One of the officials stated stating that clean water and schools were more important.

Yes, that’s true, but I wouldn’t use the word “just.” I can easily imagine a classroom full of kids with these laptops, connected into one or more WLANs (the OLPC term is “mesh”), doing all sorts of collaboration and interaction and horseplay – it’s truly an exciting educational opportunity, even without access to Google or Wikipedia.

As to the question of whether it’s a “good purchase,” I’d have to say that it’s got all the pluses and minuses of any first-generation hardware/software… and *someone* has to be the first! My congratulations to Peru for taking the plunge.

this was probably my most obtuse blog post ever, but my point was that with all the enthusiasm and hype surrounding the OLPC, it’s worth questioning whether the 1st generation OLPC is definitely a “good purchase” for all the countries it’s intended for.

Like every other aid to the 3rd world, the OLPC can be a major waste of money rather than a success. But you can’t prevent a leader to use this project as a way to get more funds and influence

Where would these internet connections suddenly appear from? Who would pay for them? If the OLPC is going to be internet enabled, the running costs for a whole country of kids would be huge!

:-D