[Olpc-mg] OLPC and Madagascar on Gaia, Openlife Grid

[David Paul]

Hello, Bonjour,

I wish all those on the project my best wishes. By way of background I
am a freelance education consultant and work on education reform
programs that align with Millennium Development Goals 2 (Universal
Education) and 7 (Environmental Sustainability). One project I am
working on involves the use of Virtual Worlds (VW) to provide an
immersive environment for meeting, learning and collaboration. There
are 2 aspects of this project that attracted my attention. First, I
run the OLPC Openlife Centre on the Openlife (OL) Grid VW; it's best
described by this video :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ewLPgn-7Vgw

Secondly, I am reconstructing parts of Madagascar in the same VW that
focus on environmental sustainability, particularly WWF projects
there, with a view to raising public awareness of environmental issues
and endangered species. Madagascar on Gaia is still under construction
but here are some photos that illustrate the theme :

http://www.flickr.com/photos/digital_dreambuilder/sets/72157618966948352/

Whilst available bandwidth might limit in-country access to the OL
grid I would be quite happy to incorporate photos of the project, or
even virtually modelling the school at Ambatoharanana, into Madagascar
on Gaia as part of any longer term sustainability strategy. Let me
know if there is interest in pursuing this further.

Best Wishes,

David Paul