Submitted by “In November, you’ll be able to buy a new laptop that’s spillproof, rainproof, dustproof and drop-proof. It’s fanless, it’s silent and it weighs 3.2 pounds. One battery charge will power six hours of heavy activity, or 24 hours of reading. The laptop has a built-in video camera, microphone, memory-card slot, graphics tablet, game-pad controllers and a screen that rotates into a tablet configuration. And this laptop will cost USD 200.”
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just trying to help….
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I can view this page without logging in – and no, I don’t have an account there so I’m not logged in automatically.
I dunno, it prompted me to login to see the article, decent article btw.
I think the automatic mesh-networking, very very easy sharing of stuff and collaboration and all that are actually things that would be beneficial in regular laptops too. And that XO has lots of other neat things to it too. I doubt I’d have much use for one myself but I still consider those things just extremely brilliant! Damn, I probably should buy one for my daughter, I’m sure she’d love it and learn a whole lot by experimenting with it on her own.
On a more global scale…I really wish these things spread like a wildfire in the third world. Considering how good and cosy we have things here I think they deserve to get something too.
EDIT: fixed typo..
Edited 2007-10-04 22:15
Agreed. The software sounds very nice indeed! I just wish my daughter was a few years older
…to an extent. The idea was to put a fully functional computer in the hands of kids that might not ordinarily be able to afford one. This laptop takes care of the needs of grade school kids (K-8). What is being done to address issues with High School students (grades 7-12)? Maybe I am missing the capabilities of the machine, and by no means am I saying it is not worthwhile to have, just it has limited usefulness for teaching students computer science and getting them interested. That is what I thought the program was about, and is the way the program comes across.
What makes you think that its geared towards K-8 only? To quote the article:
I don’t know many K-8 programmers. I know I wasn’t one, but by highschool I’m sure kids will have had enough experience with tinkering and messing around that they’ll be able to start rewriting the applications given or write completely new ones on their own. It only takes one kid to write a program that can be shared with the rest of the kids on a Mesh network. Said program can be anything from a game to a graphing calculator.
Its an education tool, people, and education never stops.
I used my first computer at 3 and was dabbling with perl by age 9 after seeing a cool book on dynamic websites at a used bookstore. Something like this would have been a huge hit with me, and I’m sure I would be much more knowledgeable today if I had such a tool – both in computing and general academia.
Seriously, I just completed the compulsory educational system here in the US (K-12), and it was a compete waste of time for people who are independent thinkers and have true interest in obtaining knowledge. Not to downplay the OLPC effort any, but why is there no interest to market a product like this to first-world countries. We are more suited to take the risk of a first-generation product and ramp up volume so cost goes down for everyone.
I agree completely with you in the idea of marketing the product in our own countries to our own children as well.
many of the top level people in the computer world cut their teeth on the tech at a early age. with the commodore 64 and similar leading the way.
those where simpler machines, where one didnt have multiple levels of libraries and similar to learn. often it was just the chips, a compiler and you.
also, here is a interesting experiment that was done in india:
http://www.greenstar.org/butterflies/Hole-in-the-Wall.htm
Thanks for the link, that’s a really interesting article.
i know, i had the story in the back of my mind but didnt bother to look it up until today.
just one of its interesting aspects is to read about the kids finding their own names for things. like calling the pointer for needle, and the hourglass for a kind of drum.
but one part that really cracked me up was the one about how a kid figured out how to write text file on the computer, when all that was available was a touch screen and a bog standard windows install!
it makes one wonder what kind of use those kids will get out of a XO.
Edited 2007-10-05 09:47 UTC
Funny, I learned Computer Science on an 8K Commodore Pet with a chiclet keyboard and BASIC.
This thing blows that platform out of the water…
“Funny, I learned Computer Science on an 8K Commodore Pet with a chiclet keyboard and BASIC.
This thing blows that platform out of the water…”
And I learned it with having to plug the phone into a modem that connected to a mainframe somewhere, the only connection being at the high school as the home PC did not exist yet, with the exception of Atari for Pong.
Either way I hope this does work out, just seems rather limiting to me.
And I learned in a Samsung i286 PC with DOS 5 and QBasic Grandpa.
I’ve heard at least one other person on here make this comment on the XO, and I haven’t seen anything coming from OLPC that backs it up. I don’t think it is focused on learning computer science at all; I think perhaps that’s what some posters on this (let’s remember) CS-centric community wish it to be. It might be a good way of learning a lot about computer usage, but otherwise I got the impression it was a general-purpose platform for efficiently learning any subject, rapidly disseminating information and resources, and so forth.
Hopefully, with merely the above passing remark, we’re getting past the “but they said $100” broken-record critique that usually merits half an article. After all, it’s not Negroponte’s fault that the USA can’t uphold the value of its currency.
Didn’t I just read somewhere that the real cost of this thing went from $100 to $399?
No, it went up to $200. The $400 is only for first-world buyers, who will then actually buy two machines, get one of them, and have the other one sent to a poor child.
I seem to recall some mention of a hardware based mechanism that locks up stolen computers.
Now that’s not going to prevent people from selling locked-up OLPCs, but people will learn about that pretty quickly.
Besides, was there any mention of the 1st world models being identical to the 3rd world models in that press release.
Do we get a choice of whom to send it to, or does Sally Struthers get to choose the poor, unfortunate, distended-bellied youth that will be the proud new owner of something that he/she will never use?
We’re so stuck with our desktop metaphor, it’s nice when it gets broken
I like how the XO lets you collaborate without signons, checkboxes, config screens, drag & drop and 100 times more point and click than what’s really needed.
Tell me when this thing gets an operating system again.
… then again, with ‘mesh networking’, they’ll have a very nice lock-in of what their users will be allowed to do, so I won’t hold my breath.
Edited 2007-10-04 23:49
The OS is linux (Fedora based). Since when is this not an os? The interface is codenamed “Sugar”. Get a copy to play with in an emulator here:
http://wiki.laptop.org/go/OS_images_for_emulation
I did not say “OS” once. I said “Desktop Metaphor”. Methinks you don’t remember enough about the OSes before Windows 1.0
Eh? WTF are you talking about?
1. Of course it has an operating system. Otherwise it wouldn’t run. The OS is Linux with a very custom userland.
2. What does “mesh networking” have to do with lock-in? And why would a non-profit organization like OLPC strive for lock-in?
Don’t mind Almafeta, he’s not only a fool but also quite quickly turning into a troll. Although MS centric, he used to have interesting things to say; but these days he seems to leave his brains behind when he starts posting on OSAlert.
Then again, you have probably already noticed this
His rabid antipathy towards anything opensource, never mind Linux, is starting to grate on my nerves too. I slap him down every time he comes out with some new line of flamebait in the hope that he will leave other people to an interesting and enlightening discussion.
Once he even had the gall to send me a private message accusing me of being unable to add anything valid to a conversation after I had told him, in no uncertain words, what I thought of his intentional baiting.
What a tool.
Well, that presents a huge problem. Its flashy appearance was intended to make it difficult for them to reach a black market, considering it is going to places were $200 can save the day… or the year.
Since only kids needing it and participating in the program were entitled to one, giving it an appearance that stood out would prevent that. Tell me how you avoid reselling now.
Yup. They’ll be on eBay in no time at all.
Tell me how you avoid reselling
Read about OLPC’s Bitfrost security framework:
http://wiki.laptop.org/go/OLPC_Bitfrost
My own suggestion for how to reduce black marketing is to make the commercially sold XOs distinct from those that go to developing countries. Specifically, I propose that the plastic bits that are green on the standard XO are made a different colour (say, Blue) on the commercial XO. This will not be very costly for the OLPC foundation, as they can just pour a different colour plastic into the molds, but it is very difficult to fake and makes it immediately obvious whether you have a black market or open market XO PC.
The one part of their plan that I don’t understand is their coy posture when it comes to selling to first world countries – why limited time offers with strings attached?
Surely, if this thing were a hit in first world countries like the US, it would enable them to scale up production and make the units more cheaply? I can see how this could be a product that would sell really well in the US and UK, for example. At $400 US dollars, it isn’t quite a no-brainer bargain that it could be.
I can’t see how it would /hurt/ the project if this thing took of in US or EU schools for example. Along the same lines, I bet there are lots of people with a family who would love to get this as a first computer for a child.
One cited concern is ensuring that they have enough supply to fulfill their contracts. (I believe that there was also a mention of there being limited quantities to ship before Christmas, the rest will have to wait.)
Another thing is that they seemed interested in testing the demand and response of 1st world customers. That means they’ll probably sell for two weeks, assess, then go at it again if they think it’s appropriate.
They have to firstly define what is the purpose of a laptop – I see in the US states handing out laptops and ipods; for what purpose? a country whose students have laptops and iPods and yet are unable to locate their state on a map let alone their country on the globe?
I know I’m sounding like a conservative grouch, but the US education system isn’t going to improved through fancy new laptops and technology – it will be improved by schools focusing on the core educational requirements rather than trying to be everything to everyone.
I hear some of the courses that are done in US secondary schools for examples – things that shouldn’t be even getting taught anywhere near teenagers. New Zealand is starting to go down that track to the detriment of the educational system over all.
Focus on the basics, then if you want to study computers, finance, psychology an so forth – that is when you go off to university or attend polytechnic. I see it in New Zealand, students leaving high school who can’t write an essay! there are lecturers at university who pull their hair out in frustration at the terrible quality of English within assignments – all going back to the education not focusing on the fundamentals.
I make a qualitative distinction between what this machine means to the 3rd world, and what it means to the first.
To first world kids, it’s another electronic toy to haul around. And for all the advantages that global search gives one, a paper book with a good index is better. At least it is to me. It would be *better* to be able to send hard bound texts to the kids, IMO. But that is prohibitively expensive. Better to send a device which can deliver the books in a more cost effective way.
The XO is not about studying computers. Kids are not expected to take the thing apart and dissect the OS. They can, of course, but that classifies as “extra credit”. The machine is about providing a device which can facilitate kids, with the help of flesh and blood teachers, learning about writing essays.
Hmmm. I wonder if “Strunk and White” is available in electronic format. {Scratches head}
Edited 2007-10-05 18:56
I think that they should sell these first to people in the first world and let them get the kinks worked out. These would be great for schools here in the States and in Europe and we have more money to work out the initial kinks than 3rd world countries do. Plus selling into the first world education market will help ramp up volume and drive down cost plus they could sell this for $250 to $300 a pop to schools and still make a profit that they could turn around to make further investments into the platform to further reduce costs there by helping to spread them into more and more markets.
You could give every kid in a school district one of these and start the switch over to e-books thanks to its 200dpi screen. Most textbooks in the US are too old as it is and with these you could update textbooks every year thanks to the fact that there is no manufacturing costs. You just update the files, send out an update, and bam everyone in the school has the most up to date text book available. Plus schools could have contracts with E-Textbook producers for 5 years so that way the producers have a more reliable source of income and a reason to update them once a year plus they cut out the middle man and actually make more in the long run. Is there a standard secure E-Textbook standard already? I assume that you could just add that feature to these laptops. Also is that standard ISO or at least internationally recognized.
E-textbooks, no thank-you.
A lot of education software is already sold on a subscription-only basis. Textbook publishers are liable to do the same, because it does ensure a revenue stream.
And while there are some benefits to this format (animations, voice-overs, interactivity, etc.), there are also some drawbacks. The OLPC screen is moderately larger than that of a paperback book, and less than half the size of a page in a typical textbook. (And even less when you consider a two page spread.)
A long and detailed account of a live deployment in Peru, and how the children/ teachers reacted to them:
http://wiki.laptop.org/go/OLPC_Peru/Arahuay
A very interesting read, I thought: I’d strongly recommend it to anyone who is interested.
Note that the account dates from June, when there were more hardware and software kinks than there are now (the article lists some of these and their current status, also).
I suspect that the lack of starvation, warlords, kids eBaying laptops and e-mail scamming would blow slashdot’s minds
A great – and also very humbling – read!
and it’s quite cool indeed, as it boots up you’ll see a kernel message
‘Hello Children of the World’
to try out sugar in Fedora 7 do as follows:-
first install qemu as root,
su –
yum install qemu
and now as normal user, get the os by doing this
wget http://olpc.download.redhat.com/olpc/streams/development/LATEST/dev…
(175mb or so)
then extract it to an img file
bzcat olpc-redhat-stream-development-devel_ext3.img.bz2 > laptop.img
then mount it in qemu
qemu -soundhw es1370 -serial `tty` -net user -net nic,model=rtl8139 -hda laptop.img
screenshot > http://www.linux-noob.com/forums/uploads/monthly_10_2007/post-1-119…
guide > http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Sugar_Instructions
cheers
anyweb
That will work on any Windows, Mac, and Linux box, not just Fedora.
I would also suggest using vmware. It may not be free, but it seems to be significantly faster. (For some reason qemu on a 1.67 GHz system seems to be much slower than the OLPC hardware.)
I agree with all of the above saying that it would be good to sell the system to first world country schools. I think selling it for the same price 2nd/3rd world countries have to pay to ‘our’ schools would be nice.
I’d manufacture a second version which is the same but e.g. blue instead of green for non-educational purposes and sell them with the buy-two-get-one model. So if you can make an agreement with ebay to ban the selling of educational models it would be way harder to sell the green model.
The blue model could then be traded like every other notebook.
Stop thinking about yourself for once.
The 3rd world has nothing compared to what you have.
Also, read the faq:
http://www.xogiving.org/faq.html
Thanks for not replying at all to my post.
What are you talking about?
It won’t hurt OLPC if they sell way more machines. More developers, more units (normally resulting in a lower per-unit-price), more popular. I think it would be nice if kids from all over the world use the same technology and there really aren’t that much kid-friendly devices on the market.
The FAQ doesn’t help me except “One Laptop Per Child hopes to work with those states and help children everywhere.”
I think that is neat but it seems that they aren’t that interested in selling their product to the rest of the world and I’d prefer that they treat everyone the same and I think that stance would be preferred by 3rd-world-contries too. Nobody likes being treated like he needs alms.
This mesh networking feature seem like a dual sided blade to me. Yes for now it’s a wonderfull thing that can be used to distribute updates and programs, but how long before the first virus hits the grid? It may be Linux but it’s still far from perfect and security hole _will_ be found.
On the other side, this laptop seem enough tough for any kid to play with it. Saddly my son is still to young, but that would be the kind of computer I’d give to a 5 years old without fears.
Does anyone know if they included GCompris or any other educationnal suite? Also it could be realy cool to have a kind of teacher laptop holding an offline copy of wikipedia.
Sharing knowledge is the only hope for humanity.
I went to the laptop.org site, which has all the specifications; I’d be more than happy to shell over US$400 for it. I just hope that the individuals who run the programme aren’t so narrow minded as to not allow international people from being able to participate.
I really like the fact that my purchase will supply one for someone else. I think that’s a good plan – “tax” the people who are grabbing one for fun/interest and use that money to kick start the distribution of the things to folks who couldn’t afford them regularly.
As a parent I wouldn’t mind having one of these for a young child. And I think elemetary-school aged kids would have fun in a classroom setting, while learning about computers at the same time.
Sadly, with the price continuing to climb (previous quoted price was $188, now it’s $200) and the double-cost for American retail purchasers, it’s simply not worth it. Heck, for $100 I’d of bought one just to play with. For $200 I’d consider one for my child. But $400, no way.
————-
Regarding the usefulness for older American kids, I don’t think it’ll do much for them without some redesign. First off, middle-school and older kids should be learning to type on full-size keyboards. Second, it needs to be able to run stadard software titles and be compatible with other computers.
The biggest problem I see in the local school computers is the inability to run industry-standard software titles. For instance our local schools just received, through a grant, 500 licenses for ArcView/ArcGIS – books, data DVDs, etc. But there isn’t a single computer in the entire district capable of installing or running the software…
This isn’t suitable for first-world use outside of giving very small children access to a Fisher-Price “My First PC” type experience.
My issue with handing this to my six year old is that she learned a GUI at the age of four; she might find this paradigm annoying.