price point + sales to individuals

[John Watlington]

On Feb 18, 2009, at 8:24 AM, Carlos Nazareno wrote:

>> In summary, you'd like to see a lower price.
>
> No, in summary, I'm thinking maybe this can be a two-birds with one
> stone approach to:
>
> a) Save OLPC financially by selling XO units with a little profit to
> all takers as Yama said. Why not tie up with and physically stock some
> units at computer/electronics stores since there are logistical
> problems with shipping to individuals? (this would also entail some
> marketing and evangelism to show how the XO is different from netbooks
> - I suspect it'd be a hit with the outdoors crowd, much like when GPS
> devices were new)

OK.   So someone has to provide, up front, the money to build the
units for stocking those retail stores.   This same organization would
handle marketing and evangelism.   Guess what ?   You've reinvented
HP/Dell/Lenovo, etc.

> b) Increase the number of software developers, contributors, content
> authors and testers by getting XO units into more peoples' hands. (see
> homebrew scene popularity and success stories: what more with a
> dev-friendly environment like the XO?)

We already have a developer program where we give away laptops
to interested people.

Cheers,
wad