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Negroponte vs Intel
Yogi_Stewart_4 writes "More OLPC/Intel love — apparently Intel used 'underhanded' tactics to try to block sales' contracts of the OLPC, trying to reach the customer directly after an agreement had been reached.
"They would go in even after we had signed contracts and try to persuade government officials to scrap their contract and sign a contract with them instead. That's not a partnership."
Mr Negroponte cited an example in Peru where Intel sales staff tried to persuade the country's vice-minister of education, Oscar Becerra Tresierra, to buy the Intel Classmate PC."
Or maybe he wants children to use open source software not windows?
Extreme Programming - Redundant Array of Inexpensive Developers
Interesting question.
I sense a flaw in your logic, but interestingly, I can't quite pinpoint it.
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>If Negroponte really just carted about the kids, and not his own ego, ...
...
If Intel cared about the kids and not their profits
What I want to know is ... is there a hidden 3rd party pushing Intel *cough*Microsoft*cough*? Intel's device is available with Windows XP. I wouldn't at all be surprised to find out that our "friends" in Redmond are responsible for this in order to get their software into the emerging world instead of Linux.
Well, maybe it has something to do with the fact Intel signed an agreement with OLPC? If I were running a business and one of my subcontractors ran off behind my back trying to poach clients, I'd be a tad pissed off too.
... and a partner firm sabotaging sales agreements is most certainly a threat.
Even with a "humanitarian" purpose, OLPC has to be aware of threats to its overall business sustainability
No, he wants kids to have good laptops and good educational materials. The Intel Classmate PC does not qualify on either count!
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
The flaw lies in that Intel promised to NOT poach like they seem to have been doing and did it anyway.
It's not that Negroponte has an ego (but everyone is seizing on the fact the man DOES have a big ego...)
but that Intel didn't live up to it's promises. If the stunt in Peru is provable, then Intel DOES have
a big bit of explaining to do- and what Negroponte has been saying isn't QUITE the "hogwash" they're
claiming it is.
It's not that he doesn't want laptops in the hands of kids. He wants education TOOLS in the hands of
kids. Unfortunately, all the Classmate devices seem to be is indoctrination tools for Microsoft products
as opposed to engines to be re-worked, etc. to teach thinking in addition to knowledge. OLPC's goal is
that. All the Classmate seems to be is discounted Windows stuff for kids and calling it "education".
I've a problem with that.
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
My current system is an old AMD dual system, and with the way Intel is acting on the world stage, I'm sticking with AMD for my next system.
Blar.
This is a troll above. Truth is even in regular for profit business if a partner company did this to my group of companies i would kick them to the curb in a split second. It is not about profits this is about being outright dishonest. You do not do business with dishonest companies.....plain and simple. Unless you enjoy getting screwed over. Why waste your time and efforts working with a dishonest partner? I know i do not and have survived as a US maker of Audio products (OEM level) for more than 40 years. Never underestimate the power of being honest and keeping your word....it will allow you to survive long after all the other bigger players have either went bankrupt or sold to off shore companies because they are no longer viable to operate here. I have seen and purchased many of those whom thought they were so smart and keen (and dishonest) yet my company is still in the USA and still making jobs and growing....and making a nice profit....why....becuase when a customer partners with me....they know they will not be screwed over. 40+years and counting....:) I wish Negroponte the best , he should have known that the likes of MS and intel cannot be trusted they are NOT honorable companies. Yes they have made huge profits....but i sleep very well at night and customers i have had for 30+ years call me more than supplier, many consider me close personal friend. Those who say business is only about profits....need to take an ethics course or 10 and also need to realize it is not just about profits. Many times ive made the choice that was less profitable or not profitable but was the RIGHT thing to do. What will you do when pressed by such a situation? Will you choose profit or what is right? The answer will determine if you really are an enlightened individual or just a blood sucker. Thats the difference.
. I love the sound of burning women and screaming rubber....
Yes, but more than that, Peru had already signed a contract with OLPC for a few hundred thousand laptops. Intel, an OLPC "partner", then tried to get Peru to drop the OLPC contract in favor of their Classmate laptop.
eclecti.cc
I take it that since the rights and free will of the citizenry aren't at stake no one finds it necessary to think of the children, only the profits. But good luck with that, Intel may be a company, but last I checked they actual human beings are the ones making these decisions and going ahead and acting them out. So bravo, another +mark for humanity.
"Thanks for all the money you paid to us. We've used it to buy off ISO among other things" -Microsoft
>here's a link for yOU: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fluoxetine
Are you the ventriloquist or the _dummy_ ?
It doesn't matter how badly Intel wanted to sell their more expensive, less functional copy of the OLPC laptop. It is simply unethical to use insider information to quash a deal and sign a separate one yourself with a client.
This is a big black mark against Intel and should serve as a warning to future partners that they can't be trusted at all. I mean you can't get much worse publicity than "deliberately sabotaged a charitable organization". Maybe the CEO of Intel would like follow it up by kicking puppies and eating babies?
Fanatically anti-fanatical
More OLPCs delivered will mean cheaper OLPCs for children in other countries. Secondly, the OLPC fits its purpose better than Intel's Classmate and uses open source software instead of forcing software that is proprietary as well as inferior on yet another generation of children.
my guess would be that the "Intel Classmate PC" might cost more (not the mention you can't even buy it yet from what i understand), so cheaper means more laptops for more users. aside from that, intel is trying to piggyback on his(OLPC's) hard work, from what i gather mr negroponte isn't in this for the money... i can only imagine intel is.
-chris antixogh@gmail.com
If you were to start a homeless shelter and get the backing of some financial sponsors, knowing that state and other funds to help you depends on your having certain numbers of clients, it would be clearly inappropriate for those same sponsors to agressively set up their own shelters in order to block you out (if social groups were generally meaner, we could imagine different churches doing this kind of thing to promote their particular denomination - fortunately churches tend to consider their notion of the public good when doing charity). On one level, it's most important that the shelters exist, but on another it's not kosher to enter a partnership with someone if you're doing it in order to undermine whatever venture they're working on.
For every problem, there is at least one solution that is simple, neat, and wrong.
Intel is just like any other company that has a responsibility to its shareholders. Now if only the shareholders cared about the kids and not their profits...
That's an interesting issue but your answer is naive.
Non-profits and for-profits are more alike than people think. If a non-profit doesn't pay the electricity bills, the lights go off. If a non-profit program doesn't reach sufficient volume, its unit costs go through the roof because of the fixed costs are amortized over fewer units. Just like a for-profit.
The difference between non-profits and for-profits is why they do what they do, not how.
If there are 270,000 children who need laptops in Peru, a non-profit would try to equip as many of them as humanly possible. A for-profit will try to equip the number of children which would maximize its profits. For example, suppose Intel's profits are maximized by equipping 135,000 children in Peru. The government would buy more if the price were lower, but Intel's profit margin would be lower. Intel could increase its unit margin so that it made more on each PC, but Peru would buy sufficiently fewer that the net profits would decrease.
The difference between a non-profit and a for-profit is that a for-profit never considers costs that are external to itself, such as the cost of 135,000 children who grow up without access to information and the world economy. A non-profit internalizes as much of that cost as possible.
When two for-profits compete, they try to poach the plum contracts from each other, and it doesn't matter. They both act in exactly the same way, so the differences between the two are small. When either looks at a population of 270,000 customers, 135,000 of which don't have enough money to play, they see a market of 135,000, give or take a few, plus 135,000 non-entities who they have no intention of serving. When they compete with each other, the more efficient of the two might equip 140,000, and the less efficient might equip 120,000, and so market efficiencies maximize the public benefit, if the only choice is between two entities that weigh the public benefit in exactly the same manner.
When a for-profit cherry picks the plum contracts from a non-profit, it's a different matter altogether. The efficient for profit equips 140,000 where the non-profit would equip 270,000. What's more the non-profit can't pick up the slack, because (a) there's no money and (b) they are amortizing their costs over fewer units so they can no longer provide product at lower prices than the for-profit.
Right or wrong? You decide. But it's certainly about more than personal ego. It's about educating students whom it is not profitable to equip; and if it is not profitable, it will never happen.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
No, it certainly isn't. But it isn't up to Intel to decide that either.
I don't think MSFT is the driver, more of a means to an end for Intel. Their interests are aligned at some level but mainly Intel wants to sell chips. I'm guessing they don't care which OS runs as long as they can keep a finger in the emerging market pie.
MS and Intel have common goals, but that could change.
What's more interesting is the callous, self-serving manner Intel is undermining a project trying to help people. It's pathetic. Lacking in even basic decency. You can claim corporations exist only for profit but it hasn't always been that way. It's a fairly recent development that we have have, at least corporately, started to turn into the Ferengi. And there are limits. When you start undermining humanitarian projects in order to protect your market position, you're over that line.
Maybe Negroponte should just pull off the gloves and make a deal with Wal-Mart and Costco to carry OLPC's. Use the profits to donate machines to developing nations. Or use the profits to cut schools in this country a big discount. If Intel and MS want a war, give them a war.
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
No, it's up to the people who are actually buying and using the laptops. And if they decide to go with Intel, he has no right to throw a hissy-fit about it.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
Disgusting behaviour like this by Intel is why I'll never use Wintel and only buy Apple
29 mpg. YMMV.
From Intel's website:
Corporate Mailing Address
2200 Mission College Blvd.
Santa Clara, CA 95054-1549
USA
(408) 765-8080
A phone call or a snail mail letter will go a long way toward letting Intel know it crossed the line.
Most large companies have a set of explicitly stated business rules that employees are expected to follow or face disciplinary action. Typically, employees are expected to periodically read and review these rules, and certify that they have done so and will follow them. Sometimes, these rules include explicit prohibitions against trying to sell when the potential customer has already placed a legally-enforceable order with a competitor. The rationale is simple, the order is a contract. You shouldn't encourage anybody to break a contract, because you would be encouraging them to break the law. Apparently, Intel's senior management apparently hasn't seen the need to set the bar that high for their employees. That's too bad and a black mark against Intel for sure. Just another reason to keep buying AMD.
Negroponte has a right to be upset. Intel shouldn't have been doing this against ANY competitor, must less one that they were cooperating with.
I'd say this is more like McDonald's, as a partner in the homeless shelter organization, trying to tear down one of the homeless shelters in order to build a McDonald's location there instead.
The OS of XO is free and open-source. Classmate specs are better than XO. There is a bit of goods in XO hardware, but not all that much. Most of it is in the software. The way I see it from the government side would be "Yes, okay, but without Windows preinstalled please. Get Linux with Sugar running on it, make it 100% compatibile with XO software, and get the price by 10% below XO (shouldn't be hard, you're dropping costly Windows, don't you? *wink-wink*) and we'll spend the same amount of cash we'd spend on XO to get 10% of the laptops more."
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So the OLPC project is a religious crusade? Wonderful! And here I thought we were just trying to get educational tools into the hands of children.
"Ask not what your country can do for you." --John F. Kennedy
It signed agreements with OLPC, so it has a responsibility to live up to that. "Maximising profits for shareholders" does not make it okay to break contracts, lie, cheat or steal, despite what many MBAs seem to think.
IF targeting the 3rd world, the classmate sucks:
a) There are cooling holes on it! Hello dirt and debris.
b) The keyboard is non ruggedized, at least compared to the XO.
c) It uses a conventional montior arrangement rather than the OLPC "behind the monitor" arrangement. This means that it has a complex, wire heavy connector through the hinge rather than just a USB and power connection.
I don't see how the classmate could last 6 months in a third world environment.
I question some of the OLPC's intent, but their hardware design blows away that Intel POS its not even funny.
Test your net with Netalyzr
How is that of all the other OLPC partner companies, Intel is the only one that just couldn't resist but to pull a fast one? I have a thick skin usually when it comes to corporations' behaviour, but NOT when it's detrimental to a charity. fsck intel
"The agriculture ministry is not in charge of Gundam" - Japanese ministry official.
what's that movie called again ? If the profits outweigh the cost of the lawsuit...
It's quite sick but companies routinely make decisions like this.
MP3 Search Engine
I wanted to like the OLPC -- no I wanted to *love* the OLPC. I wanted to love it so much that I wanted to tell the world how awesome it was, and how everyone should participate in the give one get one program.
Then mine arrived in the mail.
Initial reactions were off the charts. The packaging was even excellent! The machine is sturdy, well-built, solid, cleverly designed, rugged, and absolutely perfect for it's purpose. I can't say enough about how many of the design decisions were fantastic. The keyboard was perhaps smaller than I had anticipated, but with the intended use case scenarios even that didn't detract from the brilliance of the hardware.
And then I turned it on.
Anyone who says that the interface is revolutionary or different is trying to put a nice spin on it. Yes, some of the organization and terminology is novel, and one could even praise some of the attempts at getting you to re-think how computers work. But the entire thing feels astonishingly like X Windows from the late 1980s. The interfaces are clunky and inconsistent, and worst of all it suffers from a pervasive design philosophy of "because we could" not "because we should." I could easily forgive a lack of graphical polish, but it's much more difficult to forgive the nearly-20-year giant leap backwards in interface design.
I know what the slashdot crowd is thinking... "it's open source! Write a new UI yourself!" but that's not the point. My point is that I wish the OLPC project had spent half the effort on the software that they did on the hardware -- if they had, then maybe we really would have a device that would change the world. Who knows... maybe a version 2 will have a new UI that actually will.
At the company I work for, the Code of Conduct we are required to review every year has an explicit prohibition against this sort of thing. The section is actually entitled "Selling Against a Signed Order". The code isn't that long, so the fact that there is a special section for this one situation shows how important it is.
If I were to try and sell against a signed order, I would be fired. Immediately. With no chance of appeal.
Encouraging a customer to break a signed contract could get both the customer and my company sued by the competitor for contract interference, and rightly so.
SirWired
Providing a choice is always a good thing. Do you like that Microsoft and Intel traditionally get to decide what is 'good' for us? Negroponte has at the very least been raising a lot of awareness about the state of education in poorer parts of the world. Even if you disagree with his solution and methods, and even if he has a big ego as a few people here are claiming, he's providing a choice and making the big boys like Intel notice, so he must be doing something right.
which is totally what she said
...but many customers are demanding Windows so the children can compete in the global job market.Which is sheer stupidity! Learning Windows is not what children need to compete in the global job market. A good education is what they need. Something that Negroponte, the educator, and Papert, the master behind the scenes who has devoted his life to studying how children learn, understand a bit better than Intel's sales flacks.
"but many customers are demanding Windows so the children can compete in the global job market."
You just make crap up and pass it off as fact.
Who are these customers, and how does "knowing windows" help compete for any job?
Be specific in replying. The whole world knows you're making junk up. It's up to you to convince them that you have a *bit* of a clue.
...135,000 children who grow up without access to information and the world economy.
"Ignorance is power"
What?
He does have a right, and to more than just a hissy-fit, if Intel encouraged a customer to break a legally binding contract, and if by doing so broke their own contract with OLPC, though I'm not sure if this is the case.
It's not just about choosing the Classmate over the XO, it's about choosing it after having agreed to purchase the XO, and being encouraged to do so by a so called partner of the OLPC.
I accept I know nothing. Insulting my ignorance is wasted on me.
I like how everyone is railing on Intel, which is a corporation. These were acts by sales people. Have you ever dealt with sales people? While it sounds like these were repeated actions, it doesn't sound out of line for a sales organization. If you have sales people where you work, do they embody the spirit of your company, and truly represent it as a whole? I am guessing.... not. Were these actions ethical/moral/nice? Of course not. Is that Intel's fault as a whole? Probably not, but it is a ding against them, and is getting some press. I am sure they don't like that. But people, please... let's keep it in perspective. Comments like "this is why I'll never buy Intel" are just stupid. If you base decisions on things like this, then you'll never buy anything, because I can guarantee you that there are sales people in every organization that would step on their grandmother's throat to make a sale. Nature of the beast, if you will.
I know there were sales people in a small company that I worked for that sold things to clients that didn't exist outside a prototype, and those weren't even authorized. A signed contract and money can go a long way in making executives say "ok, that was wrong - but let's get past that and work together as a team to make this happen!" Hahah... of course, doesn't hurt that the sales dope was best friends with the president and majority shareholder of the company. But I digress.
My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.
This is disgusting. In this day and age where corporate responsibility is a prominent issue, how can Intel go and try to sabotage a charitable organization? Is the Red Cross or Unicef next cause they may have AMD chips in their computers? Do they think they can capitalize on 3rd-world children? Will the dollar difference between the OLPC and Intel version be negligible to those people? What hot-shot marketing guru thought this gem up, was it Scrooge McDuck?
I would like to see Intel publicly humiliated for this. Personally, this changes my decision to use Intel in my next computer. *sigh*... Why does the devil have to make chips?
As far as Classmate vs. XO, I think that's a smokescreen for the real issue: how to push PC-like objects with the right features into low price points and high quality so that they are affordable enough to use for mass education projects. Everybody knows Intel can't design PCs, the only technical role they can play is getting cheap, good-performance, low-power SOCs out the door. As a publicly owned company, they can only do this if they have a financial story. And getting locked into *exclusively* supporting an initiative that only uses the competition's processors? Come on! I'm as big of an intelligent critic of capitalism as anyone I personally know, but expecting Intel to back OLPC to the hilt at any cost is just the dumbest thing I've ever heard, and it amazes me how many otherwise intelligent people don't understand that. Let Intel compete to get the right processors in the right solution; that's all Intel knows how to do anyway (and as long as AMD keeps them honest, that's what they do).
And please, don't give me a rant on how everything from the west is too darned expensive anyway, because most of that boils down to issues of ridiculously manipulated currency markets.
And then there were none.
http://laptop.org/vision/people/MaryLouJepsen/
Man, try this for the ClassMate (TM)
http://www.intel.com/intel/worldahead/classmatepc/
Notice any similarities like the graphic at the top?
bang goes my karma... again...
http://www.intel.com/pressroom/kits/bios/grove/paranoid.htm with 'only the paranoid survive'. Hey, those bleeding-heart commies have taken business that is rightfully OURS, that means war.
I'm fighting back this year by buying more and more from employee-owned (John Lewis, I'm from the UK) organisations, cooperatives (Telephone Coop, local credit union), mutuals (Royal London) and anything else that doesn't have shareholders and then lastly for-profits with a verifiable social agenda and a record of honourable behaviour (harder and harder to find though).
I'm having a hard time explaining that open-source/Windows is an ethical choice too, many people here seem to only understand that in the context of food-miles and sweatshops, not in the context of technology.
As I work for non-profits, they often say 'we get really good discounts from Microsoft', so we don't want any, without considering the deeper implications. I now send them to this: http://www.freegeekvancouver.org/en/node/125 comprehensive and well-stated.
On y va, qui mal y pense!
I wish I had a catchy name... "Bill's Law" just wont catch on. Anyway, here's why companies like Intel can both support OLPC with heartfelt charity, while at the same-time underhandedly stealing their market:
A corporation's actions are dictated by the weakest morals of it's leaders.
Corollary: The simplest way to make a corporation good is to have a strong ethical leader. I guarantee that the leaders involved in working with OLPC are honest people. I also guarantee the leaders involved in knee-capping OLPC are dishonest. A strong leader would find one personality for the company, and enforce it on the troops. Weak leaders allow multiple personalities to come forward when convenient.
Beer is proof that God loves us, and wants us to be happy.
new doesn't mean you'll like it.
You've learned certain ways of doing things.
You've got used to them.
You like them.
Now, a proper XO laptop (not a cadged one meant for the children in poor countries) can have a different version of the OS on it. You'll lose the propriatory stuff (though later versions of the XO will have open source drivers or new hardware that does) but you can add a USB wireless connector that works with linux for that.
You have the hardware.
And that's the beauty of ensuring that the XO is free and open. If it used MS Windows you'd probably agreed to only have Windows on it.
If they do that then they run the risk of a public backlash, like the reactions to this story.
The OLPC idea needs perhaps 5 or 10 years to mature, in my opinion. After that, when every country in the world realizes how much computers help grow social strength, the market will be far larger and well-defined, and commercial efforts will be very welcome.
The OLPC idea is founded on these understandings: 1) That students will be far more interested in school if they have a way of accessing the world's information, especially where books are not easily available. 2) That students can teach themselves. 3) That computers are fascinating and provide an incentive to learn. 4) That one or two people in a community who are especially good at teaching themselves may provide leadership that helps the entire community grow.
If a foolish entry like Intel's competes, that may kill the entire OLPC experiment. The entire good idea could become discredited or delayed many years.
Intel has in the past been amazingly bad at producing items for users. Until 1991, Intel had a Consumer Products Division that was extremely badly managed. Can it be wise that Intel has decided to go into the low-cost, commodity consumer business, when Intel has always failed at that business? Given Intel's past history and core competency, can Intel become a strong competitor with Mattel?
If Intel wants to compete, it should offer Mr. Negroponte cheaper processors to compete with the AMD processors used now. Producing processors is what Intel does very well, apparently in spite of top management.
Intel, apparently, never wavered from its position that it was in competition with OLPC. Intel tried to kill the program before it got fully started; that's how it appears to the public. Internal attempts at spin control at Intel don't change the public perception that Intel has been, and intends to continue to be, destructive.
Many people seem to think that the underlying problem is that Intel CEO Paul Otellini has extremely poor social skills. It seems to me that the OLPC issue could eventually bring such an accumulation of bad press to Intel that the Intel board fires Otellini.
Certainly Otellini's handling of the One Laptop Per Child initiative could not have been worse. It was as though he said to himself, "How can I get billions of dollars worth of free publicity for Intel, all negative?" Intel's actions have created the impression that Intel wants to kill acceptance of the OLPC so that it can kill the OLPC project and then raise prices on its own products.
Intel marketing should possibly be called Intel "marketing" because it is often propelled by utterly foolish ideas. One example is the Intel trademark "Viiv", which was a bad idea even if people could pronounce it. See, for one example, the article Intel admits defeat with Viiv.
It still won't change the fact that the OLPC's (and Negroponte's) overwrought idealism and arrogance are dire threats to the viability of this program. Negroponte has managed to piss off many of his best sponsors and most of the governments he is trying to sell his laptops to. That is NOT the path to getting a laptop in the hands of kids. It's the path to becoming a forgotten philanthropic footnote.
But, please, don't let me interrupt the love-fest with my criticism. Expend some more mod points so that even the slightest criticism of this genius can be safely buried and ignored.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
"Classmate specs are better than XO. There is a bit of goods in XO hardware, but not all that much"
Depends on your definition of 'better'. I don't think the OLPC hardware should be underestimated. The Classmate may have a faster processor and more storage, but it also has a shorter battery life, no 'e-book' mode, no mesh network, isn't nearly as rugged or user serviceable, and costs more. Given that a 366MHz processor and 128MB RAM is a perfectly respectable combo as long as the software is tuned for it, flexibility and longevity ought to be a more significant factor than raw [on-paper] grunt.
There's a nice recent take-apart here:
http://www.bunniestudios.com/blog/?p=218
Obviously a great deal of thought and design has gone into these beasties. If only my own (much-battered) machines were built like that...
Before you go on the whole competition is good for laptops speech, remember that OLPC is not a laptop project, it is an education project.
The idea is to improve education in poorer countries, and the laptops are a means to an end, not an end in themselves. Intel's laptop sabotages the OLPC goal because it is a laptop project, not an education project. Remember that the OLPC comes with education based software and even has a "show me the code" button not to mention a screen which is very suitable for reading electronic books. They are carefully designed for education. Intel's laptops aren't. Therefore, competing with OLPC sabotages the goal of better education for poorer people.
Oh, and just to cover the other point, no, you can't eat a laptop, but that's not their purpose: they are not disaster relief tools either, they're education tools.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
The success of his project is dependent on getting enough orders to give them economy of scale savings. He is courting the wealthier countries right now, and as he gets more orders, he can reduce cost further, and reach a more and more impoverished market. If Intel uses this as a way to have OLPC do all the front work of identifying markets, getting in to talk with the people who can make the buying decisions, and then end-gaming them on the sale, they are not only hurting the success of the OLPC project and shortening its eventual reach, they are also directly stealing value from the project which did the initial effort investment. Some of these countries might not have talked to Intel directly, but had heard good things about this OLPC thing and so first entertained the idea only because of the merits brought by that project. Intel is therefore operating under the guise of friendship and help, while cannibalizing the underlying foundation of the project.
OLPC laptops are more open, more free, better designed, and less expensive. Intel ClassMate PC's are proprietary, less rugged, and require more power to operate. Worst of all they are for-profit, and those profits are sent to Intel stock holders, making wealthy business men wealthier at the expense of money which would better be used satisfying an educational need in the exact same arena as the laptop was advertised as intending to assist. They unnecessarily drain valuable resources from the very market they are pretending to aid.
Basically this is about as disgustingly slimy as I think they are able to be.
Slay a dragon... over lunch!
It's $50 cheaper than the Classmate PC. At $200 for the OLPC laptop that means that you can give five kids laptops for the same amount of money that you could give four kids the Classmate PC. And that's after the fact that the Linux discount saved them $35. Of course, one would assume that all the effort gone into designing an interface for children that encourages them to search and learn has some additional value. So basically the idea is to get more educational value for less price.
As for the advantages of open source, I'm not sure how long these kids will get to use the laptops, but 13, 14 year olds can do things that I can't think of.
I personally think that spending the money on books, libraries and teachers would work better. Atleast in my country (India), that is true, and I'm glad they backed off from the OLPC. However, Intel's actions are unconscionable any way. It is obvious their goals are different. Those few hundred thousand who won't get laptops because the price is higher won't matter to them.
"Intel has invested a billion dollars over the last 10 years alone in education around the world," said Mr Otellini.[Head of Intel]
Very telling indeed, but not in the way he intends it. He's basically saying they have high stakes in this market and, being a corporation, they expect a return on this investment.
He's basically giving away the motive for Intel to do such rotten things to the OLPC project.
---
"The chances of a demonic possession spreading are remote -- relax."
Well, the Classmate hardware specs *are* better than the XO -- but only "conventional" specs.
What about innovative features that the XO embodies? The sunlight readable screen, the tablet like e-book mode, the ultra low power capabilities, the mesh networking? Admittedly, you could argue that the mesh networking is as much software as hardware, but the hardware is a part of it.
In addition, is the Classmate as rugged as the XO?
I don't think just adding Sugar to the Classmate would match up. I submit that despite the higher specs on CPU speed, RAM, and storage, the Classmate hardware represents inferior hardware for the stated purpose as compared to the XO. Those specs are not very significant to the mission that both these units claim to aim at. The hardware advantages that the XO brings to the table *do* make a difference to that mission.
And it wouldn't be easy to save a ton of money by dropping Windows. MS is deathly afraid of non-MS OSes taking hold in the developing world -- they are offering Windows in that market at $3 a pop.
Ignorance killed the cat. Curiosity was framed.
he might also feel that putting a diesel generator right outside the window of the classroom so that the Classmate PC's can have power, just might not be good for the kids. I read in an interview where Intel came in an won a contract over the XO but when they got the laptops in the class, the inconsistent power they had would not allow for a full school day's use of the laptops. Intel brought in a diesel generator to provide constant power.
;-/
Somehow, it just doesn't seem to be a very efficient or effective way to get laptops to these kids. It is also a very good example of how the Classmate PC is not in the same league as the XO in its design goals.
So maybe Negroponte is on the warpath to keeping diesel fumes away from kids.
LoB
"Anyone who stands out in the middle of a road looks like roadkill to me." --Linus
Fight club?
Perhaps we can modify it for the case at hand:
A) Estimated public significance of a particular unethical behavior
B) Probability of the unethical behavior being revealed to the public
C) Estimated cost of repairing damaged image due to unethtical behavior
A * B* C = X , which is what it costs to act unethically. If X is greater than the profit we stand to make by acting unethically, we act ethically. But if X is less than estimated profit... MWUAHAHAHA
More like NIGGERponte, am I rite guys?
The Rainmaker
Mesh network is a software feature, could be provided by OS. E-book mode isn't a significant perk. Battery life is, but it should be able to enter some strong power-saving mode, shouldn't it?
If it's not nearly as rugged or serviceable, it might be a show-stopper, although a GOOD support contract could solve it.
As for price, it is sold cheaper than XO. And that's a HUGE catch, the "dark secret": manufacturing costs exceed sales price by a hefty margin, and the difference is paid by Microsoft, to push Windows. So actually shipping Classmates WITHOUT Windows woulld result in a significant INCREASE of the price, as opposed to 'expected' discount. That's why the "wink-wink". "Wouldn't that be price dumping? But that's illegal! Why would you want me to partake in some illegal scheme?" - a nice small blackmail, calling their bluff - either sell the laptop even cheaper, without Windows (far below manufacturing costs) or create some VERY bad press (and maybe a bit of legal trouble as well) by forcing them to admit to some illegal, evil practice against a charity.
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You're not a kid in a developing country who might have never used a computer before. The machine has to be tactile, simple and responsive. Minimal eye candy to confuse, minimum text to aid understanding in as many languages as possible. You've seen it all, Jorge in Uruguay hasn't.
Why does the desire for openness have to be a religious thing? There is a strong practical interest in not tying third world kids to the whims of a for-profit corporation in the USA. What happens when Microsoft/Intel decide to stop playing the charity game? This isn't just Wintel hating, it's basic logic --- as for profit corporations, Microsoft/Intel are _obliged by law_ to maximize their shareholder value. If that getting rid of a charitable program to take advantage of a perceived new market, then so be it. Now, I don't think there is anything inherently wrong with Microsoft/Intel entering new markets like this, but I think it's quite reasonable to believe that government dollars in those countries would be better spent on open things like OLPC, for the sake of prudent long-term planning.
A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
I see your informative link, and raise you a pithy comment.
Intel should not have signed a non-compete agreement then.
It might be ok if they were just cold-calling countries.
It is a little shady if they try negotiating with countries which they already know OLPC is negotiating with.
It is downright unethical for them to go and ask countries to break their contract for OLPC's to get an Intel product.
It is pretty sleazy for Intel to figure that there is more profit here than potential fallout over doing it.
vi +
The OLPC gains economies of scale by launching in wealthier, and more populous countries such as China and India, first. China has a long history of expertise in making inexpensive copies of anything that can be manufactured.
http://www.livenudejournal.com/
-- Subvert the dominant paradigm. Repeat as desired. http://ownlifeful.com/
Negroponte would do well to put the Intel relationship behind him. This is turning into a "he said v. they said" argument.
Of course, Negroponte could use these tactics to generate more buzz for OLPC at Intel's expense (regardless if it is actually true).
I'm not saying which side is right. I am saying Negroponte needs to move on... Jesus, how many more of these OLPC v Intel stories do there need to be?
These comments are my own and do not necessarily reflect the views or opinions of my employer or colleagues...
Mesh network is a software feature, could be provided by OS. E-book mode isn't a significant perk. Battery life is, but it should be able to enter some strong power-saving mode, shouldn't it?
The problem is that power saving is connected to the first two items. The XO mesh can forward packets while the motherboard is sleeping. Arguably, this can be done if the Classmate adopts the same Marvell radio and firmware. Similarly, e-book mode can also run without the motherboard awake, because the framebuffer is powered independently. I'm not sure if any of the G1G1 people tried it but I think the e-book battery life should be around 24hr.
Tsunami -- You can't bring a good wave down!
Did you see these agreements? Did you see what happened in Peru or do you have any kind of evidence at all tthat anything unethical happened? Any evidence that they broke a contract, lied, cheated, or stole? Personally, I find it unethical to jump to conclusions based on absolutely 0 evidence, but maybe I'm just a crazy dude.
These FOSS zealots really are the hippies of our generation, all closed-mindedness, know-it-all-ness, and an amazing degree of groupthink.
And it wouldn't be easy to save a ton of money by dropping Windows. MS is deathly afraid of non-MS OSes taking hold in the developing world -- they are offering Windows in that market at $3 a pop.
Actually, it would. Well, not easy but possible.
First, Microsoft would never admit to $3 a pop, with some $60 for Home Edition in retail. That would cause some serious outrage, so even if they ofer it at $3 a pop, they would discount some $20 just to hide that fact. And with prices of these systems that's not so little.
And the second fact is that for THESE systems, going to developing countries, conquering the market, getting potential future users, they are offering Windows at -$30 a pop. Yes, that's right, sell the laptops below costs, just to get the beach head on the new markets. Of course that's illegal, so it would be even harder to get Microsoft to admit to it, but as result the practical discount would be like $50 below the actual product cost.
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All that being said, the law is expensive to enforce, and in international bargains it may be different and difficult to find justice because of issues with jurisdiction, enforcement, substantive applicable law, and expense, meaning that breaching a contract amounts to what may be seen as, and is in effect, a form of theft.
If the african cared about their kids they would stop making more till they could feed the ones they have.
Supporting World Peace Through Nuclear Pacification
Intel will drop the price long enough to wipe out XO, then will bump it up to over 400. Perhaps more important, the classmate was not designed to survive for long in the wild. It was designed for classes. The XO is well built and easily serviceable. I would gladly give up speed for serviceability.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
If your post wasn't a troll, it would have some links to support the allegations you make, or at least some arguments in support of them.
PHEM - party like it's 1997-2003!
"Maximising profits for shareholders" does indeed make it okay to break contracts, lie, cheat or steal, but only as long as you don't get caught.
http://www.dieblinkenlights.com
I admire him for trying to bring computing to poor third world kids, even if a competitor eventually succeeds. He created this market, while big-assed companies ignored it until Nick showed it might be possible.
More practically, Al Gore probably used up the American & techie "peace prize quota" for five years. And the Bill Gates Foundation is ahead of Nick in this queue. Plus Nick's brother is considered an assh*l* by many Europeans for his lapdog service to George Bush (UN ambassador, Rice undersecretary).
First of all, your economics is silly; this kind of hardware has high fixed costs, so you almost always maximize profit by maximizing sales (or close to it). Nobody is preventing a nonprofit from buying classmates and giving them away at a loss, if that's the problem.
But the real problem is worse than that; you assume nonprofits follow their charter without fail. What happens in practice is that nonprofits eventually end up working to maximize prestige and cushy jobs at nonprofits, regardless of their ostensible goals, because that's the behaviour that gets rewarded. Negroponte apparently thinks he's entitled to a monopoly on this hardware class because his intentions are pure; no such luck.
Capitalism works. Deal with it.
What you say may or may not be true, but what IS true is that Intel was caught being dishonest and broke agreements with OLPC and as a result was kicked out of the OLPC's group.
What do YOU do when business partners are dishonest and break agreements with YOU?
--jeffk++
ipv6 is my vpn
Why does not make a distinction between a profit or non-profit. Otherwise non-profits would be renamed "do-gooders" and profits would be named "heartless-SOBs".
It has to do with their finances (their how): a non-profit balances income with expenses the ultimatum for a for-profit is to maximize income and lower expenses.
As you said, this a for-profit poaching on a non-profits territory. Quite ugly, but made even worse by the fact that Intel was in bed with OLPC. Where does personal ego fit into the mix?
I don't care if the Classmate is priced below cost or the OLPC is made with fairies' dust. The only thing myself and anyone, including Negroponte, should really care about is that there's not only one, but two cheap computers for emerging nations. And that, no matter how you look at it, is a Good Thing(TM).
If Negroponte is telling the truth and Intel's ulterior motive to underprice their Classmate is its own long-term "benefit" for the sake of market share, the only true winners are the kids, the recipients of those computers. And if Intel is trying to push their option by highlighting its strengths versus the OLPC and the governments decide to buy Classmates based entirely on technical merit, that will be good for Intel but the true winners will again be the kids. I'm sure those children won't give a damn about what type of processor these machines have (in fact, I doubt they will give a damn about a computer over a sandwich at this point, but that's an entirely different debate.)
And what about if the governments decide to buy an OLPC instead? Well, maybe that will force Intel to drop their prices even more and once again the kids will be the ultimate winners, as they will have more powerful machines for less money.
"Take the number of vehicles in the field, (A), and multiply it by the probable rate of failure, (B), then multiply the result by the average out-of-court settlement, (C). A times B times C equals X. If X is less than the cost of a recall, we don't do one."
I gave up religion for Lent.
I suppose I could always bite the bullet and buy non-Intel/non-AMD systems. Price would be high, but it beats supporting a douchebag company.
Blar.
It's like comparing the Wii to the PS3 (well, maybe not that drastic). The PS3 specs blow the Wii apart in all the easily quantifiable ways... but in the difficult-to-objectively-compare metric of 'fun game console', the Wii is competitive, perhaps even better.
One problem with innovation is the difficulty to evaluate overall capability... which is bigger, a hundred cm^2 or one cm^3? New features are like new dimensions, and can make comparisons nonsensical.
Does that sound to you like a company that gets along with its clients and delivers on their promises?
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
Negroponte doesn't want competition. He wants OLPC to be the ONLY supplier of laptops for these countries. He doesn't want to compete with Intel on this market, he wants everyone but OLPC *out* of the market.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
ah yes, spot on, they're in the plane discussing that. I should go watch it again one of these days, it's an awesome movie.
MP3 Search Engine
Negroponte has done more for humanity than any CEO, CFO, POTUS (except maybe Carter). Intel, M$, Toshiba ... now want to compete for a future market, which they will abandon depending on MF$$$. OLPC is providing what greedy/stupid SOBs would never give ... a tool too prevent poverty by allowing learning environments anywhere in the world to poor and wealthy alike.
... many other companies and governments did not do AMFT/crap for children's' education anywhere (even low-tech poor nations). To compare Intel/CEO/POTUS & OLPC/Negroponte is like a stinking piece of shit trying to say roses are smelly. IOW: BullShit from a CEO, POTUS, Pope, or you still stinks of hubris, evil, and stupidity.
..., I was happy to fulfill your implied request.
A nation's economic stability is nurtured by education, depends on citizens learning, and provides for innovation and defense of the country. The USA economy and reputation internationally has declined (IMO, I am reasonably sure) proportionally to the decline in a real egalitarian quality education for US Citizens over the last 50 years.
Intel, M$, U$, EU
If you posted for a flame
Unaccountable leaders are masters, and unrepresented people are slaves. How do US and EU fare?
While the Classmate is more powerful than OLPC, it also uses 10 times the power. Intel had to donate generators to their pilot projects before they could use the classmate. OLPC can run on hand cranks. I would say the Classmate is a better fit for industrialized countries with easy access to clean power, but not for the places OLPC is trying to reach. I believe that Classmate also doesn't have mesh, so that connectivity from the school would only reach as far as a WAP.
How very cynical.. OLPC is a not-for-profit project afaik, and with the current political and financial climate in the 'target' countries, the last thing that they need is to get financially or politically raped by a capitalistic company.. I hope that these countries don't end up being primarily Windows using nations, but if they do, at least they should be able to do it at a decent cost, thanks to the 'market' that the OLPC is creating/'exploiting'.
which is totally what she said
Oh yes, some jerkoff who designs a laptop that sucks and markets it (he ain't GIVING it away, you know) to governments that he will ultimately only piss off is definitely comparable to Bill Gates, who has given and will give tens of BILLIONS of $ to Africa for education and to fight disease and hunger.
I just PRAY your post was intended as a joke. Saying that MS (or, more particularly, Bill Gates) has never done "crap for children's education anywhere" *has* to be intended as humorous irony.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
It's not the pricing, it's the "partnership" that was a problem. They were stealing deals from them.
You first point about education is valid. But Negroponte is not crusading for education in general, he is crusading for his laptop (and his laptop only) in particular. He isn't taking donations of books for these kids, he is not advocating funding for more teachers or stronger child labor laws (all things which would probably have more impact than any laptop). He is marketing his laptop, period.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
Is it OK for Intel to stab partners in the back just because the partner is headed by someone with an ego?
If so, is it OK if I mug rich old grannies? After all, they're always going on about "kids today don't show their elders respect" showing a huge ego.
Did Negroponte shag your mum up the arse or something? You've got a hard-on for hating him for some reason...
I agree. The support wiki is full of holes but it seems to be getting filled out. The great advantage I see in the buy-one-give-one program was to get it in the hands of people in the FOSS community that can find such weaknesses and fix them. We can support OLPC by developing applications and providing input to the project.
In the rush to get everything done on time I'm betting no one coordinated their UI ideas with everyone else, and now each activity is built from the ground up without a unifying lead.
That's why god invented "version x.2"
You can't take the sky from me...
Well, sir, it's obvious that you don't know how Capitalism works! The model is: create something that looks good on paper, sell to a bigger fish, then escape to the Caymans and chuckle condescendingly when you see your old company evaporate in a cloud of "rightsizing".
It's people like you who are going to ruin this country and give capitalists a bad name, mark my words.
Disgruntled,
Ken Ley
"If god did not exist, it would be necessary to invent him" --Voltaire
The Classmate PC runs several linux distributions, and can be purchased with Mandriva or XP last I checked.
Nice way you were able to get a jab at windows there in a completely unrelated story though. Truely the slashdot way.
The press keeps letting Intel off the hook when they say that OLPC wanted Intel to drop support for the Classmate PC. That is now what I've read was the case. OLPC wanted Intel to continue to support the Classmate PC but as an Intel reference design so that others were the ones selling it and they could sell it everywhere. The problem was that Intel wanted the XO to use Intel technology but at the same time, it was pushing it's own hardware to the same customers the OLPC had. There's a conflict of interest here and since Intel is a chip company, they should understand the issue and if anything, hand off the Classmate PC project to another company.
So OLPC didn't want Intel to abandon the Classmate PC, just let someone else build it and sell it Intel really wanted to also be a partner in the XO project. From what's been made public recently, one can easily see that there was a kind of vicious sales force pushing the Classmate PC to exactly the customers the XO was being offered to. Non-profit or not, Intel just can't have their cake and eat it too.
There were other issues also like Intel not working with OLPC in CPU changes to make Intel chips more energy efficient. And Intel not providing any software or software services for the XO during the 6 months they were onboard the project. There were others but how many do you need before it's obvious that Intel is not acting as a partner and looks more like they just purchased some good PR for joining.
I just love how Intel said, and I quote, "I don't want to get into specifics but we met every obligation that we were committed to." but would not say that they met every obligation they were under contract to meet. What they were committed to and what they contractually agreed to were probably two very different lists. Unfortunately, nobody has asked if what Intel "was committed to" were the same things Mr Negroponte said they were contractually obligated to do. Isn't marketing speak wonderful?
LoB
"Anyone who stands out in the middle of a road looks like roadkill to me." --Linus
Just having a laptop is not the issue. With OLPC comes a backend infrastructure of educational materials. With the classmate you get a windows desktop..... How is that going to help kids. Sorry but the kids are better off with the one designed for them and not the one designed to contribute to Intels bottom line.
What you have to remember is that all large organizations need to make fantastic amounts of cash to pay the employees and shut the shareholders up. Its really quite surprising that we don't notice their sometimes outrageously bad behavior more than we do.
Its not all the big bad companies fault either - take the case of a startup company that used to give away free software upgrades which discovers when it has been bought out by a large company with a legal department - that it is illegal to give away software in the US unless you don't declare your sales as revenue. The law is there to stop people selling half completed stuff and pretending that they wont have to spend most of the sales money on fixing their crap product. The other effect is that everybody has to charge a huge whack for software upgrade support and cant give anything away for free. It also goes someway to explaining why you have to keep buying the next version of everything.
When we talk about big bad Microsoft, it is true, they do aggressive and objectionable things to ram product down our throats against our wishes and they will do stuff to destroy the competition. In the case of Intel I really cannot understand how they managed to get involved in the OLPC thing in the first place if it wasn't commercially useful to them. Thats what I would complain about, not the fact that some poor sales sap in South America tried to take advantage of a commercial opening.
Facts are history now plebs have politics for religion on social media.
People have been trying to integrate computers into education for years. But what is the level of success in the mainstream?
In the education mainstream, computers are used for:
a) typing up essays, and
b) learning about computers.
They can do more, but nobody has demonstrated good ways for them to be used for more. Yeah, you can load books and them and stuff, but you can also play games on them and stuff. The distraction factor is terrible.
Negroponte and Papert are radicals. Their ideas are wild and unproven.
Papert is the guy who thought Logo would be a good idea. I can tell you straight out that Logo is overhyped shit that accomplished precisely nothing. It was always presented as this great educational programming language that would encourage kids to teach themselves and it was always, always inferior in fun and self-education to things like BASIC (which came out 4 years before Logo).
Logo accomplished nothing and wasted a lot of resources. Papert is full of shit. He's the kind of guy who blames the failure of bad ideas on insufficent commitment to those bad ideas. He's fucking dangerous when he's got access to other people's money.
Papert has never been a broadly balanced expert on education. Rather, he's simply been a champion of constructivism: a philosophy of education which holds that students should be considered responsible for teaching themselves, and instructors should only be their helpers. He promotes unproven ideas, and his emotional commitment to extreme views may make him less qualified to educate children than the average adult who has never researched education.
Papert is essentially hostile to the basic concept of authoritarian teachers, even at the grade-school level, which is applied in conventional education in every rich, literate, and successful country in the world. In short, he's a fringe nut whose work undermines the educational tradition that built the first world.
Negroponte is the man behind Wired Magazine. Now, Wired can be entertaining, but it's also completely retarded. It's full of breathless optimism and uncritical enthusiam of the kind that fueled the dot com bubble. It serves mainly to promote bad ideas and whip up irrational exuberance. He's a real hazard when other informed people let him speak as some kind of authority to uninformed people, because there is no doubt he is going to mislead them while speaking with total confidence and conviction.
Trying out their radical ideas is really what this is all about, and it's a selfish motivation. They want hundreds of millions of dollars from the poorest countries in the world to run a massive psychological experiment on millions of children who are desperately in need of proven, reliable education (classrooms in good repair, papers and pencils, decent textbooks, blackboards, and literate teachers who show up every day and actually do their work) NOT crazy techno-hippie stuff.
The reason they aren't trying to sell the XO to first-worlders isn't that they're more concerned about third-world children, or that third-world children need more help. The reason is that first-worlders are confident and skeptical enough to reject their radicalism. Third-world governments - corrupt, incompetent, and aware that they aren't doing so well - are vulnerable to manipulation.
In the third world, they see weaknesses that will allow them to dominate and control the same sort of people in positions of authority who have rejected their ideas and humiliated them. Donning the mantle of charity is part of their strategy to manipulate third world governments, and a weapon to shame critics into silence.
And somehow they get away with it, despite trying to extract billions of dollars from the poorest countries in the world.
There is no way the OLPC project could succeed as a business. No chance, no hope, no matter who they were trying to sell their stuff to. That's why it's a "non-profit organization": it sounds better than "unprofitable corporation".
The XO can act as a mesh point when the main CPU is powered off; this feature clearly cannot be provided by the OS.
Perhaps not for a general purpose laptop; when you are selling to to national ministries of education as, among other things, a way to deliver educational content more efficiently, e-book mode is a pretty major feature.
That's an area that the XO has focussed on considerably, so I doubt that the Classmate can mitigate its general disadvantage there. If anything, the XO probably has the advantage on that point as well, which increases the overall XO advantage.
One that they are failing by opening themselves up to major lawsuits. Do you seriously believe the shareholders would condone this illegal action?
I am bored of parrots mouthing shareholder interest arguments, do you think other people don't know this 'illuminating' fact. Shareholder interest doesn't mean you can ride roughshod over rules and ethics, shareholder interest operates within the framework of law and general society. Human beings man these cooperations and cannot hide behind faceless nameless corps to behave unethically. Mature individuals are expected to behave ethically and morally in all societies, that's universal and working for a company doesn't absolve you of that responsibility.
Corporations is US are really out of control, ethical standards have gone for a complete toss, all these platitudes people in authority seem to utter and expect from ordinary citizens and employees seem to be for public consumption only because the entire management class seem to be operating in environment where they make the rules and don't give a fig for anything else but their personal wealth. Just look at the sub prime crisis, the telecom & cable monopoly demonstrating the subjugation of public interest, co-operating with China because you 'got to follow the rules", appalling labour conditions in third world operations, obscene exit packages for executives running their company to the ground and causing massive layoffs. And now Intel kicking a charity project for relatively insignificant gains. This sort of behavior appears to be borderline evil.
Is it in shareholder interest to take a company to the ground, cause massive layoffs and parachute out with hundreds of millions of dollars in golden handshakes or like Carly buying multiple planes and laying off employees at the same time. What happens to shareholder interest at these times, are they effective in curbing this behavior even a single percent. This is just illusion of empowerment.
Before I get into a tizzy over which is better, OLPC or Intel, has anyone done any actual science to determine and quantify the benefits of access to laptops and the internet for 3rd world children? There's science to back the notion that mosquito nets improve the lives of children in the tropics (measurably lower rate of Malaria). But on computers, we're just taking it on faith.
Intel is no different than Microsoft, does anyone remember Zylog? Intel will do to chip makers what Microsoft will do to software makers.
I can't say AMD is more ethical, but it is at least a counterpoint to the Intel near monopoly of P.C. CPUs.
Actually there are other problems associated with the classmate and all the other low cost PC ideals.
#1 Built for profit will ultimately mean the end user will have to pay out of pocket for profit margins. In most modern PC companies this means support, or bundled software with nagware.
#2 If these laptops end up with Windows on them, they will be asked to purchase AV, Spyware, and ultimately face what everyone else in the modern world faces. Support nightmares fixing windows machines or having to reinstall the OS every year because education on a windows machine means something completely different than on a Linux machine. And the whole idea was to allow these kids to muck with the OS, something you will not be doing on a windows machine.
#3 None of the other solutions are built to the same standards as these XO machines. Drops from 6 feet, dust proof, water resistant try that with the eeepc.
#4 power consumption. anyone else have a pull string for power on your classmate.
And if you read the article on the OLPC by the economist http://www.economist.com/science/displaystory.cfm?story_id=10472304
you will find that they seam to have missed the whole point of why these exist. He had to do to terminal mode to get youtube to work? And youtube is all of a sudden is a make or break education tool?
Ken Lay would probably not misspell his own name.
This isn't really a unique situation. The Big Pharma companies regularly are caught trying to impede, co-opt or otherwise obstruct the efforts of the Red Cross or the Gates Foundation. Unfortunately they have huge advertising dollars so it never makes it into the corporate-owned press. Even this barely makes it into the techno-geek news sources, you'll never see it on the Six O'Clock News or in the Chicago Trib.
"Think about how stupid the average person is. Now, realise that half of them are dumber than that." - George Carlin
Just out of curiosity would you have a problem with computers in western countries which serve as indoctrination tools for Apple or Microsoft (Apple was pushing hard to have Macs in schools in the 90's to create a new generation of Mac buyers)
. . .
No, you sociopath.
Try doing even a preliminary amount of research before you spout off trash like that:
http://outcampaign.org/
No, you sociopath.
I see you're interested in a reasonable, polite discussion.
And yes, I am well aware of why Slashbots fervently hate Microsoft. I still don't see why, other than religious zealotry, that people would deny impoverished kids an educational tool simply because it uses Microsoft. That kind of spite is seldom found outside of religious institutions.
"Ask not what your country can do for you." --John F. Kennedy
A corporation's actions are dictated by the weakest morals of it's leaders.
... In an interview with Reuters conducted over e-mail in May, Negroponte described Murdoch as a personal friend and a key backer of the One Laptop per Child (OLPC) foundation that makes inexpensive laptop computers for poor children." ( from http://www.javno.com/en/economy/clanak.php?id=67574 , emphasis mine )
How does a charity differ if you look at the core sponsors?
"Last month Negroponte's foundation disclosed that News Corp.'s MySpace social networking Web site is developing an Internet community for the poor children who receive the group's laptop computers.
CC.
TaijiQuan (Huang, 5 loosenings)
"It does not do to leave a live dragon out of your calculations, if you live near him." - Tolkien
I tested a B2 prototype for about a month in a Least Developed Country. I can attest that effective battery life in continuous heavy use was about 3-4 hours, while in e-book mode I never had the patience to actually reach the end of the charge. The diminution in battery charge over time for a more or less idle machine was hardly noticeable.
YMMV, of course; don't trust anecdotal evidence from a beta and all that.... Still waiting for official news (and numbers) from a pilot of more than 20 XOs in a neighbouring country.
Crumb's Corollary: Never bring a knife to a bun fight.
You are completely underinformed on this issue, and the little bit of an opinion that you do have is clearly based on personal bias and not factual evidence or even rational thought. Please stop attempting to contribute to the discussion until you have educated yourself to the minimum level necessary to be worth listening to. Thanks!
Those are really great points, and not to detract from them:
I personally would invest in Intel or MS before I'd invest in your company. This is not a judgement about you in particular; on the flip side I'd personally rather work at or do business with your company than either Intel or MS. But when it comes to investing money, I and most people will choose the business with the fastest growth every time. I don't want any company I invest in to do something dishonest, so this would temper my enthusiasm for investing in MS or Intel; but, in the end, I think the pure profit motive would win out for me too. And I don't think I am unusual.
My point being, that what you say may all be true, but the market is very large, and the majority of the resources will go to whoever fights the hardest (and often, the dirtiest). This means that people like you and companies like yours are sadly, destined to remain a very small part of the market.
Now is your citation of -$30 per copy speculation, or do you have actual information to that effect?
Ignorance killed the cat. Curiosity was framed.
And because of this moral lapse, all of us (who would probably do the same thing) ensure that the companies that we would like to work with will vanish. Our money has moral value. If we use it to support evil, we will eventually have only evil.
That is all.
Look at it this way.
There is nothing stopping people moving from open source software to closed source other than aversion to cost, but there is at least one thing stopping people moving from closed source to open source and that is data lock in.
What one learns on an open source system is transferable to closed source; I'm not so sure it goes the other way. I haven't used Windows for more than an hour a month (probably actually a lot less than that) in the last 3 years yet I am still better at using Vista over the phone than people using it daily. Heck I've helped people out with OSX and I've looked at one system for 15 minutes.
Semi-automatic amateur armchair Australian philosopher; conjecture ready at any moment...
Semi-automatic amateur armchair Australian philosopher; conjecture ready at any moment...
If that's the case then Intel should have never accepted a seat on the Board of Directors (or Trustees?) of the OLPC project. How can you be on the Board of a company when you directly compete with them? Fiduciary responsibility and ethics says, no - you don't.
And to address those seem not to know what the XO can do: Sure, a $300 Intel Classmate with Windows may be able to be used as is to write book reports and create powerpoint presentations, but will it come with a development/programming environment designed for kids so that they can write their own software? Will it contain any usable software beyond a word processor, e-mail client, and web browser? Will a Classmate actually be able to be used for anything like a collaborative effort by school kids to do anything other than prepare them for a later purchase of a "real" PC?
"A little misunderstanding? Galileo and the Pope had a little misunderstanding."
Starting to see things...
Something Pez forgot to mention is that you can emulate an XO relatively painlessly. There is even a premade image file that is available that you can drop into say QEMU and see what it's all about.
A few caveats: Use something with virtualization which unfortunately means x86. Trying to run this emulated on a high end PowerPC system was saddening. Yes it is only a 433MHz target, but 433MHz is pretty high when you think about it. The other thing to keep in mind is that the premade image wants to change the display to about 1024x768 instead of the XO native 1200x900. The Sugar manager seems to be fine with it but most activities (XO apps) will not display properly.
Your remark might have worked if the OP hadn't only contributed the same drive that's been regurgitated and then discredited a thousand times already on the various OLPC discussions.
are you a shill? i doubt intel wud have the balls to put one on here.
intel IS a SALES company. hello? u following this? their reason for existence is to SELL chips and chipsets. not to make better chips, or make the world a better place. the only reason they continue to make better chips is because they have to. if not a competitor would take their lunch. and even with this, they only do the BARE minimum, look at them historically, and their advertizing, it all seems to be bold letters round numbers, and over simplified specs, like MHZ!TM. with their rnd budget they could have (and probably did) made so many innovations, but they will never see the light of day until they HAVE to release something new, or risk losing sales.
never forget, dumbass, that sales companies can be one of 2 things. 1) ethical, believing in good will as an asset, treating customers well, and being assured of repeat business or 2) completely ammoral, with no regard for law, human beings, or anything else except their own growth.
which one would you rather support? i will also never buy intel again, unless i cant possibly help it, but given whats out there these days im not worried about it
Mesh network could be provided by the OS, but it isn't. E-book is a significant feature when you're in a classroom situation where you can't afford a pile of physical textbooks. Just because they *could* be provided, or a classroom feature doesn't seem significant to you personally, doesn't make Intel's product the better choice.
"Give a man fire, and he'll be warm for a day; set a man on fire, and he'll be warm for the rest of his life
I haven't heard of Negroponte before. Can someone give me some backgrounds for this. software development
because it allows them to define and create their own system for use. this is something no amount of money can buy. it is in the realm of unknown developments, and rightfully has big companies like intel and M$ so scared that they want to kill this project at all costs.
this is why ppl here are calling you stupid and modding you down; you cannot see the traditional renaissance picture of two people holding a rose out to each other, while holding a dagger in the other hand behind their back.
so your 90% of the world uses argument is pure shit if its not what they really want to use, and people are very adaptive, especially at an early age, learning linux, then windows is not very hard on anyone, except windows, which is hated here, for numerous reasons.
as for your article, where manufactures needed someone like negroponte to actually make a 100 notebook, that is really bad and fasle economics. any major hardware vendor/company cant do this easily. the question is why? they would never do this because it would destroy their own profits forever. and for the author of the article not being able to write it on the olpc, just think of late 70's and 80's pc's and how shitty their interfaces were, yet ppl wrote on them every day.
you look like a sock puppet, and the link you give is a very biased magazine
i usually don't feed trolls, but sometimes shit like yours needs to be buried
So Negroponte's ego is a problem? Without an ego this big the project wouldn't be able to stand up to the likes of Intel. If the only thing being used as payment for these laptops is the cost of materials and Negroponte's ego I can't see how the third world is going to suffer. I live in Ecuador and the OLPC would be a great benefit to the kids here. The only available processors here are Intel and they are double the price of the same units in the UK. Intel seems to have a great knack of making their profits from the people that can't afford it, and the OLPC situation is no different. I would allegedly suggest that MS have had some involvement with this as well. BBC news reports about the Intel Classmate being used in Nigeria. Wasn't this the subject recently of $3 copies of Windows being used instead of Mandrake on government systems? The OLPC project is a fantastic way of helping children (who have probably never used electricity) to understand how technology is evolving in the world around them and to provide a link to educational resources which cannot be easily provided by 'free' teachers and libraries. All they need once OLPC has taken off is some great free eduacational websites (on their mesh network) to help them with maths, cultural sciences, language and basic skills like building and design, environment and nature. Lastly, maybe if they pick up some programming skills they will be able to contribute productively to their own technologies and provide the world with some new ones without using the same old reorganised blocks of recycled crap code that the developed world treats as revolutionary.
I try run my business as morally as i can. Karma is a big wheel, it turns slowly, but it does turn. I sleep very well at night. In the end im a little guy...only employing a little over 1000 people. But that 1000+ happier families who work for somebody who gives a damn about them and their lively hoods. Not perfect, but im not evil profit only corporations and believe there are a lot more out there than you know...maybe all small guys like me or smaller but they are out there.....its the mega corps that generally seem to be the problem.....hmmmmm
. I love the sound of burning women and screaming rubber....
Won't these kinds of experiences be a more meaningful demonstration of the OLPC superiority than sanctimonious whining and name-calling? I agree that it is an education project, not a laptop project, and perhaps it would be better for non-partisan observers to tabulate the pros/cons from the pilot studies.....
Wouldn't call you a troll, but you do miss the point.
You expect a magazine like the Economist to give a damn about getting laptops to third-world kids? No. The unnamed author of that piece doesn't get it either. He compares the OLPC to his own overpriced Vista Aero piece of gold plated silicon with a Ferari logo. Author exaggerates each side's argument to suit his own ends. Overlooks the lack of ruggedness of the ASUS Eee Pc or power problems of Intel's ahem "Classmate" PC. Nah. It's naysayers like whoever won't put their name to that article and you who are trying to drag the OLPC into the ground for reasons I can't fathom, but I can guess.
for profit corporations...are _obliged by law_ to maximize their shareholder value
I see this argument a lot around here, but I have never actually seen anyone cite the alleged law.
Under capitalism man exploits man. Under communism it's the other way around.
I don't have the actual citation at hand, but someone just added up the costs of separate parts (with all the applicable bulk/partnership discounts) and came up with quite a bit more than $30 above the sales price.
45 5F E1 04 22 CA 29 C4 93 3F 95 05 2B 79 2A B2
An innocent giant evil corporation used underhanded tactics? Doubtful. I think the philanthropist is lying! :P
In other words, "I am either unable or unwilling to refute your point that anti-Microsoft fervor could deny kids a valuable learning tool, and consider insults and attacks an acceptable substitute for debate."
"Ask not what your country can do for you." --John F. Kennedy
That's what competition is for. If the Wintel product is inferior, it simply won't sell.
I find it confusing that a social community that (by and large) purports to embrace freedom of choice is so against anything that competes with FOSS.
"Ask not what your country can do for you." --John F. Kennedy
Agreed. 1998 called and wants its job skills back.
IMO, some of the whining comes from the fact that because it is a non-profit, spending funds on tailing Intel projects to do negative press releases are costly. Those kinds of negative attack tactics are not what people and customers expect from non-profits and would taint the value before any deals are even made. Who does not expect this from companies like Intel, Microsoft, etc?
:-/
Your idea of having some non-partisan observations keeping track of these projects is sound though. I can also see that getting abused since Intel could easily require notification of impending visits from these non-partisan observers and fly people out to orchestrate the 'correct' observation.
It is a shame corporate profits drive so many to an anything goes competitive aggression. Especially in these kinds of situations where, IMO, Intel would stand to profit as the OLPC project kick started the usage of computers as education tools in these areas. For instance, in Peru, they had asked Intel to bid on the follow-on project for secondary school kids. They understood that the XO and apps are designed for primary school kids and a different device and applications would be needed for secondary school kids. There is still a neon question mark as to why the Intel sales rep pushed that quote aside and continued at the throat of the OLPC contract in an attempt to kick the OLPC laptop out of Peru. There is definitely some nasty stuff going on, there's no doubt of that I hope.
LoB
"Anyone who stands out in the middle of a road looks like roadkill to me." --Linus
Nope. I am just uninterested in spending my time refuting arguments that have been refuted dozens and DOZENS of times in OLPC discussions on Slashdot and furthermore only require a tiny amount of thoughtful contemplation to see the errors of anyway. If the OP can't take 10 seconds to actually think through the problem, I can't take 5 minutes to correct his stupidity.