What do we put on the One Laptop Per Child? Sugar

The Electric Chameleon is thinking about OLPC chat programs.

There’s some great OLPC coverage from linux.conf.au, including photos.

If you’re interested in helping out the OLPC project, check out the OLPC Developers Program and some more details on Sugar.

Meddlesome posted some great links, including B1 pictures, and this fantastic size comparison (see left). Unfortunately, Google has yet to add a Thai to English translator, so I’ve missed most of the text in this post. OLPC’s Thailand initiative also has it’s own page. Some more Thai language coverage here, or add something to the OLPC Idea Pool.

It’s an education project, not a laptop project.

MIT’s One Laptop Per Child project – revolutionize how we educate the world’s children

Meddlesome also linked to the BlackBack web theory and AMD’s 50×15 project. AMD’s 50×15 initiative is a bold and far-reaching effort to develop new technology and solutions that will help enable affordable Internet access and computing capability for 50 percent of the world’s population by the year 2015. With the global population estimated to reach 7.2 billion people in 2015, there is tremendous potential for 50×15 to bring billions of people into the digital age.

Two’s Company, Three’s a Mesh Network – Logs are pulsing with OLPC searches

From the numbers of hits I’m currently receiving, I’ve gathered that one of the most important issues in Australian education has finally hit the Main Stream Media (MSM). Good job MSM, you’re only four months behind.

However they did cover some good stuff (despite the misleading, attention-grabbing headline – news please MSM, not misinformation) “Dr Tim Aubrey, Dr David Davis and Mr Alex Gibson, part of UTS’ engineering department, said they would be incorporating OLPC projects into their undergraduate and postgraduate courses, and even working on developing the software themselves.”

This is a welcome development, as implementations in Australia will need local knowledge, as well as technical expertise with OLPC systems.

“Dr Davis, a senior lecturer, said he was drawn to the OLPC project because it would allow his students to take part in a challenging engineering problem that is also “socially useful”.”

“another challenge faced by Australian governments looking to deploy the laptops is the need to order large quantities, said Srikhanta…. In order to produce them for $US150 – the goal is to bring this price down to $US85 by 2010 – countries would need to order the laptops in one million unit batches. This poses difficulties for countries with smaller population sizes, such as Australia.”

This is where smaller nations need to band together and order them as a group, or as a sub-order through a larger size nation. Most of these kinds of problems are not unique to any government, yet they shy away from collaboration, seeming to prefer wastage, duplication and inefficiency.

Another primary need, not just in Australia, is for a decent emulator for the OLPC interface, so open-source developers can start contributing to local software now. Then volunteers can create and test code to run on the OLPC laptops, without having a unit themselves. This is also important when bug-free software is a requirement. Yes, bug-free software is possible, it just requires a severe raising of the bar from current (and slacker) development/testing standards. Not only will tight development control be required, but some kind of integrated support WILL be required. Support is never just of a technical nature, it’s also a natural learning process, applying technology to solve local problems.

There also needs to be heavy penalties for people selling these items for profit, including the item being confiscated. Without heavy penalties, these are going to become a black market item of novelty value, weakening the position of the manufacturers who don’t want this available to members of the general public, as well as weakening the program itself.

People need to understand the purpose of this project, it is NOT to bring cheap laptops to people living normal lives. The Queensland Education Department obviously doesn’t get it, as they have described the machines as “far below the requirements” of students in developed countries. Yes, they are, and that’s exactly what they are supposed to be, they are not for students in developed countries! However, these would be of great assistance in Australian communities without any access to education, medical care, electricity, telephones and financial assistance. Basic literacy! Basic medical knowledge! These are greatly needed in some areas.

For all those people searching for information (a shout out to the hard working teachers and public servants who do give a shit), here are some links that may help you out. If you’re looking for something else, comment here and I’ll see if I can find it for you.
One Laptop Per Child – Wikipedia entry
One Laptop Per Indigenous Australian Child? – OLPC News
OLPC Demo

If you believe that Australia needs the OLPC right here and right now, contact your local member of Parliament (and your local paper) and ask them what they personally are doing about this issue. It’s time for them to pull their fingers out.

Does Australia support One Laptop Per Child?

Richard Giles just posted an update on the One Laptop Per Child project. Nicholas Negroponte is one of my heroes, as is Michael Dertouzos. Despite the mention on the OLPC website of Australia seeking approval, I cannot find any mention of it on any government website.

Updated: 15/01/2007 – News from China’s People’s Daily Online – Rangan Srikhanta (treasurer with the United Nations Association of Australia) does!

Poor children lack opportunity, not capacity for learning reads a description on the OLPC website. By providing laptops to every child without cost to the child, we bring the poor child the same opportunities for learning that wealthy families bring to their children.