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How OLPC made a $150 laptop a reality.
By: Eric Durrand
Children are much quicker in mastering new technologies than adults generally are. In schools around the country, programs exist in which students teach their teachers about computers and the internet. Young children intuitively grasp, through trial and error, the workings of new machines, and through that experience, some experts claim, they “learn how to learn.”
A child who has access to his own computer will generally spend time mastering it, and through it, via Internet, will gain access to vast resources of human knowledge unavailable in any but the most complete libraries.
But the restrictive cost of laptops had made impossible, until now, a vision of laptops as universally accessible and affordable. Until now, because One Laptop per Child, a non-profit organization based in Cambridge, MA, has succeeded in mass producing a laptop that will sell for about $150. Compared to even the a low-end Dell laptop, which sells for around $500, the new laptop will be mass produced and shipped only as part of government programs, usually in 3rd world countries.
OLPC is a non-profit organization created by
Nicholas Negroponte and other faculty members from the MIT Media Lab to
design, manufacture and distribute laptops that would provide every
child in the world access to knowledge and modern forms of education.
And for the first time, prospects for this project seem very promising.
The
new B1, designed in an easy to find, childish bright green, was
designed to resist dust, dirt, and rain, and can be powered by an
outlet, or by hand – to work in areas where electricity is not
available. It includes a Linux-based operating system designed for
simplicity, and wireless networking that allows sharing and
communications between devices even in areas where no Internet access
exists.
Two innovative ways in which the creators have
reduced the cost is a new type of screen, which is sturdier, easily
readable in daylight, and cheaper to produce; and the fact that this
green machine uses flash memory instead of a hard-drive. Flash memory
is both cheaper, and less sensitive to shocks.
So far, 1,000
units have been manufactured for testing and propaganda purposes. More
units are to be manufactured by Quanta in early 2007 will go to school
children in Argentina, Brazil, Libya, Nigeria and Thailand -- the first
countries to participate in the OLPC initiative. These units will be
used by the children in real-life conditions as the final phase of
testing before mass production begins in the summer of 2007.
With
access to technology, many hope, children in developing countries will
be able to develop the skills necessary to contribute to, and integrate
in, the modern world economy.
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