As the year comes to an end the Million Book Project has reached its goal of scanning and making freely available a million books! This project is spearheaded by the Carnegie Mellon University School of Computer Sciences and University Libraries, with a number of partnerships including the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization, the United States National Agricultural Library, the National Science Foundation, the Ministry of Education in China, and the University of California at Merced who negotiated to acquire copyright permission for the books which are not currently in the public domain.

So far the project has scanned 1.5 million books in 20 languages, including Chinese, English, Arabic and Telugo. The books have also been scanned using OCR to enable full text searching. The project also collaborates with the OCA, acknowledging that both are working towards the same goal of making content easily available to everyone.

You can learn more about the project here, and can access their catalog here.

After 5 years of planing and development the “$100 Laptop” is finally making its way out into the real world! One of the first countries where the XO, as it is also know, was tested, was Nigeria. At this early developmental stage producers wanted to see if the small laptop could really withstand hard use by children. Teachers in the small village are sure that the laptops are helping improve children’s learning experience, and that this learning is extending back home to the children’s parents. Unfortunately it has not all been perfect. Some of the laptop have eventually broken, and there is little support for maintenance. Accessing the internet has also been found to be prohibitively expensive in many instances.

Sadly there has also been open disregard to this initiative. The education minister of Nigeria Dr. Igwe Aja-Nwachuku is quoted by the BBC as saying, “What is the sense of introducing One Laptop Per Child when they don’t have seats to sit down and learn; when they don’t have uniforms to go to school in, where they don’t have facilities?” I would argue that uniforms are less of a need to learn than a laptop which can connect you to the world, and as for adequate learning environments; it would be great if all children had nice, well stocked classrooms, but educational advances should not be obstructed because other aspects of education are still lacking. Different initiatives can work on different aspects of this problem and we can only hope that some day children all around the world will receive everything they need to obtain a great education.

This project is so simple, yet so powerful and its sad to see so many people criticizing it and fighting against it, specially when they offer little in alternatives. Access to a good education is an issues even in first world countries such as the USA. Here there are plenty of children is poor neighborhoods and rural areas who attend schools with pitiful infrastructures and resources. Being this the case, why not give kids the tools to take charge of their own education? I’m not naive enough to think that a kid with a laptop will only be doing homework, but I do believe that as they explore the web, and use the different tools preloaded into these machines they will gradually explore the world as learn as they go. Today every single employment field requires knowledge of at least some technology and awareness of the world. The XO can provide this to millions of children around the world.

There are only a few days left, but if you want to help support this great project you can participate in the “Give One, Get One” program that will be running until Dec. 31, 2007.

Here are a number of BBC articles on the subject from Nov 27, Nov 28, Dec 6, and Dec. 11.

01.05.08 - Today the BBC reports that Intel has left the OLPC project. Intel has cited philosophical differences for leaving the project. Apparently OLPC asked Intel to exclusively support their project, instead of backing other projects such as the Classmate PC. On a positive note, the same article notes that the “Give One, Get One” initiative has managed to raise awareness and funds for this projects, allowing them to launch initiatives in Afghanistan, Mongolia, Haiti, Cambodia, Rwanda, and Ethiopia.

Image from Cnet.

December 10 seems to be a date that gathers many great events.

Today is International Human Rights Day. This year the UN is celebrating the 60th anniversary of the Declaration of Human Rights. The theme for this year long celebration is Dignity and Justice for all of us. December 10 was chosen on December 10, 1948 by the UN General Assembly, to commemorate the first declaration of human rights. You can learn more about Human Right Day and see how it has been celebrated in the past here.

Today is also Melvin Dewey (1851- 1931) and Emily Dickinson’s (1830-1886) birthdays. Dewey was the inventor of the Dewey Decimal Classification systems for libraries. The American poetess was also born on December 10, 1830. Curiously, both Dewey and Dickinson lived in Amherst, MA around the same time.

Other interesting events that have taken place on this date include; The USA state of Wyoming grants women the vote in 1869; In 1898 the Treaty of Paris is signed, ending the Spanish-American War; The first Noble Prize is awarded in 1901; A year later in 1902 women are given suffrage in Tasmania.

To see other events and birthdays on this date, look here.

Today is also my birthday!

World AIDS Day began in 1988 at the World Summit of Ministers of Health on Programs for AIDS prevention, today governments, NGOs, international charities and local organization have adopted the program. Today the Worlds AIDS Campaign (WAC) spearhead this campaign, but this task was previously held by UNAIDS. Since 2005 WAC promoted the overarching slogan of “Stop AIDS: Keep the Promise”, developing variations of this in subsequent years. The 2007 slogan adds an emphasis for leadership, encouraging us to “Be part of those who are building a better future.” WAC has a number of ways in which we can participate. For ideas, please visit their website’s page for participation.

Since 1981 when AIDS was first recognized, the disease has killed more than 25 million people world wide. In 2005 half a million children around the globe were still dying of AIDS. It is estimated that between 33 and 46 million people the world over are living with HIV.

You can see a list of all the themes for Worlds AIDS day at the Wikipedia entry. You can find WACs press release for this years Word Aids Day here.

Image info: WAC logo.