Inhabitat

Amazing what happens when our minds focus on helping people over profit potential.
Let’s see now, are there any other products that we manufacture and consume en masse that are overly hard on the environment…. hmmmmmm…. oh yeah! all of them. New paradigm?

Full video is here:
http://www.scribemedia.org/2008/02/20/greener-gadgets-jepsen/

http://www.laptop.org is the website of the One Laptop Per Child group. XO-1 is the official name of the laptop.

Currently, the laptops are not for sale to individuals. There’s a lot of reasons for this, but mainly, in my opinion, the company is just too small to handle individual sales, and they are more interested in supporting kids in disadvantaged countries (in mass groups) than technogeeks (one at a time). OLPC had a “Give One Get One” program in December of 2007, but that program is concluded. There are a few XOs on eBay, for a pretty reasonable price. (The G1G1 price was about $425, including shipping.)

There are bunches of reviews of the XO, but let me offer a brief meta-review: many reviewers compared the XO to other laptops, and found it to be missing some software that laptop users are used to having. The first complaint is lack of compatibility with Microsoft products. (Microsoft has a group that is informally looking at how to run Windows on this machine. I say “informally” because there’s no intention (yet) to either convert the XO to Windows, nor to sell Windows for the XO.)

There’s also no high-powered word processor or spreadsheet software (both are in development), no iTunes-like media player (not much room for media — total storage is 1 GB of Flash), no Mail program (use web-based Mail readers). There’s no DVD drive. There are games, including a very old version of DOOM, but you won’t see any recent big sellers because there’s just not enough horsepower. There is a web browser, and some compatibility with Flash media software, but it’s not perfect.

Reviews also found it to be slower and software less polished than other laptops. As a user, I’d agree, but OLPC is about to ship their first big update to the software, and it is fixing a lot of bugs and improving on power consumption.

ON THE OTHER HAND, you can “review” the XO by giving it to a kid, say an eight-year-old, and watching them go. Kids LOVE it. They find the activities provided interesting, educational, and fun.

In addition, in the disadvantaged countries, users love the XO because it contains a library full of books, video/audio chat, and a unique “mesh” networking strategy that lets a whole village stay connected without a lot of wires, and without a lot of extra network hardware.

I love the XO, and would use it every day — if I could just type on the keyboard…

very great
but there must be better ways to charge it in india than animal exploitation.

anyway i’d buy it.

[...] Inhabitat » VIDEO: Mary Lou Jepsen on One Laptop Per Child [...]

Wonder how this can be made available to Indian rural children below INR 4000 to 5000 unless some NGO s takes the lead, buy in bulk and donate.
Can any one suggest a better way of marketing the product in India with minimum profitability?..
Ravindranath
Strategy45

Hi Mary Lou , My family and I are Homeless U.S. citizens living in a mini motorhome. Can we get one of your little laptops? We live in total poverty up here in the North West, and we sure could use one of those wind up laptops. (our generator is not reliable - needs repair ). Please contact me at rtdnan@yahoo.com. Thanks, Nan