I accept that there are far more important things like clean water, food, medicine, safety, and shelter. But once those basic needs have been satisfied – education and knowledge must be key.
The OLPC (one laptop per child) projects goal is to ‘To provide children around the world with new opportunities to explore, experiment and express themselves.‘ It’s not about laptops – it’s about giving people a way to change their lives.
It’s a not for profit project envisioned by Nicholas Negroponte, and the idea is to get the cost of the laptops down to under $100 each so governments and organisations in developing countries can buy them as part of their educational program. The design of the XO (the laptop) is fantastic – with a screen that can be read in direct sunlight, a power supply that can be charged by winding it up, and a keyboard designed to resist sand and dirt, and be highly resistant to water penetration. The software it uses is based on open source, and it’s using a processor designed by AMD.
This project is currently at a crucial time of development, all it needs now is for a few orders to really get it off the ground and get proper buy in.
So here’s the problem, Intel have just brought out a competitor at $200, and running Microsoft software. The Intel Classmate PC looks like it’s a sickening way to profit from the increasing excitement and popularity of the upcoming XO, using their marketing muscle to sell an inferior design for more money.
