A Child's View of the OLPC

Finallyjoined!!! sends us a BBC account of a dad who traveled to Nigeria and brought back an XO laptop for his 9-year-old, Rufus. Here is Rufus's review, a child's view of OLPC. "Because it looks rather like a simple plastic toy, I had thought it might suffer the same fate as the radio-controlled dinosaur or the roller-skates he got last Christmas - enjoyed for a day or two, then ignored. Instead, it seems to provide enduring fascination... With no help from his Dad, he has learned far more about computers than he knew a couple of weeks ago, and the XO appears to be a more creative tool than the games consoles which occupy rather too much of his time."

In Soviet Russia...

[by Anonymous Coward]

America scams Nigeria!

Already?

[4solarisinfo (941037)]

I returned from Nigeria with a sample of the XO laptop

I did RTFA, and no mention of HOW he got the laptop... I know everyone was talking about these things ending up all over the world in the black market, don't tell me it's ALREADY there.

Re:Already?

[morgan_greywolf (835522)]

I believe there's a pilot in Nigeria underway. Here's another person from Nigeria's view of the OLPC [olpcnews.com].

Re:Already?

[somersault (912633)]

Hahahahahaaa.. look at this country.. U R GAY!!!

[/obligatory Simpsons quote]

Re:Already?

[Anne_Nonymous (313852)]

>> I returned from Nigeria with a sample of the XO laptop

That's nothin'. I returned from Nigeria with my late uncle's ashes and 30% of his $20,000,000 estate.

Re:How about the kids in Iraq? Any OLPCs there yet

[default luser (529332)]

South Africa, The Iraq, and the Asian countries still need a lot of help from our education over here before they're ready to get XOs and build up our future.

Actually, I think they just need more maps.

Re:Already?

[elrous0 (869638)]

You expected a Brit to go to Africa and NOT exploit the local population and natural resources?

How long will that one work?

[AceJohnny (253840)]

I thought the XO laptops had a kill switch to disable them if they leaked out from their target demographic (african schools), into secondary markets?

Isn't the article's premise the exact situation which the OLPC designers feared?

Of course, the article mentions "a sample of the XO laptop", so I hope this this specific laptop wasn't obtained through such a secondary market...

Re:How long will that one work?

[ThinkingInBinary (899485)]

First, the target markets are not all African schools. They have target countries on other continents as well. (Off the top of my head, I know there are several in South America.)

Second, it's not an automatic kill switch. It allows you to disable the laptop if it is reported stolen, and will disable the laptop if it hasn't been able to check with the server for a certain time period. If the laptop is properly configured with a school server, then (even across the Internet) it will still be able to maintain its lease, and it won't shut off.

Re:How long will that one work?

[klubar (591384)]

This sounds a lot like WGA and DRM to me. The machine "checks in" with the server to make sure it's still authorized. What else does it report to the server?

Re:How long will that one work?

[somersault (912633)]

Well, of course it reports all of your credit card details, fingerprints, blood type (those sharp corners aren't just due to low production costs you know!), and also all your thoughts using the built in brainwave scanner. Better not let your firstborn near it either, because they're programmed to fire out CDs to decapitate firstborns as a proper sacrifice (to help amortise costs).

Re:How long will that one work?

[Tacvek (948259)]

Normally nothing else. But here is the main thing. Any student can request a developer's key. Once they have a developer's key they have full control over the computer and could disable the security system entirely. Now, how does one prevent a thief from requesting the key? Well to quote the spec: "The key-issuing process incorporates a 14-day delay to allow for a slow theft report to percolate up through the system, and is only issued if the machine is not reported stolen at the end of that period of time." To see the whole OLPC security specification see http://wiki.laptop.org/go/OLPC_Bitfrost [laptop.org] especially the "P_THEFT: anti-theft protection" section.

Re:How long will that one work?

[Penguinisto (415985)]

Err, only if it's enabled by the computer's owner. That's the big diff... the XO DRM is a user option (like Lo-Jack for laptops), while WGA/DRM is a vendor's option (and is always on whether you like it or not, unless you use EULA-violating tools to disable it).

So conceptually you have a point, but practically you're way off base.

/P

Different languages

[DeeQ (1194763)]

The one thing that struck me the most was the part where the kid asked about what his "friends" were saying to him, and how hes learned hola. This is more than enough of a learning tool to master a language. I personally know from first hand experience how this can work from a game I used to play that people from all over the world played. From starting the game at age 10ish one of my friends had learned english, finish, german and a little french. The ability to talk to other kids from different areas with language barriers is a great way for people to learn a language. Also for all the people who are talking about how food would be a better choice than education etc you are missing the point. There are plenty of charities and other donations to help starving kids. Not every kid out there is starving, but even some that are not starving are education deprived. I think this program could help alot of these countries get more education for thier children which in the long run will help them with money and food issues hopefully.

Re:Different languages

[Araneas (175181)]

More so than that, Rufus' world is now a little bigger and his mind a little less narrow. A civil war in South America or a famine in Africa will have more meaning to him because it's not happening to some faceless other, it's happening to his friends.

Re:Different languages

[MPAB (1074440)]

Marge: Lisa, you got a letter.
  Lisa: It's from my pen-pal Anya! [reads]
  Anya: [voice over] Dear Lisa, as I write this, I am very sad. Our
              president has been overthrown and
                [voice changes to that of a man]
              replaced by the benevolent general Krull. All hail Krull and his
              glorious new regime! Sincerely, Little Girl.

BBC reporter

[fishter (757646)]

The Dad is Rory Cellan-Jones [bbc.co.uk], a seasoned BBC reporter on technology. A better link (with pictures) is here BBC News [bbc.co.uk]

Smart kid

[InvisblePinkUnicorn (1126837)]

"With no help from his Dad, he has learned far more about computers than he knew a couple of weeks ago."

The kid has made such a fast advancement that he has already been offered a job by Chris Hansen.

Re:Smart kid

[Billosaur (927319)]

And in his spare time, working on the next version of the Linux core...

Re:Smart kid

[by Anonymous Coward]

The kid has made such a fast advancement that he has already been offered a job by Chris Hansen.

Better than being offered a 'job' by Michael Jackson.

A child's view of the $100 laptop is good and all

[drhamad (868567)]

But what about a child's view of the $200 laptop?

Also, somebody might have pointed this out already, but this guy took a laptop from Nigeria to bring to the UK? That seems to defeat the point (from how it's stated in the article, it doesn't seem that it was from the buy one/give one program).

children are overrated

[misanthrope101 (253915)]

or at least their curiosity is. I have a Macbook and a Ubuntu desktop, and my kids (14, 16) have zero curiosity about either. There is nothing about kids that makes them magically curious about computer gear, programming, or whatever. Yes, they'll play DDR or Prince of Persia on the PS2, and they can write homework assignments with Abiword or OpenOffice, but "file>save as MS Word doc" is about as complex as their usage gets. I'm always bemused by the optimism that kids are going to be hacking perl scripts if they're given the opportunity. Kids are individuals, and those who are curious about computers are just curious about computers. The rest are not.

I even tried to entice my son by talking a bit about encryption, thinking he would make the connection of "aha! I can hide stuff from the old man!" but even that lure failed to get him to open the Missing Manual book. I keep hoping to find an encrypted container indicating that he's learned something, but alas he lacks my secretiveness. Kids today!

Re:children are overrated

[Mprx (82435)]

Your kids are too old. Once they hit puberty the natural curiosity focuses almost entirely on social status and the opposite sex. A 9 year old typically has far more general curiosity.

Conclusion: would be a great christmas present

[mean pun (717227)]

The conclusion I draw from the article is that this would be a great christmas present for a lot of children everywhere. (And that's a hint to the makers.)

I don't doubt for a moment that this thread will be filled with the usual /. grousing about the usefulness of the entire project, but let's give credit where credit is due: it looks like they have made a product that appeals to children. Perhaps they know what they are doing?

Interesting reading about the chat feature

[Iphtashu Fitz (263795)]

I found int intriguing reading the part of the article about the chat system. He suddenly found himself able to chat with Spanish speaking kids. I wonder exactly how the whole OLPC chat system works and if this is truly a "feature" or a fluke. I say fluke because the article says the chat system identified itself as chatting with others in Nigeria. Will the OLPC's be "region encoded" so kids can only chat with other local kids? Or will kids be able to easily chat with kids from the other side of the world as well? I can see the second alternative, purposeful or not, as a way to help foster a knowledge of other cultures that these kids would otherwise be entirely unaware of. True, language differences would probably minimize the impact of this sort of thing, but as the article demonstrates even a language barrier isn't enough to keep curious kids from making friends half way around the world.

Re:

[by Anonymous Coward]

>I found int intriguing

Why yes, signed 32bit integer values can be very interesting from many points of view!

The miracle machine

[klubar (591384)]

The OLPC is just an amazing machine, not only is it able to connect with any Wi-Fi network (no matter how far away or how secured), instantly make your child a programming virtuoso, make them a math whiz it can also make them instantly fluent in any language. Merely possessing the machine enables them to read and speak the language of the person they're chatting with. Not even Apple is so insanely cool.

419

[NoPantsJim (1149003)]

"a BBC account of a dad who traveled to Nigeria and brought back an XO laptop"

So...did he scam a Nigerian?

Re:419

[technomom (444378)]

Dear Sirs,

The Central Bank of Nigeria is now in possession of 500 "One Laptop Per Child" that is earmarked for our schools. Unfortunately, our minister of education recently died in a tragic car accident. You have been named as his beneficiary and will be responsible for their distribution. As one of the benefits, you will be able to keep one for your own child. To release those laptops, we will need your credit card number and personal details concerning your children so that we may chat with him on our Jabber server.

Please respond to 1-888-OLP-CCON with your information.

Regards,
M'Bol Zarhari
Esteemeed Grand Puba, Central Bank of NIgeria.

My kid made the honor role

[us7892 (655683)]

So Rufus is using his laptop to write, paint, make music, explore the internet, and talk to children from other countries.

Sounds like Rufus is a lot smarter than your kid. Figuring out all this stuff on his own. Before you know it, he'll be like his Dad, buying goods off the black market.

Another Kid's Review

[richg74 (650636)]

On his blog, Freedom to Tinker [freedom-to-tinker.com], Prof. Ed Felten at Princeton has two more reviews of early versions of the XO laptop, the B2 [freedom-to-tinker.com] and the B4 [freedom-to-tinker.com], both (very well) written by a 12-year-old neighbor.

Por fin... they can get ahead the EU & US

[emj (15659)]

Everyone says education is empowerment to the people, I think this is the first step to empower most people around the world. This is a step to help people/children easily communicate and play over large distances, talk and share ideas. You should take a million of these laptops and drop them on Lima, Peru, and see what happens. Imagine one million people using the computer to do new stuff, just producing new creative material, sharing, critizing.

This is actually a tool that would allow these counties to get ahead of EU & US. Because this will empower children when they are most active at learning, at 9 years old you can learn alot, that will get us alot of creative people, writers, programmers and artist in a 4-9 years.

The question is will these children need to learn english, or can they just create local economies, based on heir own language?

The Diamond Age

[Number6.2 (71553)]

Why do I get the feeling that I'm living not just Science Fiction, but in "The Diamond Age: Or, a Young Lady's Illustrated Primer" (Neal Stephenson)? True education is subversion, because true education will give you the tools to challenge the status quo.

First George Orwell, now this. Where does it end?

Review

[loconet (415875)]

Not to take away from the article but I would like to read a review from a kid who has not been exposed to technology/computers as much as Rufus. It would be interesting to read about their reaction to this technology and how it affects their daily lives. I grew up in Peru and was not exposed to technology to the degree that I am now, I know a laptop like that would have made a world of a difference to me.

No surprises

[DerekLyons (302214)]

No surprises in the article - in fact it sounds like a typical experience of a small child given any computer and allowed to just play with it. (Especially a child, like Rufus, who already has some experience around computers.) Jim Lileks has reported much the same thing with his daughter and the Mac she was given. I've heard similiar reports from friends who've let a child loose on a machine prepared for them.

So far as the length of his fascination - let's hear back in another week or two, or another month, or next year. From late November to now is a matter of three weeks, tops. Even for a nine year old this isn't particularly long.

This project is going to change things

[bl8n8r (649187)]

I think the OLPC project is indeed about education as Negroponte keeps insisting. The magic isn't in the laptop hardware (ok, some of it is revolutionary, such as the display) but more in the potential for collaboration and learning. It's a laptop designed to be an education tool and designed for learning. The paradigm behind it is very different than what microsoft, intel and asus are in it for, and that changes the results significantly.

Re:Something smells...and it aint my pants

[ThinkingInBinary (899485)]

The XO laptops connect through a school Jabber server, so if his laptop was set to use the same Jabber server, then he could see all of the people at that school, even if he's not on their local wireless network.

Re:

[tgd (2822)]

How does you wandering around with your DS have any bearing at all on how a totally different system with totally different software and totally different requirements works?

Oh yeah, it has no bearing at all.

Maybe you should go read up on the OLPC software stack.

Re:

[Scarblac (122480)]

Apparently it's easy to use them to connect to WiFi networks, his dad already ran one, and then you can apparently join OLPC chat rooms over the normal Internet. Not really the same as directly connecting to other OLPCs.

Re:Something smells...and it aint my pants

[Mr. Underbridge (666784)]

Something smells...and it aint my pants

It's your pants. Totally.

Re:Emulator?

[Breakfast Cereal (27298)]

From http://wiki.laptop.org/go/News [laptop.org]

Wolfgang Rohrmoser and Kurt Gramlich are proud to announce the initial version of their OLPC XO-LiveCD. This new project targets these goals:

  give children, students, teachers and parents the opportunity to participate and use the Sugar educational software on a common PC;
  support demonstration of OLPC software to non-developers;
  provide an easy maintainable Live-System for developers to test activities on the sugar desktop, this could be regarded as an alternative to existing OLPC virtualbox and qemu images.

The technology they choose embeds an unmodified official Redhat build into a framework (LiveBackup), which provides everything needed to run a live system. Going this way we are able to minimize the work for updates as new OLPC builds get released.

The ISO image are available at:

ftp://rohrmoser-engineering.de/pub/XO-LiveCD/ [rohrmoser-engineering.de]

as: XO-LiveCD_.iso

Images will be mirrored to:

http://skolelinux.de/XO-LiveCD/ [skolelinux.de]

Wolfgang and Kurt encourage everybody to try it out and give them feedback for improvements; please send mail to:

[e-mail]. Further information is available in the XO-LiveCD.pdf document at:

http://skolelinux.de/XO-LiveCD/XO-LiveCD.pdf [skolelinux.de]

Re:

[ThinkingInBinary (899485)]

It runs a customized, stripped-down version of Fedora Core 7 (details here [laptop.org]). There isn't an "XO emulator", but since it's s standard x86 system, you can emulate an XO [laptop.org] using Qemu, VMware, Virtualbox, or another virtualization program. (It's not perfect, but it is close enough to see how the system works.)

Re:Emulator?

[Atzanteol (99067)]

http://wiki.laptop.org/go/OS_images_for_emulation [laptop.org]

Enjoy. It's a modified RedHat distro with a special WM called Sugar.

Re:

[ByOhTek (1181381)]

What does this have to do with cognitive dissonance?

That typically comes from paying a high price for a low return (not just financially/materially either). In this case it is financial/material, and it seems more like a low price/high return.

Re:

[us7892 (655683)]

Your 3-year old is advanced. My 3-year old always clicks the right mouse button and ends up with the "display properties" dialog window. Then he smears his fingers on the LCD.

Re:Kids and computer

[d3ac0n (715594)]

Your 3-year old is advanced.

Not really.

My son learned how to do most of that (not counting playing CS. Although he does play some Web-based games at Noggin.com) at about 3 - 3/12. Now before you go saying "Well your son is just a genius." Please be aware, my son has Autism. He's not "normal" in any sense of the word, other than being physically healthy.

His learning is definitely behind that of his peers, requiring him to need a special in-school tutor to help him along. He's 5 now, and struggling along in 1st grade. Still, we're impressed with his progress so far, and are now looking for ways we can use his affinity for computers to help educate him.

The truth is, if parents would take just 5-15 minutes to sit down with their child at a computer and begin to use it with them, they would find that most kids would very quickly latch onto it, and soon be doing things with it themselves. I suspect that this will begin to happen more and more and the generation that was born into a world with computers and the internet as a common thing have kids of their own. Heck, it's ALREADY happening, if my son is any indication.

Don't sell your kids short. Get them in front of a computer and learning today. Their peers have already started.

Re:Kids and computer

[Xtense (1075847)]

So your 3-year old kid already plays Counter Strike: Source?

That's some pretty good parenting, right there.

You didn't miss it

[Trebuchet (98044)]

The program was extended to Dec 31, according to the web site.

http://www.laptopgiving.org/ [laptopgiving.org]

Here we go again

[A nonymous Coward (7548)]

As they themselves say, and as I have repeated ad nauseum here myself, the OLPC is justified on a pure financial basis. It replaces print textbooks with digital textbooks. The print textbooks are usually hand me downs from foreign countries in foreign languages, out of date, expensive to acquire and distribute on a per-copy basis. The digital textbooks have only the upfront cost, either in translation or original material, no distribution cost or delay, up to date, and the OLPC can carry all of them on the long walk to school and back without any extra weight or bulk penalty.

The acquisition and distribution costs alone pay for the OLPC. The other benefits are pure gravy.

It is also pathetically patronizing to tell these people to stop growing their own food and rely on handouts from foreigners for such basic necessities. "We're foreigners and we're here to help because you are too dumb to grow your own food" just doesn't cut it. Far better to grow their own food and rely on OLPC handouts that they *can't* make themselves; at least that is the beginning of a way up the ladder to a better life. Begging for food isn't.

Re:Here we go again

[bcrowell (177657)]

I know a chemistry professor at the school where I teach who's an Ethiopian immigrant, and he used to organize textbook donation drives every few years. People would give him books, and he would send them to Ethiopia. He eventually stopped doing it, however, because it was too difficult to get the books to the students due to political corruption. Assuming the OLPC machines really do get to the kids (rather than being sold to enrich politically connected adults) in places like Nigeria, a big advantage would be that it would give the kids direct access to books that can't easily be interfered with.

OTOH, I maintain a catalog of free books (see my sig), and AFAIK there is essentially nothing out there as far as free elementary school books, and almost nothing for high school either. I do know of a South African project to produce a high school physics text (http://www.fhsst.org/), for example, but the project seems to have been moving along extremely slowly. Something like Wikibooks would seem like a natural vehicle for creating such books (ease of use + ease of translation), but Wikibooks has turned out to be a failure at its original goal of producing university-level textbooks (much better at producing gaming guides). In general, I don't think group authoring has been at all successful as a model for creating free textbooks. Authoring by an individual teacher scratching his/her own itch has been much more successful, but virtually all of that activity has been (a) in English, (b) in rich, industrialized countries, and (c) at the university level.