Buy One Laptop for A Child, Get One For Yourself
The One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) movement is struggling to keep its momentum. Peru, Uruguay and Mexico have made firm commitments, and so has the government of Italy which has agreed to buy 50,000 laptops for distribution in Ethiopia. Unfortunately, the expected large orders from Nigeria and Brazil have not yet materialized, so Nick Negroponte of the MIT Media Lab, a sponsor of OLPC, is offering the XO laptop to Americans and Canadians for $399. This buys you a rugged, flash-memory (no hard drive) Unix laptop with meshed peer-to-peer wireless and a bright screen that you can read in full sun. It also buys one for distribution to a poor child. You can order your 2-laptop-combo for two weeks only, Nov. 12 - 26, and your laptop will be delivered by Christmas.
I was astonished to find out that not everyone thought this was an excellent idea! Read this blog post on the NYTimes "Bits" blog and the mind-boggling comments.