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OLPC To Be Distributed To US Students

Posted by kdawson on from the seizing-the-initiative dept.

eldavojohn writes "The One Laptop Per Child Project plans to launch OLPC America in 2008 , to distribute the low-cost laptop computers originally intended for developing nations to needy students here in the United States. Nicholas Negroponte is quoted as saying, 'We are doing something patriotic, if you will, after all we are and there are poor children in America. The second thing we're doing is building a critical mass. The numbers are going to go up, people will make more software, it will steer a larger development community.'"

8 of 338 comments (clear)

  1. Patriotic??? by iamacat · · Score: 5, Insightful

    A patriotic thing would be to offer OLPC in US before elsewhere in the world. I am not saying it would be the most practical thing to do, but turning home only after selling everywhere else and some may say after failing to realize the volume is certainly not patriotic.

    1. Re:Patriotic??? by jorghis · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Every time someone tries to sell something to the government they spin it as "patriotic". When Halliburton sells to the government they make noise about how "patriotic" it is that they are selling to them. The same is true of everyone who builds anything from roads to aircraft carriers to now laptops. Maybe I am being cynical, but I do get tired of seeing the word "patriotic" used so many different ways for so many different reasons that it really doesnt seem to have the meaning that it used to.

    2. Re:Patriotic??? by fictionpuss · · Score: 5, Insightful
      I grew up on an 8bit Z80 128k Spectrum (+2). I learned more from that and its single instruction book (no internet) than I would have from an 'industry standard' computer of the time - because I could poke and peek inside it, because it was designed to be explored and played with - the ROM/OS even had little messages inside to reward the curious.

      The point is, that these kids will be able to learn more about computers and technology with the OLPC because it comes from the same sort of heritage, than they could with a box which has any other existing commercial OS (or even just plain Linux) shoved inside.

    3. Re:Patriotic??? by Monsuco · · Score: 5, Informative

      When Halliburton sells to the government they make noise about how "patriotic" it is that they are selling to them.
      Just something I would like to mention, there are really only two major companies in the world that are able to do all of the jobs we hire Halliburton for particular field. Schlumberger and Halliburton. Since Schlumberger mostly is based in the Netherlands and France, and since Halliburton is an American company (though it also has a headquarters in the United Arab Emirates) there was little question of who the contract would go to. There are other companies that do some of what these two do, but these are the only ones who do all of what we hire Halliburton to do. Also for several years, Halliburton was losing money in Iraq, only recently did they finally manage to make a profit. Just thought I would mention that.
      --
      The Gospel according to lolcat
  2. America's education system by HandsOnFire · · Score: 5, Insightful
    ...to distribute the low-cost laptop computers originally intended for developing nations to needy students here in the United States.

    Wouldn't it have made sense for him to have started in America, seeing as the education system is similar to that in quality of the systems in the developing nations? :p

  3. what the hell... by diewlasing · · Score: 5, Insightful

    ...is with the messed up tag: "onelaptopperblackchild"? Am I the only one who thinks that's slightly wrong?

  4. OLPC XOs are instanely entertaining by christian.einfeldt · · Score: 5, Interesting

    We had our first meeting of the San Francisco Bay Area OLPC user group. Not sure if we even have a name. At any rate, a bunch of us got together at the Linux lab in the San Francisco State University to just goof around with these machines. It is really funny to hear them hiss at each other as they try to figure out how close the nearest XOs are. Yep, they talk to each other. They emit a brief hissing sound when you ask them to calculate the distance between XOs. They listen for the hissing sound (or so I was told, dunno, didn't check into it) and then they calculate how long it took for the sound to reach each other, and then they all report back to each other, and they determine how far apart their fellow XOs are. Hilarious.

    They also have built in video, which two of the resident children were really enjoying by making monkey faces, much to the embarrassment of their parents. Insanity, you know, is inherited from your children. heh. One kid composed music on his XO. He is 5. As in less than 6 years old. You can add eyes to the screen, and the screen will talk to you to tell you how many eyes it has. Very entertaining for a 3 year-old. Did I mention that these computers are called One Laptop Per *Child*? They really figured out how to make these computers entertaining *for kids*. This is really a kid-centric device.

    The amazing thing is that it brings out the kid in adults.

  5. Re:zigactly by fictionpuss · · Score: 5, Interesting
    It's about market share - which educational computing system will become the successful standard for children in developing nations? Intel have demonstrated that they are very interested in this market and will happily use underhanded tactics to claim it.

    In this light it would make absolutely no sense to service the wealthy geek niche while Intel/Microsoft maximise profits at the expense of education, because by the time the OLPC had done whatever else it would take to satisfy you, the contest would be over.

    This isn't an anti-capitalist hippie parade either, but quite simply that all profit which is extracted from these developing nations represents lost opportunity for education. Intel/Microsoft can either help or hinder, but they have no sympathy from me if they continue to choose the latter.