I must <b>strongly</b> recommend <b>against</b> ending the G1G1 program. Or at least replace it with some mechanism for maintaining white market availability of growth systems and spares.<br><br>The availability of hardware is the one of the last chokepoints which would allow an adversary to kill-off the OLPC mission and North American success. (The other is mission creep: changing the OLPC mission from one of developing an educational platform into one of competing in the North American laptop computer market.) And the adversaries know this.
<br><br>The market price point is proven. <br>The community is proven. <br>The infrastructure problems (a huge hurdle) for distribution channel, customer service, support, etc. have been largely worked through. (quite to my own disbelief)
<br><br>The next chokepoint would be to drain the market of hardware through:<br>- natural attrition of hardware failures.<br>- tying-up the manufacturing facilities by offering lucrative contracts to Quanta to build something else.
<br>- market removal (buying-up systems offered on eBay, offering a trade-in allowance, etc).<br><br>As long as OLPC can maintain the availability of spare parts and new systems for growth, both the XONA (XO North America, using the XO as a laptop computer) and the XOEE (XO Educational Endeavor) will grow.
<br><br>This could be accomplished:<br>- short term: make a committment to the availability of new systems and spares (price point is unimportant, enthusiasts being what they are) through an 'Official OLPC program'.
<br>- long term: multi-source hardware availability. <br><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Dec 28, 2007 1:29 PM, Seth Woodworth <<a href="mailto:seth@isforinsects.com">seth@isforinsects.com</a>> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">
I *think* that it is ending for the following reasons:<br><br>1.) Quanta can only make so many machines per month, and there is a backlog of orders for target nations.</blockquote><div><br>Agreed, but the competition knows that.
<br>Constricted manufacturing channels are only a factor if a component is single source, and then only when hard deadlines (like 'ship before the holidays') are in play. OLPC supporters will gladly wait 2 months to get systems if they understand the wait up front. (Many already have...)
<br> <br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">2.) It is a a *lot* harder to ship 10,000 laptops to 10,000 people than 10,000 to one country. Selling laptops retail isn't the business that OLPC really needs to be in.
</blockquote><div><br>Agreed 100%. That was a tactical mistake on the part of OLPC. If they had marketed XO's strictly as an educational tool, (they actually did a pretty good job) it would have gone a long way toward answering the inevitable questions like "how do I install Flash, why can't I connect to every imaginable wireless access point, etc.) The community would have found answers to those anyway (as proven) and OLPC wouldn't have been on the hook to do so.
<br><br>However, the hard part of building the infrastructure to ship 1 system to 1,000,000 different people has largely been built. Sunk cost at this point.<br><br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">
3.) They need to stop G1G1 in the US and Canada so they can start to scale up for Europe and Asia G1G1 sales.</blockquote><div><br>Europe and Asia deserve a chance to G1G1, too. (A mistake, IMHO, to try to exclude them from G1G1, but there may have been logistical considerations I don't understand) But if making them available in Europe comes at the cost of availability in North America, I'm going to be arranging to purchase my spares through GreyMarketEurope.
<br><br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">Good question, and not an intuitive answer. This belongs on the wiki somewhere.
<br><font color="#888888"><br>Seth</font><div><div></div><div class="Wj3C7c"><br>
<br><div class="gmail_quote">On Dec 28, 2007 8:00 AM, Josh Cogliati <<a href="mailto:jjcogliati-olpc@yahoo.com" target="_blank">jjcogliati-olpc@yahoo.com</a>> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">
Why is the give one get one program ending? The<br>program has brought millions of dollars of donations<br>to OLPC. As well it provides a good way to get<br>hardware if you are undecided on developing for the<br>machine. Plus it provides a price ceiling on ebay
<br>sales. So, why is the program ending?<br><br>Josh Cogliati<br><br><br>_______________________________________________<br>Olpc-open mailing list<br><a href="mailto:Olpc-open@lists.laptop.org" target="_blank">Olpc-open@lists.laptop.org
</a><br><a href="http://lists.laptop.org/listinfo/olpc-open" target="_blank">http://lists.laptop.org/listinfo/olpc-open</a><br></blockquote></div><br>
</div></div><br>_______________________________________________<br>Olpc-open mailing list<br><a href="mailto:Olpc-open@lists.laptop.org">Olpc-open@lists.laptop.org</a><br><a href="http://lists.laptop.org/listinfo/olpc-open" target="_blank">
http://lists.laptop.org/listinfo/olpc-open</a><br><br></blockquote></div><br><br clear="all"><br>-- <br>Steve Holton<br><a href="mailto:sph0lt0n@gmail.com">sph0lt0n@gmail.com</a>