OLPC offers one-for-two to generous North Americans For the next 15 days, it's not just One Laptop per Child. It's One Laptop per Donor. Early Monday morning, the One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) association launched its Give One, Get One programme for donors in the US and Canada. Over the next two weeks, if you donate $399 to the foundation, one nifty Nicholas Negroponte laptop …
Maybe OLPC would do rather better if they opened up this program to the rest of the 'civilised' world. After all, we can't just rely on generous Americans to solve all the worlds problems - can we ?? Maybe the rest of us in the West would like to participate, after all I was allowed to register my interest for the program even though I have a .uk email address. I can see them appearing all over ebay shortly as 'generous' Americans attempt to cash in.
The company I work for pride ourselves in supporting fair trade and the environment where we can - from buying locally for systems components (and no, I don't mean the local DSG branch!) to using fairtrade tea and coffee - so OLPC seemed to be a huge opportunity for us to not only get a new toy but also to help out the developing world.
Why oh why do these companies only release these things in the US to begin with? Surely there is a much larger market outside the US for these kinds of things? Then again, knowing what I know about the pricing of computer books, these units would probably be £400 over here...
So much for $100 laptop eh. Anyway if the company can afford to give one to the needy and one to the donor. Then wouldn't it make more sense to rather donate 2 laptops instead of one to needy children. Instead of giving one to the donor (who I doubt if they can afford to donate would really want a PC like the OLPC)
I'm a bit worried about the XO laptop being on the open market, as that will make it easier to sell laptops given to children on the black market -- they can just claim that the laptops they sell were bought legally in the one-for-two programme. That is, unless the OLPC foundation makes the two kinds of XO laptops easily distinguishable, e.g., by using a different colour of plastic for those sold to private individuals. I have, however, not heard of any such measure being taken.
Does anyone know why we can't take part in this offer in the UK? What's the point of the "Special Relationship" if you can't buy interesting tech? Seriously though, its an interesting piece of kit and a good cause too. Surely I'm not alone in wanting one of these intriguing little machines.
This is really going to cut their profit margin, giving away an 19 year old game. I mean, they must still be earning 10s of dollars a year from new sales of this title. And its not like there is a free version available that actually runs on Linux, is there?
Reporting on OLPA - great. Being clever and ironic - fine, what El Reg is known for. But it seems there's something very British about simply being rude to all and sundry, particularly when it's foreign. If you lived in the USA you would know that Starbucks has an excellent reputation for coffee, etc. You might know somewhere that's better locally, and the UK reputation may be different, but the hot spots are offered in the USA only (as it says clearly), where it is possible to enjoy an excellent coffee or tea.
As for getting one to Blighty .... i might be able to help someone out here, if i knew how to get in touch with you and you know you want to do it. No idea if you can claim it as a tax free charitable donation in the UK, that kind of things is well understood in the USA annual tax returns.
Come on, the Canadians are supposed to be pretty reasonable, even if you can't trust those crazy Americans. Or if you speak Spanish, you should be able to find a friend in Mexico.
I'm rather doubtful that the machine will replace my main machine, but it has a number of features that may make it attractive as a traveling machine, but especially the promiscuous networking capabilities. I may wind up using it mostly in the book reading mode... Or I may wind up donating my machine, but that wouldn't be a total loss, either. I don't really know if this machine is the revolution, but I'm willing to gamble a bit to find out.
Payment is via PayPal which only allows a shipping address in the same country as the credit card (normally fair enough). Therefore you have to get your friend to pay for it and then reimburse them.
Of course, if you wanted to give them the bonus of being able to claim the $199 tax credit that might be a lot easier.
Note that the deal comes with massive disclaimers as to when you might actually get your hands on the device. Certainly, nobody is going to be able to get their mitts on one in time to provide feedback for anyone else looking to buy.
Not only is Starbucks coffee crap, but it is overpriced. Their hot chocolate is not bad, though. Offhand, I can think of 3 chains that make better coffee than Starbucks, although they are all as expensive, but in thier case you don't mind as the coffee is decent.
Of course, Starbucks is spreading like a malignant tumour across the face of Britain, so the other chains will soon be out of business.
I can think of 3 places in London where there are now 3 Starbucks in a 2 block radius and I am sure there are more. The common factor in all cases is that there is or was a branch of a competing chain nearby before they opened the other 2 Starbucks.
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