What is Digg?56 Comments
- Wolfman~K, on 10/12/2007, -1/+41I still think the $200 buy one for yourself and give one to a child in underdeveloped countries was the best plan....
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+15At NO point did they ever say they are going to distribute these things individually to children in third world countries. They are available for sale in bulk to the governments to hand out.
- segphault, on 10/12/2007, -1/+14The OLPC project has already shipped over 2500 prototype XO laptop systems. It's not vaporware.
- subsonik, on 10/12/2007, -0/+10Damn, I feel dense. 300$ laptop new? Can be purchased where? No, I'm serious.
I think the OLPC is a great idea. I'm eager to see where it all ends up. - Yoshi39, on 10/12/2007, -1/+9It's still $100 for third world countries but $200 for i countries
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+8Did you read the article?
Sure there might be other things that were more urgent, but its not like they have to PAY for the laptops, they GET them from our goverments here in the 1st world, were we got so much we are overconsuming it anyways... - kmartshopper, on 10/12/2007, -3/+11Are you ***** kidding? If I was one of these kids in these poor countries, I'd get my laptop and sell it on ebay for $150. Everyone else in the developed world won't be able to get it for less than $200 and everyone in the underdeveloped world will get more than their $100 for their laptop. For a country like Nigeria where the average income per year is less than $500... sounds like a good plan (for them). It solves nothing it was intended to solve.
How about one laptop per classroom? Internet access in all schools...? One laptop per child sounds great if you read headlines, but if you spend ten minutes to think about it the laptops will just become a new piece of currency. You think the parents are really going to let their kids keep something that cost half their yearly earnings when they are living in complete poverty? I think they'd rather eat than have a laptop. - jacko1990, on 10/12/2007, -0/+8Why not, if it helps subsidise the cost of selling them in the 3rd world?
Anyway, I know plenty of poor kids in my own country (UK) that could use one of these. - bocaJWho, on 10/12/2007, -1/+8woot.com should sell these.
- shrewduser, on 10/12/2007, -3/+8"what ever happened to $100 laptop?..."
its still around, duh, this is philanthropy not free market capitalism, the $200 figure is philanthropy too, buy one and give one to the kids in the third world... - Lobster, on 10/12/2007, -0/+5Sugar!
http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Sugar
is not the only OS, Quanta should consider . . .
there is another . . .
OLPC and Puppy, interview
http://www.desktoplinux.com/news/NS2746872300.html
OLPC and Puppy
http://www.puppyos.com/olpc/
Puppy stikes back
http://www.ukuug.org/mediawatch/?p=705 - azimir, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4Every OLPC mention brings up these kinds of comments. This project has been a non-profit and in strong communication with governments from the get go. You don't get a government to give you hundreds of millions of dollars by looking good.
"1) complete clueless retarded that do not know the reality of those countries"
Two attacks in one sentence. Well done! Unfortunately, they're both incorrect making you double wrong.
The founders of this project are actually intelligent people. I know it's hard to believe, but sometimes people running these kinds of things do actually have a brain:
http://www.laptop.org/vision/people/NicholasNegroponte/
If nothing else you could have done some quick reading instead of tjust dumping mis-information on the web:
http://wiki.laptop.org/go/OLPC_myths#You.27re_forcing_this_on_poverty_stricken_areas_that_need_food.2C_water_and_housing_rather_than_a_laptop.
"2) greedy bastards trying to profit from vapor projects"
Again, this is actually two things to talk about. In this case you are kind of right on both counts, but in both cases time will tell. On the vapor count, though, you're pretty close to being completely wrong.
I cannot deny that there is money exchanging hands and that some people will be paid wages. OLPC is a US non-profit organization, though, so there are no shareholders and there are limits on the wages paid out. If you really want to find people profiting on vapor projects, go see many of the defense contractors out there. Most of them are getting money for neat ideas and vague promises more than real results.
As to the vapor project accusation? Yes, this is a very ambitious project, but one that keeps going because the countries it is intended to help keep showing interest. They're already shipped testing systems to both developers and to countries for evaluation. First round article:
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070216-8862.html
Countries include: Argentina, Brazil, Libya, Nigeria, Rwanda, Uruguay, and Thailand
Second beta hardware article:
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070302-8962.html
To sum up: please read before you flame. I understand this is the Internet and reasonable actions are not required, but it's up to you to decide the level of knowledge you bring to any conversation. - geminitojanus, on 10/12/2007, -2/+6"Well I figure if the laptop is about 100 dollars to make, 100 dollars buys yours and 100 more puts one in the wild, so I imagine this is just a simplified version of that plan."
It actually costs around $140 in components alone (no assembly, unit testing, ROM burn-in), but in units of a few million the costs will come down quite quickly. It would still be best to do the $300, buy one get two for your favorite country plan. - PonyGumbo, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4"For a country like Nigeria where the average income per year is less than $500... sounds like a good plan (for them). It solves nothing it was intended to solve."
I don't think they'll have a lot of success selling anything from Nigeria on eBay. - devindotcom, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4Well I figure if the laptop is about 100 dollars to make, 100 dollars buys yours and 100 more puts one in the wild, so I imagine this is just a simplified version of that plan.
- mrgreen4242, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3I'll definitely buy one if they include some sort of human powered charging system with it. Without, I'll have to think a little harder, but I'd love a little rugged machine like this that I can power up anywhere I happen to be! Very exciting, imo.
- schitsavich, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4I wouldn't buy it if it didn't have a hand-crank ....
- airship, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3They eliminated the hand crank idea long ago. Now they're focusing on solar power to provide community recharging stations.
- Hellmark, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2The plan isnt to have the people in the third world countries pay $200. The plan is to sell for $200 (and profit), to developed nations (Like the US), so more units are sold, which helps bring down costs and further subsidize the $100 target price for third world nations, and then have someone buy the laptops on behalf of the people who will receive them.
- londubh, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2I saw an OLPC at Pycon 2007 in Dallas, TX http://us.pycon.org/TX2007/Keynotes . It was trés cool. A lot of thought went into the engineering of the devices. I took some video of it http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xBwh1QQDMxY (sorry about the really cheezy music). As for the price, they expect with mass production the price will fall below the $100 to around $50 each. They have a very aggressive plan to have a lot of them available for children in third world countries by the end of the year and even more in 2008.
- azimir, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2The crank was dropped very shortly after a demonstration of it to the president of the UN. The crank broke off in his hand. Ouch!
Solar systems and pedal power units are in development by third parties for central charging, but the personal unit is a pull string solution so far:
http://www.engadget.com/2006/12/15/olpcs-pull-string-power-system-going-commercial/
It is designed to be affixed to a post of some sort and then the string pulled. Yes, it does look like a Yo-Yo. - mercurysquad, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Well I can't post newspapers clippings from last year advertising INR 17000 laptops, but you might want to take a look at this : http://www.trustedreviews.com/notebooks/review/2006/09/28/Intel-Classmate-PC-EXCLUSIVE/p1 Sub-$300 quoted price (http://www.crn.com/white-box/181503018 ), can run Windows XP. Considering the desktop I have back home is 866 mhz, 256 mb ram and does almost everything my folks want it to do, I would say the intel offering is quite a capable one, unlike OLPC.
- r00tus3r, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2I live in a "developing country". I wonder how much it will cost here. I'd definitely cop one of those bad boys for 100 US.
- Earlofnecromium, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1OH yeah. Just make sure it comes in the funky colors and has the hand crank.
- mercurysquad, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2myopic.
- kizio, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1Thanx a lot for the info. Very Doubtful. http://catszone.blogspot.com
- kmartshopper, on 10/11/2007, -0/+1Sorry but I dont buy the OLPC thing. Schools need computers, not children.
So in a country where the average income is less than $500 (ie Nigeria), a child can take their laptop and use its wireless capability to sell the thing to people in developed countries for $150 instead of $50 + SH. Great... - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I bet its better than a dell! has full linux support! (before they even have it) haha
- Hellmark, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1However then, you're treading in murky water, due to religious reasoning. People are working on campaigns to make sure that condoms are being used (which, I think is personally better, due to the large amount of HIV infected people in various third world nations).
- tranix, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1If so, then the govt/school simply changes some rules so the laptops remain [on] school property.
- subsonik, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Thanks for the links, MS, but are any of these 'tops actually able to be purchased NOW? I want one! :)
- Hellmark, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1The OLPC does have a color screen, it just also has a gray scale option to help conserve battery life. It isn't as gimped as you think. 500mhz processor, 256mb of RAM, a resolution of 1200x900. That isn't that bad of a machine.
- V1ncent, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I hear the backup network connection is a string and a tin can...
- Hellmark, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Yeah, most people scoff at PII and P3 processor speeds anymore, but they are still useful. I have a 266mhz Thinkpad that I use on a daily basis, running Linux, and it does what I want.
- rimbaud, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Don't forget $100 is worth a lot less than when the project was started: it's not surprising the cost has gone up to say $140 as the dollar is really weak against other currencies.
- zolushkatykva, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Dugg. Such things make me a bit crazy
- golgotha, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1England?
- antiNeo, on 10/12/2007, -1/+1Laptops don't just plan/design/manufacture themselves you know. It's not like this thing has been in development for 10 years like DNF has.
- Coach80, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0The "Yo-Yo" is being designed by Potenco, Inc. More information at www.potenco.com or http://www.myspace.com/173260750.
- abuser, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Someone should make a web site that will collect OLPC jokes...
Shouldn't it be named OLPCPC, OL(PC)^2 or OLPCL?
What a status symbol is that thing gonna be... I'm sure its iPod-like sex appeal will make it fashion accessory #1 from offices of New York to streets of LA.
Two months after the lunch we'll see first Wii-like "how to lose weight by cranking" blogs.
Soon after that someone will make a freeware Java application that will be able to transparently offload CPU-intensive tasks, such as formatting a sentence bold, from OLPC to your mobile phone.
OLPC will be loved because this will be the first and last computer that won't be able to beat anyone in chess.
An overclocked OLPC will be mistaken for low-end scientific calculator.
Low-res 16-gray scale screensaver will be the only feature of an OLPC version of SETI@Home.
There'll be no such thing as OLTP porn as it'll take less time to go out, find a date, get laid and return home than to display a single high resolution compressed JPEG image.
OLPC will never lose its appeal because it will be equally unappealing from day one.
OLPC will make African countries introduce one child (per family) policy. - sharly2007, on 10/10/2007, -0/+0Craig Barrett was correct, $200 toy isn't gonna work when it is already quite possible to get $300 regular laptops which can run normal apps. At least I know there are companies selling entry level laptops in India with a going price of Rs 15000 - 20000. If the OLPC was actually somewhere near 100 bucks, then maybe... http://www.gwafi.com/home.html http://www.gwafi.com/links.html
- abuser, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0>I hear the backup network connection is a string and a tin can...
Haha, that's a good one...
I hear that's their VoIP solution. - hernanc, on 10/10/2007, -0/+0The economics of this problem is much more complex than envisioned. The reality is that poor children will sell the laptop at whatever (highest) market price they can and most probably to us (geeks).
- maditakenaka, on 10/12/2007, -1/+0i am interested about this but how to get?
- antiNeo, on 10/12/2007, -3/+2RTFT
- WaterDragon, on 10/12/2007, -2/+1It might be a lot more effective to give one ...lifetime supply of birth control pills ...to every adult in all those countries where, despite living in poverty, people keep churning out too many babies, over-breeding like tumor cells in society.
Giving out computers is ultimately just a scam to create new markets for all our crap, as we sit by and watch the planet be destroyed by our own stupidity and the severe overpopulating done by other ignorant folks everywhere.
Pretty SICK! Nobody wants to look at the real problems. And feeble-minded idiots will constantly try to suppress ideas such as this.
Does Humanity even have a chance to survive through all the stupidity?
(Go ahead, turn up your friggin' i-pod and block this out!) - Topher06, on 10/12/2007, -2/+0Asside from the novelty aspect, anybody honestly ask themselves why they would want this thing in a developed country?
"So I can have mobile internet", yes, on a small grayscale low resolution screen. You already have internet access on your PSP and/or celllphone in glorious color, probably in higher resolution.
"So I can run my favourite apps on a cheap device", chances are those apps won't run, or will run poorly compared to what your used to.
"So I can create a Beowulf cluster", need a hell of a lot of them to reach any decent performance specs.
The mistake people are making here is that this will be a fully functioning device that will allow them to do what they are doing now with a laptop/desktop, but just be extermely cheap. They don't realize the levels of comprimise made in order to make them cheap, and don't realize that they will cater to a market in which people have never used a computer before, so they have no reference to higher performing machines. The fact they can get information and educational material will be enough for them, even if it takes 2 minutes to load the material.
Anyways, if the $200 price includes giving one to a third world country, then I would buy one just for the charity of it and then put it in a drawer with my calculator and other defuct technology. Heck, I might even just tell them to send both to a developing country. Its like a thank you gift for donating to charity, the thank you gifts are almost always ignored or forgoten about soon after they arrive. - HairyPoter, on 10/12/2007, -4/+2Someone must be earning rivers of money with this project of selling computers to third world. This is the most absurd project I ever knew.
Before buying computers, people in those countries must have access to electric power, water, heating, food and school, most basic things in life. The guys before this project are one of two things: 1) complete clueless retarded that do not know the reality of those countries; 2) greedy bastards trying to profit from vapor projects;
I know what I am saying as I lived in a 3rd world countries for 3 decades!
Regarding to selling this computers in developed country I think, in fact, they should drop price of actual laptops and reduce the large margin of profit they have. - mercurysquad, on 10/12/2007, -3/+1Craig Barrett was correct, $200 toy isn't gonna work when it is already quite possible to get $300 regular laptops which can run normal apps. At least I know there are companies selling entry level laptops in India with a going price of Rs 15000 - 20000. If the OLPC was actually somewhere near 100 bucks, then maybe...
-
Show 51 - 57 of 57 discussions
© Digg Inc. 2009
— Content created and posted by Digg users is