OLPC
“The OLPC is shit.”
One Laptop Per Child is a scheme set up by a team of ultra-rich billionaires to provide exceedingly good laptops to children in developing countries such that they can look up 'teh internets' to find hardcore pr0n and play Doom.
Since 'developing countries' is a euphemism for poor the OLPC costs only $100 $250 and is therefore consistently referred to in the media as the $100 laptop.
Innovation[edit]
The OLPC is often cited for its innovation. These include:
- Having a keyboard with the letters arranged in such a way that words can be typed in many languages.
- The screen can be read in direct sunlight just like mobile phone screens.
- It has Wi-Fi which means for the first time a laptop can be connected to another computer without wires for the exchange of informations.
- It is green in colour to make it un stealable. (when was the last time you hear of a green car being stolen?)
- It uses a solid state hard-drive meaning that it will never ever corrupt, just like USB memory sticks.
- You can recycle it into two tea trays just by snapping it in half at the hinge.
The laptop is called OLPC/XO, where XO stands for skull and bones, since the machine is intended to be used by starving children (just like Wikipedia). So it's not a coincidence that the machine can be easily converted to a toaster.
Buy one get one full price[edit]
The OLPC mega-company has run a campaign allowing rich people to buy one $100 laptop and get a second $100 laptop at only full price ($250 each, or $500 for both).
Richard M Stallman has called this the greatest marketing campaign since Steve Jobs invented the Apple Newton-Phone.
Intel Classmate[edit]
“OMG lame.”
The Intel Classmate is basically a cheap laptop which runs Microsoft Windows XP and costs about $250 which is far more than the $100 $250 laptop.
Intel has come under massive criticism for giving the buyer the choice between Windows XP and Linux. Linux has clear advantages such as people who have never seen let alone used a computer before can edit the source of their operating system to make it way cool! Windows XP doesn't require any recoding to work, and is therefore not good for h4x0rs.
Criticism[edit]
The OLPC chairman Nicholas Negroponte has criticised virtually everyone on the planet (and often beyond) for the failure of their cheap sandwich toaster based technology.
Intel have come under fire for stifling the project by insisting that the core processor should be supplied by their main competitor AMD.
The governments who never expressed much enthusiam for the project in the first place have come under fire for using their money to fund clean water for villages rather than buying laptops.
Microsoft have been criticised for allowing the OLPC to run on the open-source Linux operating system because this will require all school lessons to begin with a kernel recompile to switch subject.
Environmental groups have been targeted at being too shortsighted about the long term environmental impacts of sending millions of "pre-obsolete" computers into the developing world which will surely be on the scrapheaps this time next year. Greenpeace obviously don't care about the planet as much as OLPC does.
Negroponte has criticised books for trying to undermine the OLPC. Despite advances in modern book technology, OLPC claims that their laptop uses less power than a book and having online access to Wikipedia ensures access to information with a level of editorial scrutiny that cannot be achieved by a book.
Space aliens have been criticised for using their mind rays to interfere with the OLPCs goals.
Future of OLPC[edit]
The OLPC foundation is now seeking to make the OLPC available in the USA were it is expected there will be a huge demand for its patented 'crank-and-surf' wind-up technology.
Backwards Compatibility[edit]
The OLPC will be able to run the full catalogue of applications and games available for its sister project the MacBook Air (CD/DVD-ROM disks only).