Slashdot Mirror
OLPC Project Rollout Begins In Uruguay
Acer500 writes "The One Laptop Per Child project became a reality Thursday in Uruguay, as the 160 children of school number 24 in the humble town of Cardal received their XO computers. The learning tools came directly from the hands of president Tabaré Vazquez. It has become a matter of national pride that Uruguay is the first country to realize the project's goal. The target is that by 2009, every school-age child in Uruguay will have one, and an initial 15 million dollars have already been allocated to the project.
From the newspaper articles: 'The happiness of having a PC in their hands, some of them for the first time, had the kids in ecstasy, which didn't wait to turn on their computers, introduce their personal information (required the first time they're turned on), choose the screen colors, and start experimenting with them. What initially made them more enthusiastic was the possibility of taking photographs and filming each others with the included webcams.'" More information below.
According to the unofficial blog of the Uruguayan project, named proyecto Ceibal, the infrastructure for wireless is not yet in place but will be provided in the next few days by the national telco ANTEL. No photos of the event have been posted online, but you can see an institutional video on Youtube. One interesting point is that it has not yet been decided that the XO will be the laptop of choice for the entire project. Two other companies want to be considered: Intel, with their Classmate PC, and Israeli-manufactured ITP-C. In a press conference, Intel manager for the southern cone Esteban Galluzzi went as far as to compare the XO to a Pentium II, and stressed that the Classmate is able to run Windows XP. As advisor and local guru Juan Grompone stated, 'who will ultimately benefit from this is education?' This will be an interesting test to see if the OLPC project meets its intended goals of 'learning learning'. Let's hope this project is the means that will foster among some of the children the desire to learn and to tinker."
I agree with you in part, regarding the studies showing laptop aided development in developed countries has little, or even negative impact. However in areas where there is no ready access to technology, and other teaching materials such as books are expensive, then the concept of having a cheap way of distributing content to children and of giving them access to technology may actually be very beneficial. Although this shouldn't be seen as the only thing we should be doing to close the digital divide.
The OLPC project hasn't just been sold as an educational tool to politicians, it's also been sold as an economic one.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
Not only is it more than twice the price, the Classmate PC is vastly inferior. Let me list the ways (stats taken from Wikipedia):
-XO has a 1200x900 screen which can be flipped around (tablet style) and converted into ultra-high resolution grayscale for displaying text. The refresh rate can automatically adjust (down to 0hz) to save battery power. The Classmate PC has an ordinary 800x480 LCD.
-XO has a camera. Classmate doesn't. This article shows that the kids obviously like the camera.
-XO has a large trackpad that can be used as a graphics tablet. Classmate has a standard trackpad.
-XO operating system interface was designed from the ground up for this purpose. Classmate uses Windows XP Embedded.
-XO promotes the concept of Free software. Classmate has a freakin' Trusted Computing Module installed!
"A week in the lab saves an hour in the library"
I've heard that the plan was to put the textbooks in the laptops, which, if done, is economically viable. Each textbook is around 200 pesos (8USD), each year you require 4 of them (sometimes more) and there's 5 years of schooling. That sums up to 160USD. The laptops may be a bit more expensive now, but I think the plan is to "recycle" them (once kid gets out of school, give the pc to a new student). Also, you're getting other advantages that plain old textbooks don't give, like net access, PC education, games...
Just put a 10$ 1GB SD card in the SD card slot under the screen, and the OLPC can boot into a light, customized 3$ Windows XP OS. Microsoft has been working for the past year on adapting a Windows XP light version to run on such cheaper hardware, the OLPC hardware specs are totally sufficient for running a thinned down version of Windows XP. Microsoft certainly has the means and the will to provide such Windows XP on a 1GB SD card option, which each child could after some time and as SD card prices drop get one, and have a choice a boot-up for which OS to use.
And there in is the reason the XO is a superior solution. All the criticism of the OLPC XO and the benevolent offers of "superior" Windows based machines with $3 OS licensing fees is based off the need of a few greedy thugs to build their markets. The objective of OLPC is not to build a market for Microsoft and Intel to sell their products and introduce developing nations to the proprietary software licensing treadmill, its about instilling the ability to learn at an early age so these children will grow up with the ability to improve their living conditions. As Negroponte has already stated "An educated and creative population is, without a doubt, the best path to global health, wealth, and peace."
While I'm sure a more expensive Windows based machine could be used for the same purpose, the initial experiments that led up to OLPC used Windows based laptops, the XO and its software were designed from the ground up to serve the specific purpose of "learning learning" while the so called superior solutions being pushed by multi-billionare corporate CEOs and the like are designed to help themselves break into new markets where their current products are simply too expensive.
These wealthy individuals who lack the knowlege and experience of the people who developed and run the OLPC should simply STFU and let the professionals do their job.
i'm not sure how well a dictator would take to having an educated and/or freely speaking populace. the stereotypical dictator would _not_ want olpc's in the country, unless the internet was also controlled. i'm sure there's the possibility of a benevolent dictator, but i don't know how often that happens...
the privacy of one's mind is important.
you do have something to hide.