Hello All I think there are too many different arguments mixed all together, in a rather inadequate way. I strongly dislike the OLPC project, mostly for the reasons explained at http://macareo.pucp.edu.pe/evillan/shdf.htm, but I do believe that my arguments, as well as many of the arguments proposed in this discussion, are valid for a specific subset of "developing" countries, and even inside those developing countries, some regions or groups are to be considered under a different perspective. Inequality is wrong, I concur; at the same, unless capitalism is completely replaced by something else, it is an inevitable consequence of an specific economic structure. Programmes like OLPC try to soften or lower inequality, but besides their shortcomings, they cannot even attempt to make inequality disappear. The fact that these computers are "down-market" is not a problem per se. If (a big if) a proper usage is found, they can be adequate, since they are not trying to replace a full-blown PC connected to high bandwidth networks and used for downloading videos from a Torrent. It is. again, a question of purpose, not of specific technology. I'm against the purpose and the specific implementation of such purpose. This is a necessary debate, since it is most possible that governments of developing countries are going to get scammed into buying thousands of these machines without a critical assessment of what exactly to do with them and what exactly should be the outcome of their usage in educational settings. More voices from the "affected" communities should be welcomed. Take care and have fun Eduardo Villanueva Communications Department Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú
I delayed sending this because it's a bit off topic of AoIR issues. But since it's mid summer, I thought perhaps others might be willing in continuing this part of the conversation... Eduardo Villanueva wrote:
Inequality is wrong, I concur;
Value statements such as this may be irrefutable, and therefore have limited utility. Nonetheless, inequality is an inescapable fact of social life. It can perhaps be minimized, but cannot be eliminated.
at the same, unless capitalism is completely replaced by something else, it is an inevitable consequence of an specific economic structure.
Capitalism is not very specific, has possibly never been pure, is probably inevitable under any purported alternative, and is not the only economic structure that produces inequality. -eg
Uh, speaking of off-topic subjects. Well I don't understand economic mechanisms very much at all. I found the popular book, _Critical Mass_ (Stephen Ball) to be most helpful. It is not actually very political, but really helpful to theorize events - especially information-based events that do relate to topics on the AIR_L list. Stephen Ball was quite a bit more helpful to me after I read the popular blockbuster, _Freakonomics_ which was fun to read but short on both philosophical and operational aspects. Cheers, Denise Denise N. Rall, PhD thesis in revision, School of Environ. Science, Southern Cross University, Lismore NSW 2480 AUSTRALIA Tuesdays: Room T2.17, +61 (0)2 6620 3577 or Mobile 0427 245 497 http://www.scu.edu.au/schools/rsm/staff/pages/drall/index.html Virtual member, Cybermetrics Group, University of Wolverhampton, UK http://cybermetrics.wlv.ac.uk/index.html __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com
participants (3)
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Denise N. Rall -
Eduardo Villanueva -
Ellis Godard