[Olpc-open] How will the OLPC truly help education?

[Ivan Krstić]

Henry Skelton wrote:
> Most of the answers I have seen talk about books being preloaded. Now
> that is certainly nice, but how is it better than regular books? 

I would advise some more background research so that you can answer this
question for yourself.

> set them up, show them how to use it

http://www.greenstar.org/butterflies/Hole-in-the-Wall.htm

> So you end up with maybe $5 worth of books

That number is just silly.

> all of the problems associated with maintaining a computer.

In fact, you get very few of the problems associated with maintaining a
computer; we've been very hard at work to minimize these, both in
hardware and software.

> like it will be a nightmare, as you'll need to be able to get people out
> every time someone's computer breaks. And they will. Just look at the
> current state of home computers in Western countries.

These machines are not comparable to the current computers in Western
countries -- such comparisons are misguided. The XO has no moving parts
or a standard hard drive, and has a highly optimized, simplified
software stack that can repair itself. There are strong social and
technological theft deterrents. We're working on making sure viruses and
spyware are not a concern.

> Mesh networking depends on a
> lot of other people keeping up the computer, and making sure they are on
> and the networking running. 

Please give us the benefit of the doubt, and peruse the wiki before
making such claims. Our wireless chip is completely self-contained, and
continues to act as a mesh router with extremely low power consumption
even when the machine is powered off.

Cheers,

-- 
Ivan Krstić <krstic at solarsail.hcs.harvard.edu> | GPG: 0x147C722D