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First of the OLPCs Built
eldavojohn writes "An announcement came Sunday that the first ten prototypes of the Linux-powered OLPC XO-1 had been completed in China. From the article, 'Quanta, the Chinese computer maker that won the international bidding for the project earlier this year, will assemble 900 OLPC machines that will be used for destructive testing and distribution to our development partners.' Let's hope that these first prototypes do not warrant any design changes and that the testing goes well so that countries that expressed interest (Brazil, Libya, Nigeria, Argentina, and Thailand) can start distributing them soon."
Those of you who were hailing Khaddafi's deep commitment to freedom when he jumped aboard will be relieved to know that he's not going anywhere anytime soon, though...
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
libya has oil and is not a real poor country.
"These oil revenues and a small population give Libya one of the highest GDPs per person in Africa"
Again, Linux uses its monopoly position in the free-OS market to stomp on Corporate America. Companies such as Microsoft cannot compete with the hippy OS because they have employees to pay, hardware to buy, and general overhead that any company has and cannot compete with Linux which is put together in a COMMUNIST style by a bunch of long-haired (Alex, RMS) free-thinkers.
This monopoly position must be dealt with to level the playing field so that American companies (not the Finnish) can pass more of their profits on to people like you and I who hold shares in their retirement portfolios.
TDz.
The exit from poverty is education. Give a man a fish and he'll have food for a day. Teach him how to fish and he'll ruin your fishing economy.
Or something like that.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
First: It's not people buying them, it's governments.
Second: Not everyone outside of the US and Europe is starving in a mud hut. Both Libya and Brazil are modern, technical societies with substantial wealth. Both countries would certainly benefit from increased technical skills among their local populations.
Remeber that the OLPC is designed to replace textbooks in schools, and over the life of the machine will almost certainly provide a cost savings over printed books.
In addition, the project will foster local IT development as more and more people learn to use, repair, modify, and program for the machines. This will lead to free and/or locally produced software and a local IT service sector, keeping money in local economies rather than sending it to Redmond or to other Western software houses and consultancies.
From a development perspective, this is a cheap project with enormous potential -- it could eventually bring an even bigger fundamental change in developing societies than micro credit progams have.
1) give computer to child
2) come back in a week
If computer survives AND the kid didn't get bored with it, the test passes.
---
It's lame but laugh anyways.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
So you have been to a lot of third world countries? Oh, you haven't? Every time this project is mentioned experts of your caliber start spewing their 0.02$ around. Interestingly, that's approximately how much those expert views are worth. Combined.
:| .. I dunno... But at least I'm also doing something instead of just complaining. I've left one laptop in Gambia and one in Chile before. I'll be on a round the world trip in about a month and a half (hopefully) and I'm packing lots of older laptops to give away. Guess what kind of OS they'll be running. That's my OLPC(ountry ;P).
I've been to a few third world countries. One of them is Thailand (they are among the ones interested in the OLPC). I bet you'll see more poverty and illiteracy in New York than i Bangkok. Can you please get it through your brick wall that _any_ countrys population is not homogenous? Some people may have no use of a OLPC laptop while others will. Just as in the west. Another country i've visited where I stayed with the locals is Gambia. It's a pretty poor country but most of the young ones I met spoke 3-5 languages.Virtually everyone spoke English and French, then their tribal language and one or more of the other bigger tribal languages. How many languages do you speak? How many can you write?
Poverty != stupidity. Poor country != everyone being hungry and illiterate. People in poor countries are often much more motivated to study because they know it's a way out of poverty.
Hmmm... Why do I bother feeding trolls....
Cheers...
$HOME is where the
-- silver_p
I think corruption is a bigger problem. Without good governance, change is hard. How soon until one laptop per child becomes one warlord with all the laptops? He'll have to let some children use them (such is the nature of feudalism), but I can't see it being otherwise. Laptops aren't the same as education, anyway. It sounds like silicon snake-oil to me.
I should also say that the corruption is hardly just some internal matter for various African states. These leaders are aided and abbedded by rich nations across the world. Foreign meddling in the affairs of Africa has been intense and ongoing, but no one wants to talk about how they secure their oil rights, fishing rights, the use of their GM crops over local varieties, and so on. It's unpleasant.
Africa needs clean government to have a chance as much as it needs clean water. I can't see the laptop as part of the solution. You could argue that laptops make education easier, and that education drives economic growth. However, the prime examples of that (Japan, Korea, Singapore) all had stable governments and some measure of physical safety for citizens. In the absence of these things, what will stop the newly educated adults from leaving for the US, the EU, India, or China?
Use the Firehose to mod down Second Life stories!