[LINK] $100 laptop could sell to public

[Adam Todd]

At 09:00 AM 19/01/2007, Tom Worthington wrote:
>At 10:30 AM 1/16/2007, Stewart Fist wrote:
>>I wonder how many metres of water-pipe that $100 would buy ...
>
>About 21 m (not including delivery): 
><http://www.amazon.com/dp/B000LNJXFE/qid=1168990015/ref=sr_1_23>.

OK and how many kids are going to get these laptops?  1,000,000 at least by 
the sounds of it .

So legs be pragmatic for a moment.

21,000,000 meters of pipe, verse 1,000,000 laptops that the kids probably 
can't use all the time because they don't have power "at home" in the 
bark/mud/poo hut.

Wouldn't it be better to have 20 laptops at the school house, with a solar 
array nearby feeding power to recharge the laptop batteries and running the 
pump to pump fresh, clean, drinkable water?

Then the kids get a double benefit!  And they can probably carry a few 
litres of FREE water home with them too!

>At 12:40 PM 1/16/2007, Adam Todd wrote:
>>Bit o' pipe and a few pumps, some solar stations and presto. ...
>
>Solar panels are not cheap 
><http://astore.amazon.com/smart-apartment-20/?node=9>, nor are water pumps 
><http://astore.amazon.com/smart-apartment-20/?node=13>. Also they need 
>some training to install and operate. One way to provide that expertise 
>would be via on-line education, but I am still not sure a $100 laptop for 
>each child is the way to do it.

I have four children, they share a computer.  Well actually two of them 
do.  The youngest two aren't allowed yet :)

But again, $800 retail price (that does not include the 50% Fed Government 
rebate that pushed solar products up by 100% when it was introduced, you 
know like Health Insurance rebates that upped the price of health insurance 
by 33%!) and you have a good solar panel.

The power from that with some deep cycle batteries would give a good few 
years of power to the locals.  That can be used to charge the batteries on 
the limited number, but still sharable laptops, provide power for sat links 
for Internet Access, and probably provide power for a local area network, 
maybe a wireless one?  Not to mention pump the water!


>At 06:03 PM 1/17/2007, Stewart Fist wrote (was: "Re: Link Digest, Vol 170, 
>Issue 38"):
>>Brendan writes:
>>
>> > So you'd rather the government spent the money on weapons instead
>> > of laptops? ...
>
>It should be kept in mind that some of the OLPC PCs may be used for 
>warfare. They are semi-rugged and have daylight readable screens and so 
>are similar to hand held military terminals.

Don't Governments spend money on weapons regardless of laptops :)

Anyway aren't Military personnel buying their own equipment?  Two Way 
Radios, watches, GPS, clothing, bags etc?  The Military apparently doesn't 
stock really good stuff or have stock, so the Boys and Girls have to get 
their own.

(Reported on Link twice in the last few years.)

>My suggestion was to combine the design skills which went into the 
>Simputer with the marketing hype of the OLPC 
><http://www.tomw.net.au/blog/2005/11/is-100-laptop-windup.html>. One way 
>is to build a Simputer with a larger screen, bigger batteries, a keyboard 
>and wireless interface.

Still gotta charge those batteries!  Hard to do in the middle of the Sudan 
Desert!