Wojciech, I am compelled to respond to this one. And please, I beg of you to forgive my contriteness and my spelling and my fluid prose... those who hate this kind of stuff, please do us both a favor, click away, click away.. go to dailykos.com if you have to, but click away. I was in Tunis at the Kram center when Kofi Annan broke the handle on the prototype of the "laptop for every child" during a photo opp demonstration. It was a small embarrassment I am sure.... and something that first world engineers can insure will never happen the next time Kofi Annan or President Bush or Bill Gates cranks up one of these lil portable "western cultural diffusions" in a box. I know it is hard to see this from any other way than from "our way" living in relatively predictable metropolitan areas or suburbs where street lights work and trash is collected on time and when you have a natural disaster there actually is an agency to come out and fix the suburbs and fix the street lights and the make sure the trash gets picked up on time... Having lived through Katrina and heard all the gasps of horror over FEMA's mismanagement of the preparedness and clean up... I was humbled when my Filipino colleague said... "If this had happened in my country, people would not be waiting for any assistance... there is none and never had been. At least you can complain about an agency that exists..." Humbled I was... cause it was fun to poke at an actual agency... no fun to know you are out on a limb with no one coming to rescue you...and no agency to poke at... for fun or serious. So of course from our vantage point in the more predictable world, for lack of a better phrase, it would be crazy not to think... computers are good, Internet is good... no duh. If given a chance, even our pampered dogs should have laptaps that work on kibbles and bits. Why resist this obvious gift... this obvious gift.... like 50 years of development was not gift enough? So India is rejecting this "gift" like they are discovering the futility of their telecenters... that were suppose to connect their most rural areas to "the predictable world" and perhaps some of it was suppose to seep out to them. How, by the magical digital information coming in (thus letting them know this predictable world out there exists) and the new found digital political will to "get them some of dat"? That is magic for sure. For reasons that Microsoft India, who did the study, can discuss in more detail, Indian telecenters simply did not make economic sense, perhaps because they made no cultural sense in these settings... And this may be why giving the children of a rural community, twice the population of the United States, crank laptops might not work either. Why it may not work in Africa either... although I bet you the Africans don't resist the gift... they have become accustomed to hand outs for so long... I think the saying is... "take it all, and let God sort it out later." I am sure they can turn those laptops into a towering sculpture, a drab green shrine to development somewhere in the lush Congo or, better, sell the scrap metal for roofing, if they can't black market the laptops themselves. I can see it now... a rural serene African village with the parents working in the sweatshops or trying to eek a living from dry earth and the kids learning their ABC's from Count Dracula at sesamestreet.com, when out of the bush a guerilla force sweeps in to steal away the laptops and the kids.... selling the laptops for arms and training the kids to use them for their bloody insurrection. Even Bill Gates, once he visited Africa, touched its dry soil, smelled the sweet acidity of humanity, even he figured it out very quickly there. He said, and I paraphrase here, but anyone can google it if they object to my subjective take of what he said... "These people do not need computers or Internet, they need medicine, food, security from war...." I am sure I messed that up, but that is my take of what he said. Of course someone could argue that if they had computers and the Internet perhaps they would have medical treatment and food and security cause they could buy it all on ebay... or more directly they could become informed, innovate on their own, or politically network to demand these things... That is the hope... the cyber optimism, no? But then one could argue...and I would tend to be persuaded by this argument having traveled to Africa many times over the last half decade on research... on this very topic....that in order for these places to sustain these technologies, they need so much more than just laptops....not only in terms of proper infrastructure and logical policy, those things we take for granted in our "predictable world" where the street lights work and the trash is picked up on time.... And even if they had these things, perhaps they could develop a culture that does not look upon these life changing technologies with such distrust...but then eventually they would have our culture... and then they could develop these technologies on their own, when they were ready for them.... instead of investing the limited resources they have now, and more tragically the seemingly limitless hope for change they invest, only to be disappointed once again. Fifty years... fifty years... of get rich quick schemes... of its just around the corner... or one day over the rainbow.... you would think they would be tired of that by now... since the only ones that got rich where the ones who were rich to begin with... those offering the handouts...and the poor stayed poor if not poorer...the cruel calculus or the paradox of development, which ever floats your boat: those with the most, need the least, and pay the least for what they need... those with the least, need the most, and pay the most for what they need... and not in nominal terms...when you talk about Internet connectivity, it is in real terms. We get the juice wholesale cause we produce it, naturally... they get it at retail, after a few multinational communication companies turn it over a few times for a nice profit. But the Africans never tire...and we never tire... it just makes for good business, selling them tractors, pharmaceuticals, military arms, development experts, of which my dad was one, and now internet connectivity... And their elite's fill their bellies and their Swiss bank accounts... It is a good game that has gone on so long... I don't even think it is obvious to anyone anymore. It is like the sun and the moon. But the Indians... they tire...of the same ole same ole... And we in the more predictable world, we are aghast they do not see it like we do... it is so obvious: stop war, plant stronger crops, hire people of merit and not your son or cousin, buy coca cola, buy levis, buy Marlboro... become modern like us... see???? See how modern we are??? How predictable and convenient our lives are??? So predicable and convenient that we may have caused global warming, that has shifted the rains north, that is creating drought that is creating famine that is creating political instability that is creating genocide and continuing the cycle of poverty and war..."and in this place we are to take these magic boxes for our children and make it all better???? Obvious, of course!" says the poor African refugee. But back to India, before I end this way to long response to what I know was a well intended thing a "person from the predictable world" would say. I feel your frustration, man, I do. So I think India is at that place were 14% of their population, middle class... no small number by the way, can support an indigenous ICT industry. And this industry can produce culturally significant tools to meet their needs in their own way, at their own pace, with out waiting for the hand out... that is never really a hand out. They know they will pay more in the long run if they take that hand out... and not just in bandaging up a half billion lil fingers that get hurt when the crank breaks or the millions of prescription glasses they will need to provide...hand outs are never free... and worse when the hand out does not even solve the problem you are left paying for something that was a waste to begin with. That is insult to injury... and I think the Indians have tired of that same ole same ole... Anyone want to go out on a limb and say that these laptops will solve the problem, forever, foreverever? ...I hear crickets... Anyone? Ferris? Ferris Buhler? Well if it does not solve the problem, then why buy into the same ole same ole?...Hey if you think it is so great, get your kids one. I can bet you, if these laptops hit the developing world, you will be finding them at a flea market near you very soon, if not on ebay. I mean who would not want a self cranking laptop?... Keep it in the box, mint condition, go on PBS's Antique Road Show in the year 2050 and see what you can get for it. "Mmmmm, nice piece you have hear... you say you got this from your great great grandfather who was doing some aid work in Africa in 2006 to 2008... well I have to tell you... that is the time frame for this piece... and you can see on the back side...the crusted blood of the little African child.... yes.. no doubt occurred when the guerilla fighter ripped it from his little boney hands... well this is a find... you don’t see these in this condition anymore...really a find... I think you might get at least 100,000 dollars for it. Maybe more at auction.... mmmm, yes... quite..." And that is how it works.. the rich get richer. My sincerests apologies for this tirade... I do this only once a year... I promise. And if the message I responded to was in jest or this all was hashed out weeks ago during a proper discussion, double apologies... double apologies. Rick Duque --- Wojciech Gryc <wojciech@gmail.com> wrote:

Hi,

Keeping in mind the long discussion that was posted a few weeks ago with regards to the merits (or lack thereof) of the One Laptop Per Child project, I thought this may interest subscribers of this list:

HRD rubbishes MIT's laptop scheme for kids

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/msid-1698603,curpg-1.cms

So India has decided against the One Laptop Per Child Project (for now). Two arguments that stood out for me:

1. Poor rural children often have health problems that may be exacerbated by laptop use, especially those affecting eyesight and children's backs. 2. No developed country has universalized laptops for children, so why should India?

I must say that the first argument is a perfect example of how people in developed countries often lack the foresight and local knowledge required to adequately decide whether a technology truly is "appropriate". Forget the merits to education or the potential for employability skills -- those are secondary to the potentially negative health effects of the laptops.

Thanks, Wojciech Gryc

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