[Air-L] help on africa and computer donations

[Paul DiPerna]

This past Sunday 60 Minutes ran a feature on Negroponte and the One Laptop Per Child initiative.  It was an update on a story they first reported in May.

Link to the video:
http://www.cbsnews.com/sections/i_video/main500251.shtml?id=2830221n

Transcript text:
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/05/20/60minutes/main2830058.shtml


The business/political dynamics at play between the One Laptop Project and Craig Barrett/Intel are interesting.  The CBS report implicitly raises some profound questions about how oligopolies (here in the US. for example) can actually stifle technological progress and the diffusion of an innovation to the masses.  I'm not a business analyst by any stretch of the imagination, but that was one of my takeaways.


   - Paul




Paul DiPerna  
Blau Exchange  
http://www.blauexchange.org
online ID: http://claimid.com/pdiperna


----- Original Message ----
From: Scott MacLeod <helianth at gmail.com>
To: air-l at listserv.aoir.org
Sent: Monday, August 27, 2007 9:28:28 PM
Subject: Re: [Air-L] help on africa and computer donations

Hi,

Here's the keynote address by MIT Media Lab's Nicholas Negroponte
about the One Laptop per Child or XO-1 initiative at Harvard's Berkman
Center for Internet and Society this year on May 31 -
http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/mediaberkman/2007/06/17/nicholas-negroponte-keynote-at-internet-society-2007-2/.
In it , he tells how the initiative is proceeding, that this laptop
will cost about $130, that it is basically ready, that they are
targeting about 8 countries, and that one company built a new factory
for them due to the scale of the project. It is primarily an
educational endeavor. They'll use a mesh network that  will work in
remote locations. I'm not sure how they'll approach the language and
literacy questions, from a partly engineering orientation. All of the
Berkman Center for Internet and Society's media at Media Berkman is a
rich resource. The scale and implementation of this project is
impressive.

Scott MacLeod

See also wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One_laptop_per_child





On 8/27/07, nativebuddha <nativebuddha at gmail.com> wrote:
> This student is looking for help. Any suggestions?
>
> -robert
>
> -----------------------------------------------
>
> Hello,
>
> I am Alok Kotecha, a Computer Science major at the College of
> Charleston. I am working on a paper for my English 102 class that is
> based mainly on donating computers to the developing nations of
> Africa, mostly Tanzania, Kenya, Ethiopia, Mozambique & Zambia.
>
> My main argument is that developed nations donate technology such as
> computers to these counties with the aim of technologically advancing
> the nations, however they do not consider the fact that donating
> computers is not the main thing to be done at this stage.
>
> Below are some other arguments that I address in my paper:
>
> 1. Lack of infrastructure e.g. very few people have telephone lines
> and this will stop them from connecting to the internet.  (Wireless
> connections are out of question in most places due to the high set up
> costs and regular maintenance required.)
>
> 2. Security would be a concern - High crime rates might mean that
> high security would be needed in order to protect computers from
> theft.
>
> 3. Language would be a concern as well - Operating a computer that
> interacts in English my be a problem for many people.
>
> 4. Health Care - Many people die everyday form malaria and other
> diseases. In these cases it is always a good idea to save lives first
> by providing better health care and medical services rather then
> donating computers.
>
> Currently I have based my paper on statistics from UNDP and NYT
> articles, but because this is a very recent issue I am currently
> having problems finding more scholarly articles and I would
> appreciate any suggestions you can provide.
>
> Thank you,
>
> Alok Kotecha
> _______________________________________________
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>
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> http://www.aoir.org/
>


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