Egads! :-)

[Todd Kelsey]

Peace to you Ed. It is true that I have a fantasy of getting Bill Gates,
Steve Jobs and Linus Torvaalds to join forces and work with OLPC, but I am
not an M$ troll. My PhD original dissertation topic is on open source
multilingual content management systems -- exactly because I want to make it
easier for non-profits, ngos and governments to communicate. I used to be
militantly against Microsoft; then I got to know more about what Bill is
doing with his money. Bono supports whoever supports global education, and I
am the same (just not as famous). I've lost a lot of sleep to Windows, and I
am excited by the prospects of how Sugar OS and the eeePC Xandros distro has
to popularize linux en masse, but I still greatly appreciate the Gates
Library Foundation.

The discussion is very much a development issue, because I was trying to
propose a development solution, to address the possibility of the challenge
the xo may face at the decision-making table of some education ministers. I
don't know the extent of the challenge, but it was based on a comment
someone made to me. And because I care about kids very deeply, and care
about the program -- I tried to think of how to address this criticism of
the laptop, in such a way that the criticism might evaporate. My addled
brain saw a path through vnc -- and regardless of how much you (and I,
truly) would like to see free access for all, some may still want MS office,
and if finding a way to port it would end up getting the xo into more kids
hands, then I think it is worth considering. Not because I want to "invade"
open source, but because I want to try and find a solution to potential
objections, as a backup to extending abiword and using google docs.

I will try to continue to reduce non-dev commentary.



On Nov 16, 2007 7:10 AM, Ed Montgomery <edm at rocketmail.com> wrote:

> > > treating it as a thin client, to address those in
> some countries
>  who may feel it is important to have children learn
> ms office and windows
>  for employment purposes?
> >
> > Schools should be teaching the concept of word
> processing not a
>  specific
> > word processor but that is as far as I will go with
> "throwing
>  tomatoes".
>
> Sigh...well, it was only a matter of time, I guess,
> before an M$ troll would show up.  Children should NOT
> be learning 'M$' ANYTHING! for 'employment purposes'.
> This is an education project, not an employment
> project. As a teacher, I am much, much more in tune
> with teaching concepts, such as word processing, etc.,
> rather than a product of a corrupt megacorporation.
> (and if you want lots and lots of evidence,
> references, etc. for that, please feel free to email
> me and/or visit my blog at cdneducation.blogspot.com).
>  And $3 per user is too much.  $2 per user is too
> much.  $1 per user is too much.  Sense a pattern here?
> ;-).  Free, with source code would be ideal.  Does M$
> have that?  No?  Does M$ support the four freedoms?
> No?  Well, then M$ doesn't fit the spec.  Too bad.
> Bye-bye. (And sorry for the rant everyone.  This is a
> developers conference, and it is evident that the M$
> poster doesn't understand what that means.  As
> mentioned, any poster who wants to discuss education,
> philosophy, etc. email me personally, and stop
> cluttering up a dev conference with such drivel. My
> apologies to all here.)
> </end rant> ;-)
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
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-- 
Todd Kelsey

Good Green Fun: http://www.cftw.com/xoroids/

Willy Wonka Wonderful! - http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Image:StartOfMP.jpg

Love Poem for people of Middle East: http://welcome.cftw.com

Tour of laptop | http://wiki.laptop.org/go/608-demo-notes

About Me/CFTW | http://docs.google.com/Doc?docid=dhbxftbn_35f5b46b&hl=en">
http://docs.google.com/Doc?docid=dhbxftbn_35f5b46b&hl=en

Loving the World | http://docs.google.com/Doc?id=dhbxftbn_36cx4kj7

"Fascinating for me to sit here and realize the interplay and influence that
music can have -- it is a part of my life, yet I haven't continued as I
could, partly out of thinking "there are more important things". but it has
it's place. i am sitting at olpc offices, and someone is playing pink floyd,
and I think music is a gift of creativity that can inspire an atmosphere of
creativity, and the range of such echoes is infinite." - Me

Free tunes by me: http://www.cftw.com/music
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