[Olpc-open] [Edu-sig] OLPC G1G1 sales start today

[François Schnell]

On Nov 16, 2007 6:35 AM, Ivan Krstić <krstic at solarsail.hcs.harvard.edu> wrote:
> On Nov 15, 2007, at 4:43 PM, François Schnell wrote:
> > Looks like no one from OLPC is reading this list?
>
> Plenty of us are, but we're busy trying to get a quality product out
> the door.
>

Thanks Ivan for taking the time for a quick reply.

I certainly can imagine that in this first mass production stage the
OLPC team is very very busy.
I've also seen Nicholas Negroponte presentation on CNN and I certainly
hope this will sky rocket G1G1 XO sells :)

Concerning the Eee I've just seen this from the Boston Globe:

"""
The machine is being sold for $399 in the United States, but also will
be sold for as little as $199 to school systems here and abroad.
"""

"""
Asus is in talks with governments about selling the machines in bulk
for free distribution to schoolchildren. A company executive said last
month that a deal already had been reached with one government, but
Leung provided no details. Last week, the city of Fresno, Calif., said
it would buy 1,000 of the laptops for use in its schools.
"""
http://www.boston.com/business/globe/articles/2007/11/14/cheap_laptop_as_m

In the meantime an ICT section of the National French Education has
just tested the XO.
The results are not brilliant.
In particular they didn't see why the laptop looks like a "Fisher
Price" toy and they find the XO too slow (shouldn't be the case of the
Eee).
They conclude that in regard to the current price/performance of the
XO it leaves plenty of space for competition from other companies.

The full article (in French) can be found here:
http://www.journaldunet.com/solutions/systemes-reseaux/reportage/07/1107-education-nationale-olpc/1.shtml

Personally I'm hopeful OLPC will eventually be obliged to adopt the
right distribution plan to reach the right price.
I'm just worried about  the time lost.
Lets make Winston Churchill wrong on the second part of this quote? ;)
"You can always count on Americans to do the right thing - after
they've tried everything else."
Winston Churchill .

In the meantime, since I can't buy an XO for now, I'm turning myself
to the Eee to see how I can contribute to the Negroponte/Papert/Kay
educational vision on this platform.

I've seen Python and pyGtk are also there by default :)
http://arstechnica.com/reviews/hardware/eee-pc-review.ars/6

And some folks already can't wait to see how to adapt some of the
great gems and ideas from the OLPC project, as summarized here:

"""
A lot of innovation has gone in the development of that really
resource constrained platform [XO] , so I was thinking it would make
perfect sense to re-use pieces of their efforts on the eee pc.
"""
http://forum.eeeuser.com/viewtopic.php?id=2417

I wish all the best to the OLPC team at this very busy time.
Whatever happens next I believe we are truly living in a great period
initiated by the OLPC project. :)

francois

> --
> Ivan Krstić <krstic at solarsail.hcs.harvard.edu> | http://radian.org
>
>