$100 Laptop Takes Flight in Thailand 162
EmperorKagato writes "Nicholas Negroponte's project for every child to have a laptop will come true for over 500 students in Thailand. Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra expects each child to receive a laptop instead of books as the books will be provided electronically.
The laptop, mentioned previously on Slashdot, will now be brought to children in Thailand in October and November, with hopes for future shipments to Nigeria, Brazil and Argentina in 2007."
This story selected and edited by LinuxWorld editor for the day Saied Pinto.
where can I order mine? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:where can I order mine? (Score:5, Interesting)
Subsidizing the hell out of something and send it to the Third World is a good way to guarantee that it'll end up being sold right back to the First World, if there's any kind of demand.
Sounds like a good idea, but questions remain (Score:5, Interesting)
I see some problems, however.
The minimum wage in Thailand is just below $100 per month. That's right, $100.
What if the notebook computer gets damaged through fault of the kid?
What if the notebook computer gets damaged through no fault of the kid?
What if the notebook computer gets stolen?
What if the notebook computer gets sold by the kid / his [drug-addicted] [financially distressed] parent?
A family with one minimum wage earner could be pushed into financial ruin by any of these events.
the only problem is... (Score:4, Interesting)
Books are *great*. Reading off of a computer screen is *terrible*.
Re:Anxious to see them in action (Score:3, Interesting)
The problem isn't so much 'bringing the information to them' but 'bringing the information to them in a way that doesn't take too much time away from meeting their basic needs'. This is why improving the base quality of living is so important.
Here's a for instance. Let's say that a child in some part of the world has 16 waking hours a day, and it takes 12 of those to get food, clean water, etc. This means that there are 4 hours left for education. I am not convinced that a person can learn more in 4 hours from a computer than they can learn in 4 hours from more tranditional means. However, if you give them some kind of automated washing machine, or refrigeration so they can store food, so they only need to spend 8 hours getting food and clean clothes, you have doubled the amount of time available for education - and I'm quite convinced that you can learn more in 8 hours than you can in 4 hours (all else being equal, of course).
Now, having a computer might make it possible to learn more per unit time, because, for instance, if there is only a single book people have to share, so some time is wasted. Electronic copies could mean more people can look at the same material in a given period of time, but I'm still not convinced that it will help speed up the learning process. But I don't think that has anything to do with the rate of learning, but just with the availability issue, as you mentioned. The problem I think isn't that "villiages" don't have enough books - it's that they don't have *any* books. Here's a for-instance: instead of spending time to ship the laptops into the area, why not spend the time to ship in books? Unless the licenses (ugh, I hate that word) for the educational material are very inexpensive, and can easily be brought to the "villiages", I think books are just as viable an alternative. Books tend to last longer, too, and don't suffer from "what format is that in" syndrome either.
As a final note, is anyone aware of studies that show the relative rate of learning using traditional means versus with electronic presentation?
Re:Ebooks for the poor (Score:2, Interesting)
Yeah, it has a footpedal doofus! That's completely different!
Actually they discussed several things, including using a foot pedal, and a crank on the external power supply (as opposed to the original design connected directly to the laptop), but they don't appear to have made a decision. The picture in the FA shows a hand crank. But surely you wouldn't have called someone ignorant without doing a little research; what did they end up using for these laptops in Thailand?
Re:where can I order mine? (Score:2, Interesting)
Case 2: The trial run of ~500 fails miserably, and Negroponte says "boy am I glad the initial run was only 500 instead of >1 miilon!)
There are two main things to fixing poverty in the undeveloped world: proper inter- and intra-national distribution of food, and educating the masses (although the US will only allow education if it's done in the right way).
Obviously the distribution plan isn't airtight. Some laptops will be broken, stolen, sold, or misused, and some kids may fall through the cracks because of it. But that doesn't mean we should cancel the project and rob millions of children of this opportunity--then nobody will fall through the cracks, they'll just all be in a big ugly hole.
- RG>
Re:where can I order mine? (Score:2, Interesting)
Really, though, Thailand is not that poor. Prime Minister Thaksin is himself worth something like US$600m, being a telcom baron and the richest man in the country. The rest of the country is fairly well developed when seen in comparison with other countries in the area. Try visiting Cambodia or Laos and then comparing the experience to Thailand.
When I originally read about this deployment of laptops last week, I wondered why Thailand was even on the list of countries which would receive donated laptops. The Thai Open Source team with the gov't NECTEC program just released a new version (7.0) of the School Internet Server which puts just about every school online and makes it easy for them to share Internet in a computer lab (computers likely provided by MS during their push to reduce piracy).
Thailand is NOT rich, and there are pockets of severe poverty (just as there are in most countries), but Thailand is not an underdeveloped country. It is generally regarded as developing.