One Laptop Per Child News on Countries

No More XO Laptop Keyboards for Nigerian Children

Posted on January 03, 2008 by Guest Writer in Hardware: Keyboard, Countries: Nigeria

Don't touch the keyboard!

Seriously--it's now a crime for OLPC to sell or distribute the laptop in Nigeria. You have been warned. Pay $20 million to LANCOR and all will be well. No, this is not a Nigerian scam...or maybe it is. Judge for yourself.

There is an excellent summary of the status of the lawsuit against OLPC on Groklaw. The post includes links to copies of the court documents and a summary of applicable Nigerian law.

Lagos Analysis Corporation, also known as LANCOR, got a Nigerian judge to sign an order in December that stops OLPC from distributing the XO in Nigeria. Violate the order and the consequence is time in a Nigerian jail.

LANCOR claims that OLPC and Nicholas Negroponte stole the design LANCOR patented for their KONYIN Multilingual Keyboard.

OLPC attorneys requested more information about the alleged "infringement of intellectual property rights" but haven't received anything specific from LANCOR other than a demand for $20 million US dollars. Groklaw quotes part of the OLPC attorney's letter in response to LANCOR:

I assume that you are not claiming that LANCOR has a monopoly on the creation of multilingual keyboards. Please specify what aspects of LANCOR's multilingual keyboard design you believe to have been infringed.

Finally, although it is premature to engage in discussion of your client's alleged damages, I feel obliged to note that, given the fact that OLPC has to date sold no multilingual keyboards and that, according to LANCOR's website, its multilingual keyboard sells for $19.95, your demand of $20 million is not well founded.

Groklaw points out that the protection of intellectual property may not be the end goal of the lawsuit. It could just tie up OLPC in a long battle. Others gain monetarily while the children of Nigeria lose.

I wonder what the children of Galadima would say if they knew other children in their country won't be having the same chance they have had just because some grownups think money is more important than learning.

This post was submitted by Eden Krehbiel, who reminds you that your French Pootle needs your help.

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BBC Visit to OLPC Nigeria's Galamida School Pilot

Posted on December 02, 2007 by Winter in Countries: Nigeria, Commentary: Press, Implementation: Schools

A key OLPNC actor in action

Hi, I am Winter. We had Anders Mogensen's wonderful reports from Galamida School, Abuja Model City, Nigeria on OLPC News just in early October

Now the BBC carries a story about the same school.

The story is set in a positive tone. Children, teachers, and reporter do seem to like the project. They do not seem to expect to solve world peace, hunger, and the climate problems like Negroponte envisions.

We do get a first example of class room use.

At the moment the laptops are used to augment the text books and black boards rather than replace them. "One of the biggest uses of the laptop is for note-taking in class," said Mr Kusamotu.

In addition, he said, teachers use the preloaded encyclopedia to teach classes. During our visit we saw a lesson on the mammalian eye based on the preloaded content along with maths lessons that used the calculator.

This is more or less what is to be expected from a short deployment. In such a short time, no real results will be gathered. But the teachers remain positive. On the downside, around 40 laptops were broken, lost, or stolen. This disrupts classes as some children (more than 10%) have no XO anymore. Clearly, some sort of replacement program must be added to the program to offset the losses.

Children be as they are, they will not always pay attention.

In addition, the laptops can be a distraction - often pupils play games on their computer rather than follow the class.

It is good to see that "maintenance" is what we all hoped it would be, the children themselves. But without parts this will remain a problem.

OLPNC XO geography class

Some of the children have learnt how to fix broken keyboards and remove the screens and batteries. They act as engineers for the whole of the school - fixing friends laptops as and when needs arise. But software and infrastructure problems may be more tricky.

An early example of technical problems were the solar panels which were not installed correctly and did not function. A bigger problem will be funding for the internet connection. The current connection is way too expensive to pay after the free trial period is over. However, the local people remain optimistic about the future price developments.

Mostly, this article looks as if the reporter, Jonathan Fildes, has read OLPC News. Many of the points discussed here were included. There is even the obligatory "porn" reference. It's nice, though, to see the broader public being informed.

Here's a video about the BBC visit:

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KONYIN Keyboard Registered Industrial Design: Expired?!

Posted on December 01, 2007 by Wayan Vota in Hardware: Keyboard, Countries: Nigeria, Commentary: OLPC News

Stop the keyboard madness!

Do you remember Adé G. Oyegbola's quote about his patent infringement lawsuit against One Laptop Per Child:

"[Ade's friend] said, 'Wow, I saw your keyboard on OLPC,' " said Oyegbola, who then visited the foundation's website. There he saw a document describing a keyboard layout that seemed nearly identical to his own. "They didn't try to hide anything," Oyegbola said. "They just copied everything verbatim."

Well look what Santa sent me early-like: copies of the Nigerian patent documentation on LANCOR's Registered Industrial Design of the KONYIN Multilingual Keyboard.

Page 1 - Page 2 - Page 3 - Page 4 - Page 5 - Page 6 - Page 7

Now we can see everything verbatim ourselves, and it's an interesting read. From the looks of it, Adé G. Oyegbola's suit should be frivolous after all. I say the registration expired a year ago and Oyegbola should cease and desist asap before he embarrasses himself more.

The Boston Globe is already digging up his past, and it ain't pretty:

The founder of Lagos Analysis Corp., Ade Oyegbola, was convicted of bank fraud in Boston in 1990 and served a year in prison. Oyegbola insists his Nigerian patent is legitimate and said he plans to file a copyright-infringement lawsuit against OLPC in an American court.

Good luck Ade, you're gonna need it. I expect your systems are going get hacked by mad geeks. Right. About. Now.

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Nigerian Patent Infringement Lawsuit: Scam or Shame?

Posted on November 27, 2007 by Christoph Derndorfer in Hardware: Keyboard, Countries: Nigeria, Laptops: XO-1

Original XO or infringed IP?

Now I'm not quite sure what to make of this at the moment but a United States-based Nigerian-owned company has sued OLPC for an alleged patent infringement about multilingual keyboard technology. As MarketWire.com puts it:

The patent infringement lawsuit was filed on November 22nd, 2007 as a result of OLPC's willful infringement of LANCOR's Nigeria Registered Design Patent # RD8489 and illegal reverse engineering of its keyboard driver source codes for use in the XO Laptops.

More specifically LANCOR claims that:

...OLPC purchased two KONYIN Multilingual Keyboard models (KONYIN Nigeria Multilingual Keyboard and KONYIN United States Multilingual Keyboard) with the express purpose of illegally reverse engineering the source codes for use in OLPC's XO Laptops.

After reading that story I went to look for the Nigerian Patent Office's website,

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All Education and Educational Decisions are Local, Not Federal

Posted on November 27, 2007 by Wayan Vota in Use Cases: Education, Countries: India, Countries: Nigeria, Countries: Peru, Commentary: Press

Yesterday's Boston Globe had an telling juxtaposition of Iqbal Quadir of the wildly successful GrameenPhone and Nicholas Negroponte of the wildly publicized One Laptop Per Child. Like last week's WSJ article, Negroponte again came off looking the fool. Why? Because he ignored local user groups in favor of dealing with governments - federal governments. Now let's have Iqbal Quadir give the money quote on why GrameenPhone is a success and OLPC isn't:

"I have learned from history that actually, the countries that are developed, where governments behave and serve the public, are those where the citizens have empowered themselves through technologies and business,"

So let us take a tour of XO laptop users where citizens have empowered themselves through technologies, through education, to form more holistic communities. First up, a news report on OLPC Peru's Una computadora por niño program in Institución Educativa Santiago Apostol de Arahuay

.

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WSJ: OLPC XO Laptop Threatened by Intel & Microsoft

Posted on November 24, 2007 by Wayan Vota in Sales Talk: Competition, Sales Talk: Countries, Sales Talk: Intel, People: Negroponte, Countries: Nigeria, Commentary: Press, Software: Windows

Today's Wall Street Journal front page has long article on One Laptop Per Child: A Little Laptop With Big Ambitions. In it, Steve Stecklow takes the position that a computer for the poor was stomped by tech giants:

I'd like to take the position that if OLPC is getting stomped (and I don't think its being "stomped" at all), its due to its own foolishness and arrogance, as much or more than any underhanded competition from Intel or Microsoft.

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OLPC Nigeria Implementer Pushing Windows on Classmate PC?!

Posted on November 21, 2007 by Jon Camfield in Sales Talk: Competition, Sales Talk: Intel, Countries: Nigeria, Software: Windows

Two weeks back, we reported the horror story that Mandriva was being wiped from all 17,000 ClassMate PCs, purchased for an education pilot in Nigeria - and being replaced by Windows XP. Many worried about bribery, while OLPCNews focused on the potential impact of this as a precedent for XP on the XOs. It turns out there was a bribe of sorts; $400,000 to the implementing company, and that the Nigerian government has now stepped in and is sticking with Mandriva Linux.

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Halloween Horror Story: Nigeria Buys Windows XP Classmates

Posted on November 02, 2007 by Jon Camfield in Sales Talk: Competition, Sales Talk: Intel, Countries: Nigeria, Software: Windows

Open Source Software fans were happy when Mandriva met the ClassMate PC last year, and recently they still could cheer when Nigeria decided to buy Intel's Classmate PC loaded with Mandriva Linux. But now, Mandriva Linux's Chief Executive Officer François Bancilhon is telling a Halloween horror story of Microsoft in Nigeria:

We recently closed a deal with the Nigerian Government. Maybe you heard about it, Steve [Balmer]. They were looking for an affordable hardware+software solution for their schools. The initial batch was 17,000 machines. We had a good answer to their need: the Classmate PC from Intel, with a customized Mandriva Linux solution. We presented the solution to the local government, they liked the machine, they liked our system, they liked what we offered them, the fact that it was open, that we could customize it for their country and so on.

Then your people entered the game and the deal got more competitive. I would not say it got dirty, but someone could have said that. They fought and fought the deal, but still the customer was happy to get CMPC and Mandriva. So we closed the deal, we got the order, we qualified the software, we got the machine shipped. In other word, we did our job. I understand the machine[s] are being delivered right now.

And then, today, we hear from the customer a totally different story: “we shall pay for the Mandriva Software as agreed, but we shall replace it by Windows afterward.”

There's a lot of speculation about exactly what went on between deciding on ClassMate/Mandriva laptops and deciding to put Windows on after they get them, but it mostly revolves around various versions of bribery. Let's keep at least some of the conspiracy theories over at slashdot and focus instead on the impact that this has on the OLPC Project.

Obviously, Microsoft has woken up and is playing catch up to the low-cost computing market, and is willing to cut some very attractive loss-leader style deals to not lose its grip on the desktop in developing markets. They're definitely in it for the long term, and if it means giving away their OS and Office suite for a few years in return for protecting their monopoly position through extending their lock-in effect, then it just makes plain business sense -- marginal cost of a copy of XP? Zero. Licensing the next copies of Microsoft software, indefinitely, for all of these new users? Priceless, even with piracy.

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The Nigerian One Laptop Per Child Model

Posted on October 11, 2007 by Wayan Vota in Use Cases: Business, Countries: Nigeria, Implementation: Plan, Implementation: Schools

I am Anders Mogensen, co-founder of Seismonaut - a Danish idea and innovation consultancy. At Seismonaut we map emerging technologies, new media and user trends in the changing global landscape.

ex-President Olusegun Obasanjo

A few weeks ago I was in Nigeria taking a closer look at the OLPNC (One Laptop Per Nigerian Child) initiative. During my five day visit I had the opportunity to meet with the key stakeholders in Abuja, and pay a couple of visits to L.E.A School Galadima.

Over three days, I am sharing some of my findings in short write-ups. One Laptop Per XO'ing Child with OLPNC was the first one, OLPNC Galadima School Headmaster Interview was the second, and this is the third installment:

The Nigerian One Laptop Per Child Model

Yes, Olusegun Obasanjo the former Nigerian president did have influence on the OLPC XO-1 color scheme, so I am told by a reliable source in Abuja. And according to the same source Obasanjo was and still is very committed to the OLPNC project. But what about the 1 million laptops which apparently were ordered by the former Nigerian president?

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OLPNC Galadima School Headmaster Interview

Posted on October 05, 2007 by Guest Writer in Use Cases: Education, Countries: Nigeria, Implementation: Schools

OLPX XO geography class

I am Anders Mogensen, co-founder of Seismonaut - a Danish idea and innovation consultancy. At Seismonaut we map emerging technologies, new media and user trends in the changing global landscape.

A few weeks ago I was in Nigeria taking a closer look at the OLPNC (One Laptop Per Nigerian Child) initiative. During my five day visit I had the opportunity to meet with the key stakeholders in Abuja, and pay a couple of visits to L.E.A School Galadima.

Over three days, I will share some of my findings in short write-ups. One Laptop Per XO'ing Child with OLPNC was the first one, this is the second.

An Interview with the headmaster of L.E.A Galadima School

I step into the office of Mrs. Juliana Okonkwo, headmaster of L.E.A Galadima School. It's Monday morning, and this is the first day of school after the summer holidays. Outside some kids have started coming to school, most have brought along their XO, and a few have opened them up and have started working on them.

A teacher calls out the name of a girl. She comes forward and is handed a broom and told to start sweeping one of the classrooms I guess that's what you get for coming early to school :-). As she starts sweeping, dust is whirled up all around her. Only half floor of the classroom is covered with cement.

The headmaster calls me in and asks me to please sit down. She finds the visitors book and asks me to please sign it. I quickly scan through it I always find it interesting to study visitor books, and this one in particular is interesting, as it gives a perspective on who has been following the Galadima project.

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One Laptop Per XO'ing Child with OLPNC

Posted on October 02, 2007 by Guest Writer in Use Cases: Education, Countries: Nigeria, Implementation: Schools

The OLPNC physical environment

I am Anders Mogensen, co-founder of Seismonaut - a Danish idea and innovation consultancy. At Seismonaut we map emerging technologies, new media and user trends in the changing global landscape.

A few weeks ago I was in Nigeria taking a closer look at the OLPNC (One Laptop Per Nigerian Child) initiative. During my five day visit I had the opportunity to meet with the key stakeholders in Abuja, and pay a couple of visits to L.E.A School Galadima. Over the next three days, I will share some of my findings in short write-ups.

Visiting the school

Before meeting with the stakeholders I decided to pay an unannounced visit to the L.E.A. School Galadima, to get a personal first hand impression of the project. This was a few days before the school would resume after the summer holiday.

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OLPC Nigeria's Shocking Electrical Power Costs

Posted on August 16, 2007 by Wayan Vota in Implementation: Maintenance, Countries: Nigeria, Hardware: Power Supply

Low OLPC XO transportation costs

Do you remember Jon's computation of One Laptop Per Child "$100 laptop" costs that concluded that XO's are really "$1,000 laptops"? Or the implementation cost follow-up where we debated the estimate in detail? Or José Antonio Meira da Rocha's OLPC Brazil laptop costs comparison study?

Jon's general point was that computer hardware is usually only one small component of the Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) for technology implementations in the developing world. Training, maintenance, and Internet connectivity can drastically increase a project's scope and expense

Expenses in follow-on years are even more difficult to cover when the initial excitement of new shiny flashy things has past. Now that the initial fanfare around the One Laptop Per Child pilot testing in Galadima School, Abuja, Nigeria is waning, OLPC Nigeria is starting to learn this lesson with a cost we didn't include: electricity.

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Participation Design of OLPC XO-2: With And For People

Posted on August 08, 2007 by Guest Writer in Countries: Nigeria, Laptops: XO-2

Is Real Video player educational?

The greatest downsides of the OLPC project has been said to be the total lack of piloting with research on educational impact, as well as lack of curriculum integration and implementation plan. I am Teemu Leinonen and I think these two challenges are obviously interlinked.

The reason for this can be that One Laptop Per Child does not value very high the principles of human-centered design, neither educational planning. Without these pieces in place the claim of OLPC being educational project rather than a laptop project is not very convincing.

It's not a secret that OLPC is a project of technologists, more precisely engineers. It's also known that educators design education, (good) designers design solutions and engineers design technology. We may ask what OLPC laptop is? Is it education solution or technology?

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One Pornographic Image Per Nigerian Child

Posted on July 19, 2007 by Wayan Vota in Internet: Access, Use Cases: Community, Countries: Nigeria, Content: Reference

Check it out! They are "XO-ing"!

While I've discounted the OLPC child pornography fears of others and we've explored adult OLPC XO uses, I haven't spoken about the potent mix of Internet access and the natural curiosity of children, especially those reaching puberty, to go looking for images others may not want them to see.

Of course, the worst kept secret for any telecenter or cybercafe is what happens when you mix Internet access and young men: porn. I've seen whole computer rooms turn into porno galleries as boobie-gazing men replace women and children as the primary customers of a center. Yes, its sad, but its also human nature.

And human nature just bit One Laptop Per Child on its naked ass,

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OLPC Nigeria's Progress with XO Computers in Classrooms

Posted on June 27, 2007 by Wayan Vota in Use Cases: Education, Countries: Nigeria, Commentary: Press

In March 2007, the One Laptop Per Child Foundation provided L.E.A. Primary School Galadima, a public school in the outskirts of Abuja Model City, with an XO laptop for each Nigerian child in Primary 4, 5 and 6 and each school staff member. OLPC should now be also providing each child in Primary 1, 2 and 3 with their own laptop.

While we can't be in the school to observe the children's reaction directly, we do have a write up on the laptop adoption progress by Carla Gomez-Monroy, a former MIT Media Lab student who studied under Walter Bender and volunteered with to Schlumberger Excellence in Educational Development (SEED) Foundation. She writes:

All of a sudden, School Galadima has gone from the age-old chalk-and-board teaching technology to the avant-garde one-laptop-per-child XO technology with cutting-edge features.

Nevertheless, OLPC's mission focus is not on its state-of-the-art innovative technology, but on its educational approach that fosters discovery of knowledge by the children themselves, encouraging them to find the application of that knowledge in a practical and meaningful context.

Both, the technology of the OLPC laptop and the methodology of the Constructionist educational approach has been inspired, researched, developed, and implemented by MIT scholars.

But its not all press release talk from Carla, she also highlights a student-centric initiative that holds promise for the OLPC pilot in Nigeria, and with other participating countries.

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One Laptop Per One School's Nigerian Children

Posted on April 16, 2007 by Wayan Vota in Countries: Nigeria, Implementation: Plan

Khaled Hassounah introducing OLPC X0

By now I am sure you've read the C|Net article about OLPC Nigeria where Khaled Hassounah is shown introducing the Children's Machine XO to eager students in a one-room school.

Were you in awe of the accomplishment, rejoicing that One Laptop Per Child sent its Director of OLPC's African and Middle Eastern operations to teach a single class of poor children how to use computers, the nascent start of an OLPC implementation plan?

Or did you think there was too much focus on Khaled's story and too little focus on OLPC practicalities? That a few photographs from a single school in the capitol city made you react like Christoph Burgdorfer and think:

Looking at the inside of the classroom, still no sign of any electricity. Instead you have this smartly dressed dude from the western world with his shiny 100$ Prada belt explaining with the upraised digit how this shiny green fisher price device will solve all their problems... This somehow smells like a publicity stunt. A short one as well. 3 hours maybe - until the batteries run out of power.

I too recognized the introduction of OLPC's to a school in Abuja a brilliant PR play. The kids in that one-room school look quite happy and excited, and this trial run has many people feeling all warm and fuzzy about One Laptop Per Nigerian Child. A feeling I'll have when OLPC delivers on Erik Speckman's call.

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Reality Checking OLPC's Mapping

Posted on October 26, 2006 by David in Sales Talk: Countries, Countries: India, Countries: Nigeria, Countries: Thailand

Last week, OLPC updated their OLPC Country Map causing a number of the countries on it to change colour. Some of these changes appear rather surprising to me. It seems wildly optimistic on the part of OLPC to presume that some of these countries, such as Ethiopia and DRC could be involved at such an early stage, given the political situation they find themselves in. Moreover, the map colouring, in its current form, doesn't reflect facts on the ground:

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OLPC in Nigeria by the Numbers

Posted on October 19, 2006 by Wayan Vota in Countries: Nigeria

In the middle of an OLPC debate on the , Edward Cherlin has estimated the cost of OLPC's for Nigeria.

Edward starts off accurate with the number of Nigerian students:

UNICEF puts the school-age population (6-18) in Nigeria at 45 million. One-year age cohorts (children born in a year, less deaths before reaching school age) are currently 4 million.

But then his numbers start to go awry. He uses the now outdated $100 laptop cost. OLPC 2B1 Children's Machines are now $140 dollars per laptop, or $208 per laptop on the initial install.

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