Thompson accuses me of being “patronizing.” Huh? How?
BBC NEWS | Technology | Give me rice, but give me a laptop too
To make things worse Intel and Microsoft seem to have done everything they could to undermine the project, offering cut-price hardware and discount operating systems in an attempt to keep this remarkable machine, with its Linux operating system and AMD processor, at bay.
Now US journalist John Dvorak has weighed into the debate, dismissing the laptop as a ‘little green computer’ that changes nothing, and arguing that sending food aid to Africa is a better way to solve the continent’s problems.
Dvorak is so wrong that it pains me.
He misrepresents both the laptop’s capabilities and the plans for how it will be used.
‘Demeans people’
He ignores the educational uses and its sophisticated mesh network and acts as if the sole purpose is to get online, asking what benefit the “spam-ridden Information Super Ad-way laced with Nigerian scams, hoaxes, porn, blogs, wikis, spam, urban folklore, misinformation” has to offer.
And he demeans the people who will receive the computers, asking his readers if they will feel “better about the world’s problems, knowing that some poor tribesman’s child has a laptop”, apparently contrasting a “tribesman” with a real person like himself, safe in his Western affluence.
Yeah, that’s compelling logic. Take a cheap shot at me with a politically correct barb. Oh! Ouch!
No matter. I stand firm with my opinion.
You can read it here, if you have not already. I expected a few off-the-wall apologists for the project to take a few runs at me. Nobody likes a critic.
John, I think the truth lies somewhere in between your two opinions. That said, Bill Thompson has deserved a shoeing for a long time. His columns are usually fatuous, “will this do?” pieces, stating the obvious, often accompanied by an oversized picture of himself with his smug pursed lips sticking out from an unkempt, oh-so-hippy beard. I unsubscribed from the BBC tech feed because more and more of his drivel kept showing up. Leave it John, he’s not worth it!
23,25..
A computer can be many THINGS..
But ask yourself…WHAT is the wireless connections in the African Belt?? NILL, NADA, ZIP, ZILCH, Zero.
How many nations have setup wireless Internet or CELL access..2-3?? HOW many charge for Access, and WHOM is paying??
Let me do it this way…
IF’ I gave you a Console that would PLAY every game ever made and display it in HD, AND the monitor as well. controlers and everything.
BUT, there are 2 problems..
1. THERE ARE NO PORTS on the machine to let you LOAD the games. NO DVD, NO USB, NO NET..
2. Its uses a special POWER plug, and is powered by 15,000 WATTS.
What good is it??
The best i can see this thing doing, is sending NOTES to each other around a Settlement or small(small) town..
AND,
If you do find a person/teacher that knows computers, and figures out the machine. they can send notes to each student, and ?? .. Math? english??(DUMB) History?? ONLY If’ that person had access to the data could they send/distribute it, or they would need to TYPE every bit into the machine.
I know!! It MIGHT make a good night light, for the poor.
Looks like the OLPC is just an updated large scale implementation of the “BBC Microcomputer System” from the 1980’s era.
That might be why Mr. Thompson took the views presented in Mr. Dvorak’s column personally.
“But ask yourself…WHAT is the wireless connections in the African Belt?? NILL, NADA, ZIP, ZILCH, Zero.”
Wireless internet (via satellite) is being setup in the communities.
Next.
Fuuuuk the BBC!
If terrorists really did exist then they would of taken care of the BBC long before now!
John, The OLPC is a sacred cow because it is directed at the poor.
Attacking it, makes you an easy target for those wishing to express their “humanitarianism”. Since they cannot find something good they did, the alternative is to parade around anything “sacred” and defend it.
That is how religion works. Wonder why you have Sunday worshipers? That’s the parade.
It is not our place to do anything with Africans such as “give the man a fish for a day or teach him how to fish”. When the fictional star trek the next generation’s Captain Picard stated over again the prime directive comes to mind.
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In the fictional universe of Star Trek, the Prime Directive, Starfleet’s General Order #1, is the most prominent guiding principle of the United Federation of Planets. The Prime Directive dictates that there can be no interference with the internal affairs of other civilizations, consistent with the real world concept of Westphalian sovereignty. It has special implications, however, for civilizations still at a ‘pre-warp’ stage of development, since no primitive culture can be given or exposed to any information regarding advanced technology or the existence of extraplanetary civilizations, lest this exposure alter the natural development of the civilization. In addition to exposure, purposeful efforts to improve or change in any way the natural course of such a society, even if that change is well-intentioned and kept completely secret, are prohibited.
‘Pre-warp’ is defined as any culture which has not yet attained warp drive. Starfleet allows scientific missions to investigate and move amongst pre-warp civilizations as long as no advanced technology is left behind, and there is no interference with events or no revelation of their identity. This can usually be accomplished with hidden observation posts, but Federation personnel may disguise themselves as local sentient life and interact with them.
Europe endured many famines and harsh winters no body helped us. The engineered ukraine famine comes to mind Solomon Morel helped 20 million ukraine christians to their death.
Africans do not need to be remade their world does not need to be remade. Say no to tikkun olam.
These laptops won’t last long either. Think of all the waste and pollution. I would say they are going to be in a landfill by a years time but no probably just left broken in the street.
Sean,
do you know the power needed to send a signal to a sat??
THIS dont have that much power.
Even if you used a 5 watt signal, you wouldnt get Far enough.
Even a low voltage, 40 watt, relay/Hub…Is going to have a HELL of a time.
You might as well use the OLD radio system and have a HUB near the location, you could get better coverage.
PS, WHOM is going to PAy for the sat? NOT THE POOR.
Maybe it is a better idea to send food to Africa, but it probably would help more if America and Europe reduced the subsidies that mean farmers in poorer countries cannot compete. Also would help if African countries were not just seen as a source for raw materials and they produced more value added goods for export. That’s where the West could invest for a more equal and fairer future. If only we had the will to do it…
Another opportunity for the super-rich to show their magnificence by throwing a bone at… er, I mean “helping” the super-poor.
Paradoxically, the former can’t exist without the latter.
#40 ECA – The governments are setting up wireless Internet relay stations with Earth based satellite links. That is how they are supposed to get wireless Internet.
Whether it (OLPC) is a good idea or not I can’t say at this point but I watched the class using a bunch of them and they seemed genuinely excited to use them and they were learning how to do things.
Just imagine if some of the children could do research that would help them make things with the materials they have on hand.
I say try it and see what happens. For a change it isn’t my money footing the bill (I hope).
Congrats, John, on getting someone from a site as important as the BBC to take the bait! 😉
Yes, now I can go back on the street with my dollar bill-on-a-string.
Hi, i live in latin america, paraguay to be exact, and i just know that they are trying the OLPC to accept here, i am 100% agree with you, in the poor part of my country there aren’t doctors, the schools didnt have roof, i will be very usefull if the give then a schooll or milk insted a computer.
Here things are a lot of chepper tha in US, i think that for 2000$ you can build a school, not the best school of the world, be a better that they have.
Why the will want to use computer to people that need to know how to read first.
Sorry for my english.
Screw OLPC. Let’s start with the basics – roads, sewer, electricity, gass, actual schools that teach, teachers, some medical care, sustainable agriculture… how about that?! HA?!?!?!?
You wanna give’em laptops? go ahead, fine by me. I think it will be better to teach them how to do the stuff I listed above – it’s not that hard, you just need to know how, have the will to do it, and then just to do it – with the materials and resources you have around you.
I do not expect to see an 8 lanes highway, just a nice 1 or 2 lane road. No huge water ways, just basic pipelines that MOVE water from the lake/river to the farmers that desperately need it and dying from hunger 10km away.
I don’t expect to see MIT or Harvard SPRING from the savanna/jungle/desert, just a nice little school that children can go and learn about the world around them, learn there are alternatives to their way of life. A nation is responsible for itself.
It’s those far left crazy bastards and their high tech dreams – they wanna feel good so they gonna send them Linux with an AMD cpu…… what a bunch of f*@!en condescending morons.
I hope Africa will do better bit by bit.
And by the way, I would send them a killer LAPTOP with some cool games and software just to inspire them!
The devil is in the details. Always.
Will a laptop help a starving child?
No, nothing will if it’s stolen by the “Benevolent Ruler for Life” or his lackeys. No amount of rice will help, either.
Since rice can be stolen, we should not send any, right?
What is a Curmudgeon anyway?
A curmudgeon’s reputation for malevolence is undeserved. They’re neither warped nor evil at heart. They don’t hate mankind, just mankind’s absurdities. They’re just as sensitive and soft-hearted as the next guy, but they hide their vulnerability beneath a crust of misanthropy. They ease the pain by turning hurt into humor. . . . . . They attack maudlinism because it devalues genuine sentiment. . . . . . Nature, having failed to equip them with a servicable denial mechanism, has endowed them with astute perception and sly wit.
Curmudgeons are mockers and debunkers whose bitterness is a symptom rather than a disease. They can’t compromise their standards and can’t manage the suspension of disbelief necessary for feigned cheerfulness. Their awareness is a curse.
Perhaps curmudgeons have gotten a bad rap in the same way that the messenger is blamed for the message: They have the temerity to comment on the human condition without apology. They not only refuse to applaud mediocrity, they howl it down with morose glee. Their versions of the truth unsettle us, and we hold it against them, even though they soften it with humor.
– JON WINOKUR
I’m still waiting for the Sam Kinison observation as well: “Move to where the fricking food is!!”
Finally, excellent thread. If you were Bill Gates Foundation==how could one best spend money to do the most good?
My answer is still cheap/clean energy. Everything seems to flow from or depend on that.
Some people wont give food or medicine or a clean water pump to the poor, but they will give a computer?
[From Merriam-Webster – curmudgeon – a crusty, ill-tempered, and usually old man. – ed.]
Why wouldn’t these two arrogant bastards from Google build a factory in Africa for water pumps and water pipes or even better invest in an existing african factory (it must be owned by africans though) and then distribute the hardware and materials to the places in africa they actually need it – for free! Send an engineer to teach them how to operate and do maintenance on the hardware, how to move water from a lake to the field where they need it to grow crops so they won’t die of hunger next time the rain is late?! How about that?!?!??!? Hey Larry and Sergey! Are you listening?!?!?!??!?????????
#50 – bobbo –
On all points – a Big yup !
“do you know the power needed to send a signal to a sat??”
You misunderstood me. My fault. The communities are getting internet via satellite. The satellite dishes are plugged into normal wifi routers. The laptops are communicating with the routers. Same as in your home.
It’s no different than how millions of people in The States do it (Although I think satellite internet is a little sketchy).
You people make it sound like these communities can have either a laptop, OR food/medicine, which I don’t think is the case. They’ll get both.
People who contribute to food programs will continue to do so. People who give to the OLPC program might not have ever given anything to food programs.
The communities aren’t losing anything. The OLPC program isn’t stealing away money that could have been spent on medicine.
Apart from AIDS, now add Carpal Tunnel to it.
my two cents worth
Thompson is right
Dvorak is wrong
If you want to attack a waste of money, how about “military aid”
Negroponte already tested the scheme using normal laptops in Cambodia many years ago.
Has anybody considered the “end of life” implications for the OLPC from an environmental perspective? I mean, what happens to all that cadmium inside all of those batteries not to mention the heavy metals within the electronic components of the innocent looking OLPC when the thing inevitably dies?
Do we responsibly offer to take back the broken laptops for proper recycling, with the same enthusiastic fervour that colored our judgment in the first place, or will it by then conveniently be considered “Their problem” ?
If this hasn’t been taken into account, then we’ve simply replaced one problem for another.
Peace / Badtastic
(Sweden)
Sean, for years I’ve said I would never donate food to a 3rd world country. I would be willing to donate a single shot rifle, if I thought it would get into the hands of an average citizen instead of one of the local tyrant’s lackeys.
Africa can grow all the food it needs and has plenty of mineral resources even yet. There’s plenty of places for hydro power. Many of the people are ingenious and hard working (where chronic sickness does not cripple the work force). They have three problems, bigotry against people who are not members of their own tribe, acceptance of warlords and the corruption that goes with warlords, and superstition.
In other words, Africa’s problems are social and political.
I suspect these laptops will go a long way toward decreasing all three problems.
More rice will just give the warlords something to sell so they can buy guns and fighters.
53,54
AND you still have the same problem..
HOW are you going to get power to run a server and wireless??
Have someone STAND THERE and crank the server??
Whats the wireless RANGE of this server?? 40 miles?
And THEN you need ANOTHER ONE, and ANOTHER ONE…
@ECA – You should really try reading their wiki sometime. You might be a smart guy and all that, but the project is being run by some of the brightest minds in the industry. I think they can figure this stuff out.
#45 “Yes, now I can go back on the street with my dollar bill-on-a-string.”
Uh, John better use a Euro-on-a-string I don’t see many people bothering to pick up a dollar these days. 😉
Cheers
PS: 1 Euro = 1.47 U.S. dollars (Cripes!)
Sean,
Iv seen some of those BRIGHT ideas of the past..
Nuke plants, that were built by the Lowest bidder, comes to mind. Which has led to Many problems in the USA, and alot of BAD News, and a HATE for Nuke plants.
Somebody did a review of the thing.