And we're talking a serious slap too. Two-thirds of silicon.com's 12-strong CIO Jury IT user panel says OLPC is "fundamentally flawed". Ouch!
The group pointed out two major issues I've asked about before. Nick Clark, director of IT services at Tower Hamlets College, went for connectivty
"A wind-up laptop may keep going but what is it going to be used for without the communications infrastructure? It may be better to invest in that infrastructure and provide a cheap mobile phone with browser to access it. But then there's the question of who will pay for the calls."
And folks like Chris Broad, head of IS&T, UK Atomic Energy Authority asked about in-country implementation:
Giving equipment or even building a school does not contribute to educating the children unless the trained teachers and infrastructure is also there.
And then there is the imperism angle, which may have been an influence on India's Education Secretary Sudeep Banerjee calling the One Laptop Per Child idea "pedagogically suspect." Funny enough, it was the British, specifically Russell Altendorff, IT director at the London Business School, whipping out "imperialism."
: "Professor Negroponte and the US in general must realise that many countries will treat their largesse as imperialism by another means. They mean well but they really have to respect the capabilities of other countries to make their own way. More realistic trade agreements would be a better way of helping the third world."
Hmm, Kettle, it's Pot, we gotta talk.
Tags: CIO Jury | Nicholas Negroponte | OLPC | One Laptop Per Child | Russell Altendorff | Tower Hamlets College | UK Atomic Energy Authority | imperialism |
