Laptop Training Begins in Peru
,----[ Quote ]
| This week, teachers from remote rural villages in Peru are gathering in
| several regional cities to learn how to do their jobs via One Laptop per
| Child (OLPC) machines distributed to their pupils. Peru is now engaging in
| the world's most ambitious OLPC deployment: some 400,000 machines are headed
| to the Andean nation's poorest and remotest schools--about 6,000 schools in
| all. The first 25,000 of these machines are now being inventoried in a Lima
| warehouse and are poised for shipment to the interior.
`----
http://www.technologyreview.com/blog/editors/22041/
Recent:
Astounded in Arahuay
,----[ Quote ]
| I recently returned from a grueling three-week stay in Peru, where I worked
| with the serious Ministry of Education team entrusted with the country’s
| 260-thousand laptop OLPC implementation.
|
| [...]
|
| As there are few roads in and around Arahuay, the children don’t communicate
| much outside of school — with anyone. The teachers started independently
| pointing out to Mr. Navarro that this was changing once the laptops arrived:
| kids started talking to each other outside of school hours over the mesh, and
| working together more while in school. They started talking a lot more with
| each other in person, and conquered their previously paralyzing fear of
| strangers.
`----
http://radian.org/notebook/astounded-in-arahuay
Related:
Laptop-Project Founder Faults Intel
,----[ Quote ]
| Oscar Becerra Tresierra, general director for educational technology at
| Peru's Ministry of Education, says that after the country recently agreed to
| buy 272,500 OLPC laptops for primary-school students, an Intel sales
| ^^^^^^^^^^^
| representative tried "to scare us" by claiming the machines and their power
| ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
| adapters didn't work. "I don't feel very happy about it," he said. "We
| wouldn't like the project to fail because somebody is spreading gossip about
| ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
| the machines that doesn't turn out to be true."
`----
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB119948070480568405.html?mod=googlenews_wsj
Peru signs up for 260,000 OLPC laptops
,----[ Quote ]
| The first countries to place mass orders for the rugged green-and-white
| laptops were Uruguay and Mongolia.
`----
http://www.news.com/Peru-signs-up-for-260%2C000-OLPC-laptops/2110-11746_3-6221061.html?part=rss&tag=2547-1_3-0-20&subj=news
In Peru, a Pint-Size Ticket to Learning
,----[ Quote ]
| But no competitor approaches the XO in innovation. It is hard drive-free,
| runs on the Linux operating system and stretches wireless networks
| with "mesh" technology that lets each computer in a village relay data to the
| others.
|
| [...]
|
| Negroponte said 150,000 more laptops will be shipped to such countries as
| Rwanda, Mongolia, Haiti and Afghanistan in early 2008 through "Give One, Get
| One," a U.S.-based promotion ending Dec. 31 in which participants buy a pair
| of laptops for $399 and donate one or both.
|
| The children of Arahuay prove One Laptop's transformative conceit: that you
| can revolutionize education and democratize the Internet by giving a simple,
| durable, power-stingy but feature-packed laptop to the world's poorest kids.
`----
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/12/29/AR2007122900720.html
Lessons to Learn from the OLPC
,----[ Gist ]
| 1- Cheap is good
|
| 2- People don’t need a lot of power
|
| 3- Linux please
|
| 4- Flash storage is key
|
| 5- Make it efficient
|
| 6- Hand crank!
|
| 7- Don’t skimp on the features
|
| 8- Make it rugged
|
| 9- Make it look cool
|
| 10- It’s a tablet, too
`----
http://www.geek.com/lessons-to-learn-from-the-olpc/
One Laptop Per Child (New Version), Reviewed by 12-Year-Old
,----[ Quote ]
| For a regular laptop, this would be the paragraph about its problems, its
| deficiencies. But the thing is, there aren’t any problems with this computer!
| Congratulations, OLPC. You’ve done it. Or will you come out with yet better
| laptops? Is that even possible? We’ll have to see...
`----
http://www.freedom-to-tinker.com/?p=1206
On Education, Innovation, OLPC, And Open-Source
,----[ Quote ]
| While I used the machine for only a few minutes, I came away very impressed
| by it, in part because of my recent thinking about the growing importance of
| open-source to education, and the shared sense of adventure and hope that I
| found at the conference.
`----
http://daveshields.wordpress.com/2007/10/21/on-education-innovation-olpc-and-open-source/
Intel: doing the dirty on OLPC
,----[ Quote ]
| Intel’s agreement with the OLPC Foundation included a ‘non disparagement’
| clause, under which Intel and One Laptop promised not to criticize each
| other, according to Nicholas Negroponte in the latest article in the Wall
| Street Journal.
|
| Still Intel tactics have violated that repeatedly to kill OLPC efforts in
| Nigeria, Libya, Pakistan, India, China and Intel is also still trying to pull
| those tactics in Mexico, Brazil.
| This is simply disgracefull of Intel, scandalous.
|
| But Negroponte has signed an agreement saying that he is not allowed to
| criticize Intel, so he is not allowed to talk about these shameless tactics
| even though Intel is the one violating the agreement.
|
| So only independant voices on the Internet can get those messages of truth
| out about Intels tactics.
|
| In Nigeria, Intel came and donated 3000 laptops to counter OLPC efforts, then
| sells 17 thousand Classmates to Nigeria at a loss.
|
| Then Microsoft corrupted Nigerian officials with 400 thousand dollars to
| install Windows XP on those instead of Mandriva Linux.
`----
http://www.p2pnet.net/story/14124
Bill Gates: Cheap PCs won't help the poor
,----[ Quote ]
| Asked if he could start over and develop an operating system from scratch,
| what would he do?
|
| Nothing.
`----
http://www.builderau.com.au/news/soa/Bill-Gates-Cheap-PCs-won-t-help-the-poor/0,339028227,339286422,00.htm
Poor Kids' Laptop Cranks Up
,----[ Quote ]
| Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates earlier this year told the Microsoft
| Government Leaders Forum, "Geez, get a decent computer where you can
| actually read the text and you?re not sitting there cranking the thing
| while you're trying to type" (see Bill Gates Mocks $100 Laptop).
`----
http://www.redherring.com/article.aspx?a=17302
One Laptop Per Child - Production Delays Caused By Microsoft, Intel?
,----[ Quote ]
| I sincerely hope that no matter what the people who are running the
| OLPC project decide, that their project will continue and not get
| bogged down in a play of corporate greed and ambitions.
`----
http://www.lockergnome.com/nexus/blade/2007/04/28/one-laptop-per-child-production-delays-caused-by-microsoft-intel/
Lessons from Africa: How to Kill Your Own FUD
,----[ Quote ]
| So, even as Microsoft claims superior quality over Linux, they act as if they
| don't even buy their own FUD. If they really believed that Windows was
| superior to Linux, they wouldn't have to bribe people with “marketing help”
| to get them to choose Windows.
`----
http://www.linuxtoday.com/news_story.php3?ltsn=2007-11-09-030-26-OP-MD-MS
[Mandriva CEO:] An open letter to Steve Ballmer
,----[ Quote ]
| Wow! I’m impressed, Steve! What have you done for these guys to change their
| mind like this? It’s pretty clear to me, and it will be clear to everyone.
| How do you call what you just did Steve, in the place where you live? In my
| place, they give it various names, I’m sure you know them.
|
| Hey Steve, how do you feel looking at yourself in the mirror in the morning?
|
| Of course, I will keep fighting this one and the next one, and the next one.
| You have the money, the power, and maybe we have a different sense of ethics
| you and I, but I believe that hard work, good technology and ethics can win
| too.
`----
http://blog.mandriva.com/2007/10/31/an-open-letter-to-steve-ballmer/
Not Such a Harsh Toke, Actually
,----[ Quote ]
| This is socially, economically, politically and otherwise innovative. It is
| good for democracy too in some of the few remaining places that good thing is
| having trouble getting hold. We regard that thing too lightly, I fear.
|
| The Gates | Otellini axis directly hurts us deeply. To me, it is a
| particularly American shame.
`----
http://fussnotes.typepad.com/plexnex/2007/11/not-such-a-hars.html
|
|
