One Laptop Per Child - Give One/Get One. Right now, between November 12 and November 26, if you make a $399 donation, you donate one XO laptop to a child and receive one yourself. $200 of the donation is tax-deductible.
If I hadn't had my car vandalized and my iPod die and the need to buy a new one that ran things like iTunes, I'd have been very tempted. As it is, I forwarded it to my mother, in case she was looking for something to donate money to before the end of the year. XD
(As a really simple Internet box and game station, it seems really cool.)
This is tempting. I'd like to have computers for my kids. But I'm not sure I can afford it... and not sure I could figure it out well enough to teach them, since I don't know Linux.
The thing is that it's designed to be easy enough for kids themselves to hop in and figure out on their own - you don't need to get into the Linux if you don't want to. It's got a GUI (graphical user interface) like Windows or the Mac, so the user just points and clicks to use the stuff on it.
Of course, it uses software written specifically for it, not anything written for Windows or the Mac or anything else like that, so you're basically left with using the programs it comes with, or what the open-source developers are working on now. (http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Activities)
I wish I could afford to get one just to play with, because I adore playing around with new interfaces (...when there isn't pressure for me to get something specific done to a deadline!), but I'm probably better off saving up for a "normal" laptop. *sigh*
Also, the keyboard is sized for a child's hand, not an adult's. (I believe in part to avoid having corrupt educational officials sell them on the grey market instead of providing them to children as planned.)
But I bought one anyway to see what it was like, and to donate one elsewhere. Since it's small and green, maybe I'll call it Yotsuba (http://www.amazon.com/dp/1413903452/).
I'm tempted, just for the programming possibilities in developing for it. Not that I'd actually do that - I'd put the laptop somewhere and every time I saw that I'd think "I really should get on that" and never get around to doing so. XD
As a possible community informatics librarian, I may be one of the few people who's not especially thrilled by OLPC (let's just say I think it's a really wrong-headed approach to bridging the so-called digital divide and leave it at that), but, uh, carry on?
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
...we still have yet to get a wireless router. Aheh. But that's mostly because we didn't have a wireless laptop before.
no subject
(As a really simple Internet box and game station, it seems really cool.)
no subject
no subject
Of course, it uses software written specifically for it, not anything written for Windows or the Mac or anything else like that, so you're basically left with using the programs it comes with, or what the open-source developers are working on now. (http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Activities)
no subject
Really neat project, though.
Child-sized keyboard
But I bought one anyway to see what it was like, and to donate one elsewhere.
Since it's small and green, maybe I'll call it Yotsuba (http://www.amazon.com/dp/1413903452/).
no subject
Re: Child-sized keyboard
no subject
no subject
no subject