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One Laptop Per Child: Are we there yet?
Sep. 1st, 2006 10:37 amThe British technology webzine, The Inquirer, reports here that a Taiwanese company (figures...) has finally broken the $100 barrier on producing laptop computers sought by Prof. Nicholas Negroponte's "One Laptop Per Child" project. Quanta Computer will supply the group and its developing-country clients with 10 million Linux-running, fully loaded, hand-crank-powered and Net-capable units inside of a year. The project, which seeks to bring what it feels will be quantum-leap economic and educational progress to the Third World's poorest even in areas where electricity is scarce or prohibitively costly, had previously still been a few years away from offering a unit for any less than about $130.
Some have suggested that poor children need food, clothing, water, health care and shelter way before they need computers, and that the benefits OLPC suggests will come from having laptops are exaggerated at best in any case. I'm of two minds myself (comes with being a Gemini, donchaknow :-) ). On the one hand, I see the detractors' point, and wonder whether the benefits of having the kids get laptops will be severely reduced unless Net access can also be provided along with them. On the other, I have myself experienced the life-changing effect of computer and Net access, and the connectivity and information they can bring.
What do y'all think? Is this a case of misplaced priorities, or are the Prof and company on to something? And how is Quanta accomplishing this engineering and manufacturing feat -- honest innnovation or just old-fashioned sweatshop labor and corner-cutting? As Linda Richman would say on Coffee Talk, "Discuss."
Some have suggested that poor children need food, clothing, water, health care and shelter way before they need computers, and that the benefits OLPC suggests will come from having laptops are exaggerated at best in any case. I'm of two minds myself (comes with being a Gemini, donchaknow :-) ). On the one hand, I see the detractors' point, and wonder whether the benefits of having the kids get laptops will be severely reduced unless Net access can also be provided along with them. On the other, I have myself experienced the life-changing effect of computer and Net access, and the connectivity and information they can bring.
What do y'all think? Is this a case of misplaced priorities, or are the Prof and company on to something? And how is Quanta accomplishing this engineering and manufacturing feat -- honest innnovation or just old-fashioned sweatshop labor and corner-cutting? As Linda Richman would say on Coffee Talk, "Discuss."
