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Negroponte confident about Windows on OLPC (Updated)

[Updated below with Negroponte's remarks about Intel, and Intel's response.]

Posting from Las Vegas ... Nicholas Negroponte, chairman of the One Laptop Per Child initiative, is speaking here at the Consumer Electronics Show this morning, a week after Intel dropped its support for the project. Meanwhile, Microsoft has been tentative in its support, planning field trials but cautioning that it might not work out.

As it happens, I bumped into Negroponte outside the Hilton Theater in advance of his appearance, and got a chance to ask him a few questions. He confirmed that Microsoft and OLPC are talking about the possibility of offering the ability to dual boot the OLPC XO laptop into either Windows or Linux, but the plans sounded perhaps more tentative than reflected in some coverage this morning. He also confirmed that OLPC plans to bring the XO to poor children in the U.S.

The rest of his comments:

On how Windows XP runs on the XO, and why Microsoft isn't more definitive in its support: "The answer is very well. Look, we are a non-profit organization without shareholders. We can say whatever we want. They have real fiduciary responsibility and it would be crazy for Microsoft to announce it as a formal product if there's any chance they couldn't support it. So they're just being prudent. We know that. "

On Microsoft's relationship to the OLPC initiative: "I think they've become much more friendly to open source in general. I think the change in culture at Microsoft over the past couple of years -- nothing to do with OLPC, just their own movement -- has made it much easier for us because, as recently as two years ago, if we had put a stake in the ground with Microsoft, all the people at OLPC would have walked out."

On Microsoft's reaction to XO in developing countries: "When they announced the $3 Windows, I viewed that as partly as a result of OLPC, as a success."

Update, Wednesday afternoon: During his address, Negroponte briefly brought up subject of the Intel/OLPC split -- the "Intel fracas," as he called it -- which was related to Intel's separate marketing of its alternative Classmate PC.

A slide listed OLPC partners including Google, Nortel, Red Hat, Citicorp, eBay and chip maker AMD, the Intel rival. Intel's decision "doesn't really affect OLPC," Negroponte told the audience. "These partners are extraordinary, and we move on."

Asked about Intel's OLPC relationship in a subsequent session, William Swope, the company's vice president and general manager of corporate affairs, said the chip maker was "disappointed that we couldn't make that work."

"We believe that to really go meet the needs of a billion children, it's going to take an entire industry," Swope said. "We're very saddened. It's a fundamental difference in philosophy, and we're sorry it got to that."

Posted by at January 9, 2008 9:02 a.m.
Categories: Open Source, Windows

Comments

#83835

Posted by unregistered user at 1/9/08 8:33 p.m.

Microsoft (and Intel) are looking for SERFS, people who immediately have to come back to the lord of the manor (Microsoft) for updates, changes, improvements and bug fixes. It is simply not possible to learn about computing science (as opposed to learning how to use a few applications) if one is using Microsoft's closed and proprietary system.

OLPC is seeking to distribute KNOWLEDGE. The people who use OLPC systems will be able to learn how they work, will be able to modify it themselves to suit their needs, and won't have to come back to OLPC for a handout every time something goes wrong. Given time, they might even be able to build their own, which is something that will be encouraged rather than beat down with legal proceedings.

The difference is night and day. The fact that Microsoft and Intel are actively seeking to befuddle the issue should be exposed for what it is: profit before knowledge and humanity.

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#84064

Posted by unregistered user at 1/10/08 12:28 p.m.

Knowledge is not gained by injection except profit for auto fuel manufacturers & auto function to the borg. This will work without those & why both fuel & new software are overinflated in price & why I have to be sure my tires aren't underinflated. There is a dispairity when domestic children do not have the same advantage of having a computer let alone laptop for the same price as this is hyped to be going to 3rd world countries & not these developed countries that could afford them more than thousands of dollers fpr laptops then there are close to none.

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#84160

Posted by unregistered user at 1/10/08 3:41 p.m.

"It is simply not possible to learn about computing science (as opposed to learning how to use a few applications) if one is using Microsoft's closed and proprietary system."

Ok first off, I don't fault the rest of the argument in this post, but this part here is just ignorant. So what exactly about "computer science" can one not experiment with and learn under a closed source OS exactly? Because I can't recompile the windows kernel myself? I say that's bs.

Additionally if the OLPC was about teaching the poor computer science I think it's a pretty misguided initiative. Hey you.. poor kid in developing nation. Learn c++ I'm sure it'll help you with your problems. Like no food.

The potential of the OLPC is primarily to enable self education on a wide variety of topics and this information could be provided via pretty much any OS whether it's closed source or not.

I do agree in that Microsoft in particular has a strong interest for developing regions to be on-board with their OS early on. In the same way they (and apple) approached the education system of the US and elsewhere with freebies. Certainly there's some commercial interest there, but frankly if it helps some impoverished folks move up in the world I couldn't care less. Who has done more good? He who intends to give away the cure for cancer after he finds it, but fails or he who intends to make a tidy profit from the discovery and succeeds?

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