Go OLPC Chile!
What would you do if you were the first person in your country to get a Children's Machine XO? If you were Eduardo Silva or his friend Carlos Verdugo and you were the first people in Chile sporting an OLPC XO?
Why you both would blog about One Laptop Per Child of course! Even make a whole OLPC Flickr pool too. And you can feel the excitement they have when Carlos Verdugo says (via Google translation):
Today I had a experience that I did not think that it would happen so soon.. I had the opportunity to have in my hands famous OLPC (One Laptop Per Child) or as we know it by these sides: Laptop of 100 dollars.While Eduardo and Carlos are busy getting their geek on the OLPC laptop, they do take a moment to look at the larger picture. They denote the prospects for One Laptop Per Chilean Child to those interested (again, via Google translation):This wonder appeared of the hand of Eduardo Silva, who is a young Chilean of Valparaiso that participated working for Google in the development of applications for this important project of Nicholas Negroponte.
I have good and the bad news to them.Yet they did not let politics get in the way of good times with technology. They did indeed get their geek on, and for those who follow One Laptop Per Child from south of the Rio Grande, they got it on in Spanish too:Now if only I wasn't the Gringo Cousin, I know what they were saying.The Bad one: Negroponte offered at its moment to the Minister of Education of the time (Sergio Bitar) the opportunity for buying these computers, and the vision (or rather the nonvision) of the minister was reflected with “no thanks”. Brazil, Argentina and now the last Uruguay already bought and they arrive this year to him.
The Good one: There are people who in spite of the bad decisions of the past are worked hard in which these machines arrive at Chile, for example the Senador Fernando Flores who thanks to his contacts and love by Chile has itself it jeopardize to bring some thousands to Chile.
What a fabulous video!
Eduardo and Carlos did a wonderful job of discussing and demonstrating the XO. I got pretty much all of the startup routine from watching the screen and the screen itself looks amazing considering the lighting in the room they were in.
I was not surprised at the lengthy startup procedure. I'd personally like to see something other than bootup messages showing. Maybe images introducing the user to their XO (no text of course - to allow for any language user). It was also the first time I've seen the SD flash slot underneath the screen.
I now have to get a Chilean friend to watch it and translate for me.
Yes, we are all excited in Chile after this unexpected news.
In fact, we were just about to launch a campaign to promote further national involvement with the OLPC (and other similar alternatives). More info soon about that.
Greetings from the end of the world
LUIS.
please check our 'beta' websites for the chilean campaign
http://uncomputadorporniño.cl/
http://www.olpc.cl/
Hola, paso a saludarte y a contarte que cambié mi dirección de Blog, salí de Blogger y me mudé con todo a Bligoo.
Además ahora tengo dominio propio, por lo que me podrás encontrar AQUÍ. Te pido que cuando tengas un tiempo actualices el blogroll y/o los links que tienes hacia mi antiguo blog.
Muchas gracias y nos leemos!
Carlos Verdugo V.
ok!everything is good in this laptop but i want to know that does some internet facility would be in it or not?
Here's a *very* rough translation. (I'm not a native Spanish speaker.) Please feel free to do whatever you like with it.
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[0:00] Carlos: Hi. I'm here in a historic moment for technology and education in Chile. I'm here with Eduardo Silve, here at my side. And I've got a great little toy here, the famous OLPC. Is it on camera? It's really a quantum leap forward. Eduardo is going to talk about the technical features of the computer.
[0:35] Eduardo: OK. This laptop has the latest technology. Even though it seems a bit limited, such as in memory capacity, it's not really limited in how it works.
We've got wireless support. And the wireless supports mesh networking, which lets you connect to other similar laptops without a router or central server. So you don't need Internet access to connect to other laptops.
[1:06] Carlos: Perfect.
[1:07] Eduardo: Also, what we've got here the display ... (they discuss resolution). ... It can suspend the CPU and continue showing an image.
[1:46] Carlos: Great! How many USB ports does it have?
[1:48] Eduardo: It's got 3 here, and on the side, one more. Also, the audio input and output jacks. The speakers are here in front.
[1:59] Carlos: Are those little antenas?
[2:01] Eduardo: Yeah, WiFi antennas, exactly.
[2:06] Carlos: Do they run separately?
[2:08] Eduardo: They are separate, but they connect to the same chip.
(Something about normal laptops being heavy and using lots of power?)
Another great thing about this device is that it uses very little power. It's really optimized.
[2:52] Eduardo: Here we can insert a chip for extra memory. It has 512 megs built in. Someone might think it's not much, and if you installed Windows, yeah you'd need 1.5 gigs. The system installed here weighs in around 120 megs. Leaving about 300 free. (I think these numbers are what they said, even though they don't seem to add up.) And if you want more, you can install a memory chip here.
[3:20] Carlos: Are all the applications you just showed me, to make music, to use the camera, are those part of the OS itself?
[3:29] Eduardo: The OS provides the basics. What we see here are the apps. They let you use the camera, sound, etc. The visual environment we have here is called Sugar. It's made for kids, and is very visual, using colors and objects.
[4:02] Carlos: And how about the touchpad, tell us about it.
[4:06] Eduardo: This part here, closest to the camera, is a tripple touchpad. The center part here is the mouse. On the sides, for writing with a pen. And here are the mouse buttons.
The keyboard is also adapted to the Sugar environment. Here we have the same options as on the desktop. We can see them here.
[4:35] Carlos: Let's get a closer look. Yeah it has a few buttons that a normal computer doesn't have.
[4:55] Eduardo: Let's talk a bit about the design here. A bit of modular design. Just give me a second... (turns screen) you can work like this. Or like this, flat. What we've done here is turn on the camera, the webcam. So it can work like this, ..., or like this, a game console.
[5:40] The camera's on right now. ... (playing with camera)
[6:00] Carlos: And what other specs does it have for kids? It's a bit more durable? Right now it's a bit fragile because it's a development version.
[6:15] Eduardo: It's really not very fragile. Well if you hit it against something, it'll be damaged. It's a bit more reinforced than a traditional laptop. Especially the LCD, which is the most delicate, and also the most expensive part.
[6:49] Carlos: And the battery on this model lasts about 2 hours. And future versions should last about 3 or 4 hours more than that.
[6:59] Eduardo: Right. The battery is here, on the back, this battery here has a lifetime of about 2 thousand charge cycles.
[7:15] Carlos: And a normal laptop?
[7:20] Eduardo: About 500. Mine, for example, 500. And the battery is cheap, unlike a normal laptop.
[7:35] Carlos: Great, I appreciate it, thanks for meeting. Everyone wants to take photos of it. It's really great. I hope it'll be available later in our country, for the schools, and that every child in the world can have one.