need is food, a clean source of water, and (especially for the girls) a chance to go to school and become literate.

https://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos /ni.html

Nigeria:
Literacy:
definition: age 15 and over can read and write
total population: 68%
male: 75.7%
female: 60.6% (2003 est.)

https://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos /br.html

Brazil:
Literacy:
definition: age 15 and over can read and write
total population: 86.4%
male: 86.1%
female: 86.6% (2003 est.)

https://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos /th.html

Thailand:
Literacy:
definition: age 15 and over can read and write
total population: 92.6%
male: 94.9%
female: 90.5% (2002)

https://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos /ar.html

Argentina:
Literacy:
definition: age 15 and over can read and write
total population: 97.1%
male: 97.1%
female: 97.1% (2003 est.)

See also:

"Africa's cell phone boom creates a base for low-cost banking"
http://www.usatoday.com/tech/products/gear/2005-08 -28-cell-banks-africa_x.htm

"Africa's cellphone explosion changes economics, society"
http://www.usatoday.com/tech/products/gear/2005-10 -16-africa-cellular_x.htm

Re:How about the source...

[Dicky]

The distribution and libraries are all open source, published and out there - and there's already a simulator which can do things like the dual-mode screen. Have a hunt around their Wiki - particularly the software section for you, I'd guess, and you should find everything you want. People to develop software for it is exactly what they want and need from us - go ahead, jump in!

Re:Awesome

[darkenbinary]

I don't know if HP has sold a million+ PCs in one sale, but they do a lot of similar charitable work like this. They are pretty giving in comparison to many other corporate giants.

http://www.hp.com/hpinfo/globalcitizenship/gcrepor t/socialinvest.html

Re:Still very tough to pull off

[StrawberryFrog]

I remember reading that they need 10 million to even be able to produce them. They are still a long way off.

You remembered wrong:

"The laptop won't be produced unless at least five countries sign up at a million laptops each.

Four out of five isn't that far off.

Re:my guess

[TubeSteak]

Not every child in poor nations is starving. Even the ones who suffer from some level of malnutrition can still benefit from education.

The National School Lunch Program Background and Development
http://www.fns.usda.gov/cnd/Lunch/AboutLunch/Progr amHistory_2.htm

To summarize: mal/undernourished children don't learn for shit. Since they will only learn a minority of what you teach them, the majority of the money spent on teaching them is wasted.

"Few of us sufficiently realize the powerful effect upon life of adequate nutritious food. Few of us ever think of how much it is responsible for our physical and mental advancement or what a force it has been in forwarding our civilized life." - Robert Hunter (author of Poverty in 1904) wrote that in the introduction to John Spargo's 1905 book The Bitter Cry of the Children

You can read more history here.

Some objective numbers

[g2devi]

Since people are arguing over subjective impressions on both sides, I decided to pull in some harder numbers.

WRT education hear are some stats on the literacy rate:
Argentina: 97.2%
Thailand: 92.6%
Brazil: 88.4%
Nigeria: 66.8%
(Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_ literacy_rate )

Okay, so except for Nigeria, most people in these countries seem to have a decent (though not necessarily high tech) education.

WRT general human development, here are some stats:
Argentina: .863 (High Human Development)
Thailand: .778 (Medium Human Development)
Brazil: .792 (Medium Human Development)
Nigeria: .453 (Low Human Development)
(Source: http://hdr.undp.org/reports/global/2005/pdf/HDR05_ HDI.pdf )

Okay, so except for Nigeria, most of these countries seem to be decent places to live (even though life is likely much harder than what north americans and europeans are used to)

Re:Not Awesome: Vaporware

[bunratty]

If there are no working prototypes, how did Kofi Annan present one at the World Summit on Information Society?

Re:Yeah Apple is going care.

[wanorris]

The CPU is already designed, and has been in production for a while. (Corollary: that's why it's so cheap.)

It's an AMD Geode, which is an x86 computer-on-a-chip (onboard graphics, io, memory controller). It's a little late to try rearchitecting it to make it work differently.