One Laptop per Child (OLPC) is a non-profit organization trying to address the lack of resources many Third World Countries struggle with and how these affect education and hinder technological development. Keeping in mind that many countries can only afford to spend $20 per child per year on education (compared to about $7,500 that the USA spends), OLPC tries to circumvent traditional approaches to the situation, and instead want to make available the tools that can allow children to explore and learn on their own. OLPC feel that efforts should continue to build school and train teachers in the poorest corners of the world, but simultaneously, want to try a more direct approach. The idea is to transform these children with personal laptops into teachers. Each child can explore the world on their machine, and will later be able to teacher elders and other children about what they have learned; in this way the entire community can benefit.

These laptops are designed for use by the world’s poorest children. They run on open source software, keeping in mind that while all children won’t become programmers, they should have the opportunity to continue growing without constrains by their equipment. The machine itself is designed to run on very low power, and some of the earliest models were powered through cranking, or with a foot-pedal. The display must also be sunlight-readable, since most children will be outdoors when working on their laptops. The machine itself is small, light and has a handle for easy carrying. It also has a monitor which rotates, allowing for others to participate.

This program was first designed to involved governments in buying laptops for children, and initial conversations involved proposals for Brazil, Argentina, Libya, Nigeria and Thailand. Recently Uruguay and Rwanda have also joined in. Currently the program continues to grow through donations by individuals, businesses and foundations.

If you want to learn more about the project visit their site and their wiki. You can find information on donating and participating here.

Above images come from the project’s wiki, and can be found here.

04.03.07 - I just found a webcast by Walter Bender, president of OLPC, discussing this project; you can access it here. There is another webcast by Nicolas P. Negroponte, chairman and co-founder of OLPC,which can be accessed here.

04.17.07 - The OLPC interface runs on a lightweight version of Fedora Linux, called Sugar. You can take a look at it here.

07.15.07 - Intel has just joined forces with OLPC, after creating competition for each other, in trying to offer low cost computers to children in the developing world. Currently there is no talk about changing processing chips, yet the idea is to develop a variety of low cost computers in the future that can function of a variety of platforms. Intel has been producing the Classmate for sale in developing countries at a cost of US $200.00. You can read more about this in an article by the BBC.

07.23.07 - After much anticipation and testing, OLPC is posed to start massive production, explaining that they finally have orders large enough to make the project viable. You can read more about this at an article by the BBC. And here is another article explaining the different components of the laptop and how they work.

Image info here.

06.08.07 - It seems that everyone is in a rush to grab a piece of the computer market in the developing world. Today the BBC has an article about other major computer producers rushing towards this market, although they differ form the OLPC project, in that these other companies are out just to make some money. Beijing based Levono has announced a low cost computer that can be plugged into the TV

10.29.30- Uruguay just became the first country to buy a large number of these computers to make available to children 6 - 12. They hope to make these laptops available to every children in the country by 2009. You can read more about this in an article from the BBC.

11.15.07 - “Give One - Get One” has started for the USA and Canada and will run until November 26, 2007. You can order yours here.

This week García Márquez has a lot to celebrate. 2007 marks the 40th anniversary since his famous novel, One Hundred Years of Solitude was first published; it also marks the 25 anniversary of winning the Noble Prize for literature, and if this isn’t enough, the author turned 80 just earlier this month. Celebrations are taking place in Cartagena de Indias, organized by the Real Academia Española. The RAE will has also launched a new, commemorative edition of the novel, which according to Mexican newspaper La Jornada, sold 14,000 copies in just four hours last Monday.

It took García Márquez 18 months to write One Hundred Years of Solitude, and in the mean time his wife had to create miracles on a daily basis to keep the family afloat. Once this great novel was finally finished it was first published in Buenos Aires, by Editorial Sudamericana, where is sold several million copies in the first few weeks on the market. This was only be beginning for a novel that has transformed the literary plane, the world over.

The novel has since sold over 30 million copies, has been translated into 35 languages, and it is estimated that about 50 million people have read it.

The Guardian has an article about the celebration; you can read it here.

InformationWeek for Mach 19, 2007 had an interesting article titled “What Will Drive Open Source?” by Charles Babcock, which discussed the controversy that has been created with the proposal of GPLv3 (General Public License 3). A GPL is (according to Wikipedia) “a widely-used free software license, originally written by Richard Stallman (his personal page is here) for the GNU project.” Basically it’s a license that was written to go along with the GNU project which aimed at unifying similar licenses so that code from different versions of GNU could be shared freely.The GPLv1 was released in 1989, and it aimed at preventing the two main ways in which software was made restricted to users, by making them only executable, but not modifiable, and by adding legal restrictions to the license. This first version wanted to make the source code available to users, and prevent restrictions from being added to the license. GPLv2’s main difference from the original once was the “Liberty of Death” clause which stated that if a distributor was legally obligated to restrict the source code to users, then it couldn’t distribute it at all. This version was released in 1991.The article I read focused on GPLv3 and the controversy around it. GPLv3 is currently being worked on by Richard Stallman, founder of the Free Software Foundation, and others. GPLv3 has run into disfavor by proposing a prohibition on the use of Digital Rights Management (DRM) technology along with GPLv3. (DRM prevents users from copying, copyrighted material.) Another aspect of GPLv3 tries to foresee all future attempts to patent it, and forbid this, a move some say is unrealistic and will instead make the license too restrictive. Another main aspect of GPLv3 is its “giveback provision”, which will affect huge internet corporations like Google and Yahoo. The provision aims at addressing the fact that companies like Google and Yahoo have greatly benefited from GPL code and have modified it to their benefit without being forced to make these alterations public, since they do not distribute products based on this code. This particular provision would also affect all other kinds of private companies.

GPLv3 is still in the works, and in the mean time it’s creating a lot of tension within the Open Source community; we’ll have to wait to see how this plays out.

(This post was originally used for my technology class.)

In 1992 the UN General Assembly adopted a resolution making March 22 World Water Day; This year’s theme is “Copying with Scarcity”. When thinking about water, a number of complex issues need to be address, including cultural norms, lifestyle, ethnicity, race, and socio-economic level, just to name a few. Water scarcity is a huge issue not only because natural reserves are being depleted, but also because potable water is increasingly being privatized. This has lead to violent confrontations in several cases, the most notable being Bolivia.

This water imbalance in the world has created a movement wanting to address the situation. Water Partners International is part of this effort, trying to provide clean drinking water to communities throughout the developing world. Another one is International Water Management Institute, a non-profit scientific research organization trying to promote sustainable water and land use. There is also the World Water Council, which tries to promote awareness and build political commitment to address water issues at all levels. The International Water Association try to address water concerns both through research and practice.

Although this is just a symbolic drop in the bucket, you can send an e-card and remind others of this important day.

A couple of days ago, the UK’s Guardian published a story about record breaking remittances going to Latin America. The high numbers involved shouldn’t really come as a surprise to anyone who regularly interacts with immigrants. Immigrants, especially those who come alone often work well over full time and live in crowded homes in order to save as much as possible, and in this way help their families back home.

The article mentioned that Latin Americans abroad send as much as £32 billion annually, a number that makes direct foreign investment look pale by comparison. While foreign investment can be beneficial, it often creates investment in urban areas, and therefore limits the amount of people it benefits. In contrast, remittances are sent directly to families, many living in rural areas, and thus helping with vital needs, such as paying for food, education and utilities.

Currently the groups of Latinos abroad sending the largest amount of money back are Mexicans, followed by Brazilians, and then Colombians.

That emigrants can make such a dent in world finances, working as nannies, migrant workers, and all kinds of other very low wages employments in absolutely admirable.

08.23.07 - Today the BBC has an article about the rise in money transfer shops in the UK. The current growth of these businesses points to the increasing number of immigrants that live there, and the trend of moving abroad to work intensely for a free months or years while trying to make as much money as possible, and then returning to one’s native country and family.

(Image by Marissa; Openphoto.net)

I was just reading “The Case for Open Source: Open Source has Made Significant Leaps in Recent Years. What does it have to Offer Education?” by Miguel Guhlin, in Technology & Learning, February 2007. The article discusses how open source has succeeded out in the world, and how educational institutions, including K-12 and universities can benefit from this technology. The author ponders how education may be revolutionized if educators were allowed to modify and adapt the content of curriculum to their specific needs, and then share this information with others, just as it occurs with open source. Another good reason to embrace open source in educational institutions revolves around all the money they can save in the process. With open source schools wouldn’t have to purchase expensive software, and then have to pay licensing fees. In a large school district this can add up to millions saved.As enthusiastic as Guhlin is about the possibilities, he also acknowledges that the transition would require a lot of work. Educators and staff in general will need training in these new systems, along with explanations as to what exactly open source is, and what benefits it brings. Another obstacle can be IT support, since, currently there aren’t too many IT professionals specializing in open source. Yet the solution to this seems to already be here; online tutorials. The website NewsForge offers a variety of articles relating to open source along with case studies, as well as tutorials on how to implement this technology and how to use it. There is also an entire blog titled OpenOffice.org dedicated to teaching you how to use OpenOffice.

Open Source in it’s variety of existences may not have yet ironed out all the glitches, but the ability to expand it’s usage and create entirely new applications, more than compensate for this. Besides, the code is public so changes and adaptations can be made on the spot!

(This post was originally used for my Technology class.)

There is a good amount of discussion in the library world that revolve around how and if we want to make library services more like Google or Amazon.com. The belief is that library users today want information to be available very quickly and without much effort, and that recommendations such as those used in Amazon.com might help patrons. Well Primo®, created by Ex Libris seems to have made these thoughts in to reality.

The North Carolina State University Libraries have already implemented this system. The search page on their OPAC is very simple, giving you the option to search for words, or a phrase, and then qualify these searches. A search for “Garcia Marquez”, “Anywhere” will give you an amazing amount of information. It gives you specific titles both by and about Garcia Marquez. It shows you the different call number ranges under which you can find material mentioning Garcia Marquez as author or subject; it gives you results by genre, format, region, time period, and languages, all on the same page. The possibilities seem to be endless.

I just read an article about proposed legislation making English the official language in Oklahoma, and how American Indians are opposing this move. American Indians point out that their languages are disappearing fast enough, and that legislation of this type could make matters worse. Proponents to the bill mention the same arguments always used for this type of bill; immigrants to this country must assimilate, and that means learning English, and adapting to the social structure here. I think that in a world that becomes smaller everyday, the USA has an incredible opportunity to its advantage. The world is coming here, why not take advantage of the situation and learn about the world? Today global commerce and education are common practices, more people are traveling than ever before, and situations like Global Warming (or Global Warning as my friend’s mom likes to call it) are forcing us to communicate and engage people all around the globe, this requires fluency in various languages, and cultures. The USA should take advantage of the situation here; immigrants are providing this country with a free education about the world and languages, lets learn from it!

Valentines Day and Mother’s Day are the biggest days of the year for flower sales around the globe, but do you know how those flowers come to you? It’s not a pretty sight. Colombia is one of the world’s largest flower producers, and the industry is plagued by problems, usually concerning very low pay, long hours, and constant exposure to a number of toxic chemicals.In 2002 I spent some time on the outskirts of Bogotá talking to a group of women who “worked” at these flower farms. I use the term “work” very loosely since they had tried to ask for a living wage and in retaliation have been locked out from work. The women had organized and set up tent outside the various farms to express their opinions about the situation. They had been doing this, while unemployed, for over a year.

A recent article in the UK’s Guardian commented about these gross work situations, and mentioned something that I hadn’t heard before. Colombia has created logo to designate “good” farms to work on, with the label of “Florverde”, but the article in the Guardian says that even on these farms there are common violations to workers right.

If you want to learn more about the matter, I suggest Marta Rodriguez’ film “Amor, mujeres y flores / Love, Women and Flowers”, available from Women Make Movies (also available from a number of academic libraries in the USA). This film documents a specific case where workers managed to take over a flower farm and ran it successfully for a while, until the previous owners brought in the police and destroyed the place, and let the farm run into the ground. The ruins of this particular farm still stand as an example of what “happens when workers try to demand just working conditions”.

Here are a few links to organic and/or fair trade flower producers around the world. (I’m not endorsing any of these, use your own common sense when/if you want to patronize them.)

EcoBusinessLinks

Fairtrade.org

This week I got to meet Dan Hazen, Associate Librarian of Harvard College for collection development, and what a treat it was! I was most interested in learning about his involvement in international programs to promote libraries. We talked about PLALA (Program for Latin American Libraries and Archives), which he co-founded with Norman Fiering from the John Carter Brown Library at Brown University, and Ignacio de Larramendi, head of Fundación Histórica Tavera. The initial committee, along with a grant from the Mellon Foundation set out to provide help, at the most basic level, to small libraries and archives throughout Latin America. Grants tend to be around $10,000 and are used for projects such as buying shelves to get material off the floor, to fix leaking roofs, or in some cases for converting collection to microform. This program has also been effective in encouraging others to help out. In Argentina, Fundación Antorchas has taken the challenge and has matched a few of PLALA’s grants in the region (sadly they have since gone out of business). They have created their own competition for microfilming projects. Libraries and archives that have benefited from these grants have also publicized them, and have therefore created renewed interests in their institutions and collections.

Hazen’s enthusiasm for the library world is positively infectious and has been greatly inspiring. I’m going to start working on getting my own hands involved in similar initiatives.

- This post was approved by Dan Hazen -