Negroponte's Talk at Emerging Technology Conference 195
xacting writes "The video of Nicholas Negroponte's talk about MIT's One Laptop per Child (OLPC) research initiative was just posted to MIT World. In it, he discusses the challenges of tripling the world's laptop production, dealing with China's policies towards free speech and the problems of grey markets." From the article: "The key to churning out these cheap educational devices is volume -- and the more countries that join the bandwagon, the sleeker and less expensive the computers are likely to be. Negroponte casts a wary eye on the potential grey market appeal of the machines, and is determined to make them so distinctive as a government-distributed, educational tool that taking one would 'be like stealing a post office truck.' Negroponte concludes, 'Changing education on the planet is a monumental challenge,' taking decades. But OLPC will 'seed the change,' and help 'invent the future.'"
Not so sure ... (Score:4, Insightful)
I want one, no, TWO! (Score:4, Insightful)
I'll happily pay for at least one 3rd world child's $100 laptop if I can buy another one for MY kids!
Re:Not so sure ... (Score:5, Insightful)
Think of what benefits would result if every student in a small Kansas town were given a $100 laptop with Net access.
I don't understand this approach (Score:5, Insightful)
So why is Negroponte so keen on preventing everybody who's not a starving child from getting the 100$-laptop? Especially since he seems so worried that they might not be in enough demand to grant them the best prices for components etc.
I say, why limit distribution and *force* this to be a government-sponsored program?
Re:Not so sure ... (Score:3, Insightful)
I rather have kids (in Kansas or Africa) read a good international newspaper than to have them uncontrolled access to the Internet.
Re:Not so sure ... (Score:4, Insightful)
Food is a temp sollution as it feeds them once, barely, and after being fed they require being fed again after.It grows dependency on the Western world. Making them independant, giving access to information and education creates independance and in the long run will help them feed themselves, maybe train some doctors engineers and farmers in the long run? Education will be able to provide that, in the long run.
Further, having the 3rd world countries develop, will create an economy to do business with for the Western countries, instead of exploitation.
Re:Not so sure ... (Score:4, Insightful)
A lot of fat Ameircan kids get very early access to computers, what good does it do them? Seems like we still have a problem with math, reading, and reasoning in this country and throwing money at it doesn't necessarily help.
I'll repeat myself, I'm sure it's a great idea on some level. But will spending all this money on technology ahead of treating disease, famine, poverty etc. produce results? These machines can't teach a child to read or write can then? Will they just become a fancy Feynman-eque abacus?
Methinks the whole approach is wrong (Score:3, Insightful)
Wouldn't it be a whole lot better to first develop and distribute a "thin client" laptop that is not much more than a browser, screen, keyboard, and Wifi connection, along with substantial enough (and presumably pricier) servers that act as access portals, and then second, a more advanced laptop that can store useful data and other programs usable by more advanced students that qualify for them?
Secondarily, I would think that the first and/or second laptops could be sold as an entry level laptop in the first world countries with a sufficient profit margin (and the ability of educational systems like rural school districts, etc. to purchase a limited number of machines without the profit margin built in) to underwrite the distribution of many more machines to the third world? After all, if the whole thing is done under a non-profit framework, there isn't shareholder bottom line to worry about. What think ye all?
It's the Software, Stupid (Score:4, Insightful)
For the most part, "the Internet" in itself is not directly useful in a lower-grade classroom, unless you want to teach kids about porn. What electronic media is available is usually only optional, and designed to complement the printed books.
What really needs to be created is MEDIA, electronic versions of suitable textbooks. And a database of quiz and test questions, organized by book sections, and a program to automatically check those answers. If the hardware had a way to do very-short-range networking (I'm thinking IR here, it only needs to work inside one room and not cause interference in adjoining rooms) then the ability to push file content over it and a way to check quiz answers in real-time would be a good thing too.
But you really don't need a whole laptop to do this. A laptop is really just adding a whole bunch more problems. A simnple e-book type device with a few input buttons would work. You wouldn't even really need a multi-tasking OS; this greatly cuts down on the speed and memory requirements of the hardware.
And finally, the thing's got to be drop-proof, water-proof, crayon-proof, ect. It needs to run off of regular disposeable (or possibly rechargeable) batteries, not $150 li-ion jobs. A laptop is NOT what will work for this.
And really--e-textbooks would/should be priced far lower than printed copies. There's no incentive for any school to even consider going to e-book use, if they are going to have to pay a bunch of money for hardware, and then pay a bunch more for "e-book licenses". If they just go with the printed books, they only pay a bunch once.
~
I may be way off base here, but... (Score:3, Insightful)
Particularly since $100 is probably a half to a third of their yearly income...
It's a brilliant dream (Score:2, Insightful)
It's not like stealing a post office truck (Score:4, Insightful)
It's not stealing. Isn't this more like BUYING a used, surplus truck from the postal service? You give someone a laptop-- what's wrong with them selling the laptop?
What would be the disadvantage in selling these laptops to people in wealthy nations as a commodity? That is precisely what the Freeplay Foundation [freeplayfoundation.org] does with their "Lifeline Radio", which is a robust, windup/solar powered, AM/FM/SW radio designed for people who live in areas without power. You can buy one radio through CCrane [ccrane.com] and they'll donate a second one to someone in need.
Re:Not so sure ... (Score:4, Insightful)
The internet is a good international newspaper, and much more. Internet access with good training is probably the most empowering thing you can donate to people who don't have access to such tools. Save people from dying of starvation, malaria, and war, and then teach them how to use the Internet. Then they can write their own international newspapers.
Re:Why is it hard to convince people of a good ide (Score:3, Insightful)
Much of the negative feedback for this project seems misplaced to me. I suspect that just because we don't know how these laptops will be used doesn't mean that they won't be used. I don't believe that there is "alot more that could be done with this money." I think this is similar to the argument against desktop computers back in the day - no one could imagine how they would be used, so it seemed like a big waste of time.
Here's my simple formulation of an argument: every little bit helps.
Re:Books (Score:3, Insightful)
A 100 dollar laptop that can connect to the internet is FAR more valuble, and is a less expensice. Becasue one device can get you a lot more information then the same weight in books.
Re:Why is it hard to convince people of a good ide (Score:3, Insightful)
There are many, many cases where rich people, large corporation and companies have done something becasue they thoughyt it was right?
However, you could tell them that it is in the corporation best interest to have an educated self-suffciant population. You need to to have a strong market base to sell things to.
I guess you could say "It's better to have people be fed and educated with disposable income that companies will try to get, then it is to have people starving to death with no way to help themselves that companies don't care about"
Your friends would rather give a man a fish, instead of the fishing pole.
Re:It's the Subject, Stupid (Score:3, Insightful)
These are crayon & water proof.
These don't require a $150 LiOn battery, they use a hand-crank.
They're not just intended to be dumb reader devices but links to the larger world. Online encyclopedias, newspapers, updated textbooks, communicate with other kids in their native languages (IM shorthand in Urdu), get their assignments from the regional school, etc.
Lots of kids schools aren't like your wealthy western ones. They're shorter days, breaks for plantings & harvests, don't have libraries, indeed lots of these kids don't have electricity in their homes (why these laptops are often the brightest thing at night in their houses.) They have to be able to take them home, use them at night, etc.
Govt's like China allocate the equivalent of US$20/year for each kid's printed school books. With these laptops they can offer those gov't text supplied texts, a coupla thousand others, the latest news, access to encyclopedias, etc. all for negligible cost over the laptops.
Oh, and media? With a standard cheap platform lots of that can be developed quickly, by interested individuals, by non-profits, by governments, by the communities themselves. Once the 1st batches are out there the next set will find a set of tools to build further on, etc.
But, you'd know all this if you watched the videos or read any of the articles on this before rushing to post your under-informed argument against what you (incorrectly) assumed it was...
They're not esthetically unattractive (Score:3, Insightful)
Oh wait, you didn't bother to actually watch or look up any of this before posting, huh?
'Cause if you did you'd know that they're actually pretty attractive little boxes. Their 'unattractiveness' will be in the sense of "You're using a device my community paid for, you're not a kid, not a school-teacher, what kind of jerk are you and have you met the business end of my hoe?!" unattractive.
Regarding capitalism, yes Quantas, Nortel, Intel, Redhat, etc. are all in this entirely for altruism... NOT.
Quentas gets to sell the design commercially (they guesstimate that model will cost around US$200.) Nortel gets real-world experience in mesh networking. Redhat gets their name and OS out on hundreds of millions of devices. Intel gets to expand their market with all of those Intel-friendly applications and follow-on laptop versions.
If that's not "taking advantage of capitalism" then I dunno what is.
Re:It's the Software, Stupid (Score:3, Insightful)
Your comments about software and e-books are great, however the above quote shows you haven't actually read anything about these or watched the video. Don't rant about something that you don't know anything about. This laptop more or less IS just an ebook but with a full keyboard, or did you really think kids could do work with only a few buttons for input? It's supposed to be an extensible yet simple learning device which means output AND input for any subject. Touch screens are expensive and fragile so we're left with full keyboard input to capture all input needs.
Second, it does run off rechargable batteries which are recharged by a handcrank. Thus solving the need for electric outlets for all these, costs of electricity, or even electricity being present at all.
Finally, yeah, there's a lot of porn on the internet, but why does everyone setting up this argument make it sound like that's the only thing you can possibly find? Hell, half of all US universities have class notes online in unsecured sites. (MIT itself offers many complete course notes free.) Wikipedia, as someone else mentioned, while not 100% accurate certainly boasts enough correct info to be a good starting point for almost any subject. And what about the thousands of other sites that offer information for DIY projects? And just because there isn't cheap/free/OS media or lessons/ebooks available now doesn't mean they won't be developed hand-in-hand with this project. You have to start somewhere, if the hardware is put in place the software will follow. It seems to me that a noble pursuit for any teacher would be to donate some time developing open source course work for these machines, I'm sure that many will. In fact perhaps some slashdotters with all their open source organization skills should set up a site to start developing and hosting such programs so that when the time is right there IS learning software to distribute with these? Although given the huge strides this program has made already just developing this laptop and worldwide goal I'm sure the people involved have given plenty of thought to the idea of software (although right now the only articles I've read on it don't make much mention as the hardware is the big news item at the moment).
Re:It's the Software, Stupid (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:It's not like stealing a post office truck (Score:3, Insightful)
Look, I'm sorry for the sarcasm, but if you really think a library is the way to go, why not do something about it? Why sit here and criticize a project that has legs that is genuinely trying to help these people in very economically depressed areas? I'm stupefied by the arguments that people come up with for not doing things to help those less fortunate than we are.
Seriously, give me a worst-case scenario here. At worst, the market is flooded with cheap laptops that don't work very well, and we've ended up throwing lots of good money after an idea that just can't work. But hey, that's better than throwing lots of good money at underdeveloped countries, and then watching the government steal it all. I think the chances are that this project does wonders for helping to educate thousands, perhaps millions of people (not just kids) who otherwise would never get their hands on technology. Even if they're just getting an education on how to use a crappy computer, that's still *great*! I just don't see the drawbacks to this idea, when I look at it from a global perspective.
Re:Not so sure ... (Score:2, Insightful)
1) Yes, starvation is a huge problem in Africa. But it doesn't mean that "the optimal way to help is to devote all resources to this problem". Fighting problems is not always exclusive. Actually, sometimes there are synergies. Also, different people have different abilities. You see, Mr. Negroponte is probably much better at designing a cheap laptop than at organizing a fundraiser for food.
Think about it: should we all stop fighting against civil rights violations, corruption, minorities rights and etcetera, because "hunger is the biggest problem in the world and that is what we should fight"?
Also consider that, by creating a $100 laptop that would previously cost 3 times more, Mr. Negroponte is giving a net benefit to society. He created value. I mean, if you give an African $100 dollar worth of beans, that is one thing. But if you develop a variety of bean 3 times cheaper, you can help much more with the same amount of work. Now, the governments of the countries that choose to enter the program will give to children a laptop that could cost $300 , spending $100.
2) The very notion of "starving African child" is also exaggerated. First of all, this program is not restricted to Africa. And, not every child in Africa is starving! Africa is indeed poor, but Africa is not what you see in the Discovery Channel. Not everyone is illiterate or starving. Some children could really use a laptop, lern from it and benefit society. This program won't give laptops to illiterate children or children in refugee camps. There is a stereotype about Americans: that they do not have a clue about the rest of the world. I think it is true to some degree, after all.
3) Give a man a fish and he will eat for a day. Teach him to fish and he will eat for a lifetime. When a government spends $100 in a laptop, giving a child a better education, which will lead to a boost in the economy and the child propagating knowledge (e.g. teaching his/her parents how to avoid certain diseases), this in the long run might improve the overall quality of life more than $100 worth of beans. Specially considering that the government could save money in textbooks. And that it will help create a market for IT.
4) If teachers are better investment, depends on the situation of each country (and this program respects the coice of each country). In many countries (like Brazil), $100 dollar per child, paid once, is much cheaper than significantly raising the salary of teachers. Again, it depends on the situation. And, as I said before, it is not exclusive. Stop think that we should either spend all the money in teachers or in laptops. We can do both. Here in Brazil, we have some elite universities for the best students, that sink a lot of money, and poor schools in certain areas. Each expensive equipment in the best universities them could pay for many of teachers in the poorest areas. So we shouldn't have elite universities, and use ther money in the poorest ones? Well, the university where I study was responsible for the creation of Embraer, the main Brazillian airplane design company. The exports of Embraer in 2005 were bigger than all money invested in this university sinced it was created in 1950. So maybe, an African country could focus mainly on basic education, but build an elite school or elite university (in which those laptops would help) for the best students in the country.
5) Isn't "This won't help the starving children" very similar to "Oh, please, think of the children! Won't anyone think of the children?"? Instead of real arguments, an appeal to emotion. Very common nowadays, and very dangerous to society.
Who said anything about Internet ? (Score:2, Insightful)
Getting fast Internet anywhere besides North America, Europe or Far East is almost impossible. Are they going to use one dial-up connection for the whole class ? That is, if school has a phone line
help for you non-educators (Score:2, Insightful)
This is not about creating a utopia, feeding the hungry, etc. Most of the anti-$100-laptop posts here focus on those red herrings.
Bottom line, this is about the digital divide. The internet provides access to more information than has ever been collectd in the history of humankind (wiki, etc). Right now, only those with a certain level of wealth have ready access to the internet. Now, don't you say 'they can go the library' or some other lame counterpoint cabal BS...we all know how important using the internet in your time and space is, and telling poor people to just go to the library or whatever is a joke and lame.
As far as the uses in the classroom...what a joke of a counterpoint! There are inifinite possibilities, use your damned imagination. I am a teacher, adn I envision a classroom with
Re:Finding the pea (brain) in the shellgame (Score:1, Insightful)
I guess this "liberal" thing you speak of must be kinda like a "Conservative".
You know, like the guy who said "Iraq has Weapons of Mass Destruction and is directly supporting the 9-11 Terrorists"; his butcher bill is now on the order of 2000 American and allied military and -in his own words "thirty thousand Iraqies".
I guess they ALL lie...., but, as the say "when Clinton lied no-one died!"
Re:No meme. (Score:3, Insightful)
Yeah, sure, the other old, tired, meme: people in poor countries live in refugee camps. I made a comment on this earlier in this story [slashdot.org]. What you should realize is that CNN does *not* paint an accurate picture of the world outside of the USA, Canada, Japan, and Western Europe. If there isn't a civil war going on, CNN doesn't send a team to report.
If you want to have an idea on how the poorest people of the world live, think about Inglewood in LA or Brooklyn in NY, only poorer. They have more or less the same "western" culture. They listen to Britney Spears on the radio, they watch Harrison Ford on TV. If they are over 18, most of them can drive a car, they know what a remote control is, many have a TV, maybe a VCR too, but they probably can't afford a DVD yet.
If you can't think of the poorest people other than in refugee camp terms, then you are one of the reasons why some refugee camps exist. It's the absence of alternatives that lead to the civil wars that cause refugees to exist. Give cheap laptops to the poor and there will be no more refugee camps.
Re:It's the Subject, Stupid (Score:3, Insightful)
Thank you for posting. This topic seems to be a veritable magnet for people with strong opinions and a complete inability to read or even just watch a video. There also seems to be an assumption that this non-profit effort is taking money out of some of these commentators pockets. Hey, if you have another idea that you think is better then go for it! No one is holding you back. Negroponte has been pursuing this goal for years and there is nothing naive about his effort. I hope more people read about the mesh network architecture that has been built into these laptops and stop parroting the fashionable dismissal of the internet.
Possibly the best aspect of this effort is the chance to avoid the usual corruption that fungible aid has always created. A grey market in these devices needs to be kept in check by treating those with diverted laptops as social pariahs.