Re: [DDN] The future of DDN
What I have not seen in this exchange is the cost for the system including: a) the number of staff, their positions, full or part time and the over all costs for each area (not individuals), mgmt, tech support, etc b) the overhead costs for hardware, software and other maint. issues c) other costs. In other words, what does the quick books version of this operation look like d) what is the proposed model going forward- maintain the status quo or build a new, different and potentially lower cost operation My bet is that the current model which was funded by the WB and other sources is not the lean/mean web versions that so many other networks are using. If the above are not put on the table then there is no way to understand what the next steps should be. Concerns over approving postings etc are mis-directions and not the issue at hand dr. tom p abeles, president sagacity, inc 3704 11th ave south minneapolis, mn 55407 tabe...@hotmail.com Date: Tue, 11 Nov 2008 11:38:41 -0400 To: digitaldivide@digitaldivide.net From: taran.a.ramper...@gmail.com Subject: Re: [DDN] The future of DDN /me hums Drupal's theme at Tobias as well. Tobias Eigen wrote: Thanks Adam - this is all very interesting. I think the biggest problem I am seeing is that emails get stacked up for approval - this really limits any real discussion that might take place here on this list. I'd propose either opening it up or recruiting some volunteers to help manage the approval queue on a daily if not more regular basis. The ning idea is a good one, especially since it's a free (advertising driven) platform. I believe educators can get advertising-free spaces. Another platform well suited for email-empowered online communities is golightly, used at http://groups.nten.org If you are really concerned about costs for DDN into the future, then rolling your own site might not be a great idea. Cheers, Tobias On Mon, Oct 20, 2008 at 9:07 AM, adamcl...@takingitglobal.org wrote: Thanks for the responses to our idea of what to do with DDN :) To clear somethings up: -Tobias asked if the donation for membership is voluntary or not. We have no intention of charging people to access DDN. What we do want to do is identify people who are financial supporters of DDN. We don't have a donation system set up yet because we wanted to make sure that it was a good idea first. -The wiki issue is being looked into. The system should be able to handle your existing DDN login information so you don't have to create two accounts and login to both all the time. -Taran's idea of GoogleAds is interesting and we'll have our tech team see how easy it is to implement. Which should be very easy. The hard part will be finding a space for them as we don't want GoogleAds on the front page of DDN has it may make the site look less credible. Any thoughts on that note? -Many people have suggested moving DDN to a new system. This is just as hard (or even harder) than keeping our current system running. We've though about this at TIG and were moving ahead with our system because it is the easiest for our developers to work on. Adam Clare ___ DIGITALDIVIDE mailing list DIGITALDIVIDE@digitaldivide.net http://digitaldivide.net/mailman/listinfo/digitaldivide To unsubscribe, send a message to digitaldivide-requ...@digitaldivide.netwith the word UNSUBSCRIBE in the body of the message. -- -- Taran Rampersad c...@knowprose.com http://www.knowprose.com http://www.your2ndplace.com http://www.opendepth.com http://www.flickr.com/photos/knowprose/ Criticize by Creating - Michelangelo The present is theirs; the future, for which I really worked, is mine. - Nikola Tesla ___ DIGITALDIVIDE mailing list DIGITALDIVIDE@digitaldivide.net http://digitaldivide.net/mailman/listinfo/digitaldivide To unsubscribe, send a message to digitaldivide-requ...@digitaldivide.net with the word UNSUBSCRIBE in the body of the message. _ Suspicious message? There’s an alert for that. http://windowslive.com/Explore/hotmail?ocid=TXT_TAGLM_WL_hotmail_acq_broad2_122008 ___ DIGITALDIVIDE mailing list DIGITALDIVIDE@digitaldivide.net http://digitaldivide.net/mailman/listinfo/digitaldivide To unsubscribe, send a message to digitaldivide-requ...@digitaldivide.net with the word UNSUBSCRIBE in the body of the message.
Re: [DDN] The future of DDN
hmm, how long between submission and approval as in this just released batch of postings. I am wondering how useful a network working in the ICT4Dev area really is with gate keepers. Think China in today's world. Who would fund such an organization when the internet is pushing for open source/open access and the number of free blog and similar social networking tools are supported by volunteers? I still am interested in seeing the books for the proposed organization and who has their hands on the kill switch of intellectual ideas. Funding comes with strings best tom tom abeles --- From: tabe...@hotmail.com To: digitaldivide@digitaldivide.net Date: Tue, 2 Dec 2008 10:56:02 -0600 Subject: Re: [DDN] The future of DDN What I have not seen in this exchange is the cost for the system including: a) the number of staff, their positions, full or part time and the over all costs for each area (not individuals), mgmt, tech support, etc b) the overhead costs for hardware, software and other maint. issues c) other costs. In other words, what does the quick books version of this operation look like d) what is the proposed model going forward- maintain the status quo or build a new, different and potentially lower cost operation My bet is that the current model which was funded by the WB and other sources is not the lean/mean web versions that so many other networks are using. If the above are not put on the table then there is no way to understand what the next steps should be. Concerns over approving postings etc are mis-directions and not the issue at hand dr. tom p abeles, president sagacity, inc 3704 11th ave south minneapolis, mn 55407 tabe...@hotmail.com Date: Tue, 11 Nov 2008 11:38:41 -0400 To: digitaldivide@digitaldivide.net From: taran.a.ramper...@gmail.com Subject: Re: [DDN] The future of DDN /me hums Drupal's theme at Tobias as well. Tobias Eigen wrote: Thanks Adam - this is all very interesting. I think the biggest problem I am seeing is that emails get stacked up for approval - this really limits any real discussion that might take place here on this list. I'd propose either opening it up or recruiting some volunteers to help manage the approval queue on a daily if not more regular basis. The ning idea is a good one, especially since it's a free (advertising driven) platform. I believe educators can get advertising-free spaces. Another platform well suited for email-empowered online communities is golightly, used at http://groups.nten.org If you are really concerned about costs for DDN into the future, then rolling your own site might not be a great idea. Cheers, Tobias On Mon, Oct 20, 2008 at 9:07 AM, adamcl...@takingitglobal.org wrote: Thanks for the responses to our idea of what to do with DDN :) To clear somethings up: -Tobias asked if the donation for membership is voluntary or not. We have no intention of charging people to access DDN. What we do want to do is identify people who are financial supporters of DDN. We don't have a donation system set up yet because we wanted to make sure that it was a good idea first. -The wiki issue is being looked into. The system should be able to handle your existing DDN login information so you don't have to create two accounts and login to both all the time. -Taran's idea of GoogleAds is interesting and we'll have our tech team see how easy it is to implement. Which should be very easy. The hard part will be finding a space for them as we don't want GoogleAds on the front page of DDN has it may make the site look less credible. Any thoughts on that note? -Many people have suggested moving DDN to a new system. This is just as hard (or even harder) than keeping our current system running. We've though about this at TIG and were moving ahead with our system because it is the easiest for our developers to work on. Adam Clare ___ DIGITALDIVIDE mailing list DIGITALDIVIDE@digitaldivide.net http://digitaldivide.net/mailman/listinfo/digitaldivide To unsubscribe, send a message to digitaldivide-requ...@digitaldivide.netwith the word UNSUBSCRIBE in the body of the message. -- -- Taran Rampersad c...@knowprose.com http://www.knowprose.com http://www.your2ndplace.com http://www.opendepth.com http://www.flickr.com/photos/knowprose/ Criticize by Creating - Michelangelo The present is theirs; the future, for which I really worked, is mine. - Nikola Tesla ___ DIGITALDIVIDE mailing list DIGITALDIVIDE@digitaldivide.net http://digitaldivide.net/mailman/listinfo/digitaldivide To unsubscribe, send a message to digitaldivide-requ
Re: [DDN] PhD research on OLPC
Hi Taran what educational institutions preK-gray have to offer is certification. Some of the skills to obtain that certification can be provided through the certifying institutions and people choose to acquire both that information/knowledge and the certification as a package. But given the rise of the Internet, the package can/has/is being deconstructed as political, physical and social boundaries are becoming transparent and the walls of the ivory tower have been breached. We know full well that some institutions provide better information (which includes many tangible and intangible assets) and others provide more credible certification. One just weighs the balance like choosing a shirt or where one buys a house or which clubs to join or who is in your social network thoughts? tom tom abeles Date: Thu, 16 Oct 2008 07:05:46 -0400 From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: digitaldivide@digitaldivide.net Subject: Re: [DDN] PhD research on OLPC Sorry for the late reply. My ISP lost control of it's bodily functions - and it was about as disgusting as that sounds... Responding inline. Catherine Arden wrote: Hi Tom I agree that the sage on the stage in the brick space structure is an outdated model of education that perhaps has more to do with maintaining power and control than teaching and learningHowever, there are nonetheless real challenges working within our new paradigm. For instance, how do we value knowledge? Value. Knowledge. Loaded words, these. Present administration does more to equate value to costs and potential revenue than anything else, it seems, which seems fair considering that metrics of value are not clear and, perhaps, never will be. Maybe they could be if one were to consider value as a form of potential energy (Physics). Consider that a book could be seen as having a high amount of 'potential energy', and that tapping that energy is really the key. And the same applies to knowledge itself, really... But then, I believe that I am thinking well outside of established boxes... How do we teach 'instrumental' skills such as literacy and numeracy effectively and how do we know they are learned? Well, we never truly know... I favor fuzzy logic (the concept) in this - if something is learned, it is learned to a degree of truth. Fuzzy Logic incorporates truth values to establish how true something is. Unfortunately, bayesian probability is more liked in the United States and other parts of the world due to it's simplicity in being integrated in software - but I really believe that Fuzzy Logic excels in questions like this. It isn't a true/false question - it is a matter of how true we believe something is based on information available. How do we recognise scholarly achievement? I think that the large mass of people on the planet rarely recognize scholarly achievement other than little pieces of paper that are hung on walls - and sometimes to their own detriment (they pose a risk when they fall, and are typically not OSHA compliant). How do we 'transmit' cultural values? And how do we 'receive' cultural values? ;-) Are these questions really still about hegemony and fear of losing control or do we need to have some way of controlling education if we are to further our human development and not find ourselves wallowing in a sea of pseudo? There has to be some control in a learning environment, but control does not have to wear latex and wield a bullwhip. While videos along those lines are inexplicably popular on the internet, I do not believe that there is a need for dominance/submission in education. Frankly, most of the things that I have learned that I am most happy I have learned have not come from a curriculum or a reading list provided by educational professionals - no offense to anyone. I believe in discussion, and discussion requires mutual respect. Where mutual respect lacks, discussion is impossible (which probably explains 93.6% of the Internet. I love making up statistics.). Where does mutual respect come from? Can we teach that? And can we get educational institutions to evaluate discussions, are have they become too much of businesses to use metrics that are less than tangible? I do not know. Some people require structure in their educations, others do not need the structure. Therefore comparing results boils down to comparing people's learning styles against educational institution knowledge transfer methodologies. And since no two humans are alike... -- Taran Rampersad [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.knowprose.com http://www.your2ndplace.com http://www.opendepth.com http://www.flickr.com/photos/knowprose/ Criticize by Creating - Michelangelo The present is theirs; the future, for which I really worked, is mine. - Nikola Tesla ___ DIGITALDIVIDE mailing list
Re: [DDN] The future of DDN
Hi Cindy First, on charging a ¨fee¨. Tax Deductable? As my farmer brother-in-law says ¨deductable against what? Second, given networking in the web 2.0 world with U-Tube, Twitter, Linkedin, Wiki´s and so many other social networks, what do we get for a fee that this list and other tagged, networked, distributed and . . . systems don´t give for free. Fees are the equivalent of the Great Wall that walls information out and not in. It creates filters that are normally made by those on the net who choose how to access and limit access to the one non-leveragable commodity, TIME. And that is the individual´s responsibility. thoughts? tom tom abeles Date: Thu, 16 Oct 2008 11:18:12 + From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: digitaldivide@digitaldivide.net Subject: Re: [DDN] The future of DDN Wiki is a good idea ... but I still think mailing list is a lot more VISIBLE. I have clean forgotten about THE Future of DDN until this mail. Yes. I agree DDN should look into methods of payment. Perhaps some thoughts on the following two items? 1) there should be perhaps free memberships for students for example. 2) As some of us at DDN have mentioned again and again during the debate on $100 for a One-child-per-laptop etc. etc. ... perhaps we might want to look at what is $100 to some in certain part of the world? Cindy = [EMAIL PROTECTED] --- On Sat, 11/10/08, Claude Almansi [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: From: Claude Almansi [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: [DDN] The future of DDN To: The Digital Divide Network discussion group digitaldivide@digitaldivide.net Date: Saturday, 11 October, 2008, 11:43 AM Hi All, I am answering on the mailing-list (with Bcc to Adam Clare and Taran Rampersad) rather than on the wiki because today I have a problem with logging in at the wiki (1). About: ...To make the site easier to manage we propose the removal of the communities functionality and discussion boards of DDN and replacing the categorization system with tagging. DDN's strength lies in the active mailing list and TIG realizes that the mailing list isn't perfect. In an ideal setup the mailing list will also be accessed online and have greater stability. Online communities encourage discussions between users in more than one place, right now that discussion happens on the mailing list for DDN and less so on the website. To encourage more discussions we would like to implement commenting on most DDN content. ... (in http://wiki.digitaldivide.net/index.php?title=The_future_of_DDN) - Removal ot the communities and discussion boards: I agree; at first, each community had its own discussion board, but this stopped (around 2005?), which meant that there could be no diaogue within the communities. Anyway, even with that first set-up, there was little dialogue in community discussion boards and in discussion boards in general. - Mailing list: the archive is actually accessible online, but I'm not sure it's really necessary to be able to post to it from the web. However, until August 2006, the mailing-list archive had an RSS feed through which the last messages were automatically shown bottom right of the site in the Featured RSS feeds (2). That was a useful feature: would it be possible to have it again? For instance by using a yahoo or a google discussion list that have RSS feeds? - Making content taggable and discussable: great idea but in this case, would it not be simpler and cheaper to move rather than revamp? I'm thinking of Ning.com, where Steve Hargadon set up http://www.classroom20.com. And then he convinced the Ning administrators to make a special, ad-less, free offer for educators and provide a network for them, http://education.ning.com/ . One problem might be back-ups, though. Re Taran Rampersad's addition to http://wiki.digitaldivide.net/index.php?title=The_future_of_DDN : The Membership level is certainly worthwhile and is one that shows promise, since DDN membership probably would be tax deductible, though that needs to be clarified. While that is sufficient given enough buy-in from the community, I'd also suggest continued monetization of content through Google Ads (such as those found on email list archives) and Amazon advertising. Further comments for funding would probably require a prerequisite of what TIG has already tried to do such that we can avoid repeating things I agree. Moreover, how could the payments be made? Some members may not have a credit card. Best Claude Almansi (1) Yesterday evening I was automatically logged in at the http://wiki.digitaldivide.net wiki, presumably because I was logged in at the www.digitaldivide.net main site, and even able to add some things on the resource page of the wiki. Today I am logged in at the main site, but not at the wiki. The URL of the log-in link at the top right of the wiki pages is http://www.digitaldivide.net/includes
Re: [DDN] PhD research on OLPC
Hi Steve You are right, there are transitions and there are different models. What might be appropriate today in Ghana might be different, today in the US. The approach of education planners is to want to eventually find the one global model. Yet with technology, as you suggest, there are many models for learning including different approaches from didactic, sage of stage, to a problem-based-learning model as examples. The difference, today, seems to me to revolve around the ability of the knowledge to come to those that need it when and where they need it. Information packages nicely and doesn't necessarily require paved four lane controlled access roads. It is strange and wonderous to see how knowledge travels in dispersed rural communities where everyone knows everyone's business and problem solving knowledge travels across fields almost by magic. The issue is one of scarcity and control. That we learned, in the west from the Church who had a problem when the Vulgate appeared. Just go to the iTunes store and go to podcasts and search for a subject and see what is available, free. And we are just starting Think about motivated home school students in the US and students eager to learn, around the world but who have to work so the family can eat. How long before we figure out that brick-spaces dedicated only for educational purposes need to be repurposed in order to better meet what they are delivering almost like zombies walking down the street. What virtual larning options do is to point out that the current model is like the consumptive in Poe's short story of Valdemer. A snap of the fingers will break the trance and the system will plunge into chaos. The people who have a vested interest in the status quo and the idea of mapping technology in the schools are the schools of education who have no other model. They are like the brakemen in the caboose or the last flight engineer in the 3 person cockpits of modern airliners. thoughts? tom tom abeles Date: Mon, 22 Sep 2008 09:47:55 -0700 From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: digitaldivide@digitaldivide.net Subject: Re: [DDN] PhD research on OLPC In a message here filled with much good sense Tom Abeles says this: thinking about mapping click space technology into brick space thinking. We might begin by trying to understand why radio, television, film--all the earlier technologies that promised to reform education--have failed to make a difference in what goes on in those brick spaces that Tom talks about. Winston Churchill said this: We shape our buildings, and then our buildings shape us. That is: the school building and its classrooms and lecture halls is not merely a container that can house instruction organized around the computer or radio or television as easily as it can accommodate teacher-led instruction: the building--Tom's brick space--shapes what goes on within in it. Anthony Giddens says spatial arrangements are constitutive. The school building, then, is not a neutral container that can house any kind of instruction, but is a decisive and determining factor in the shaping of teaching and learning. Tom proposes abandoning the present building-centered school. We may need a transitional strategy. One possibility might be a 3-2 system. Children go to the school building three days a week to learn from teachers and each other through conversation, dialog, and the older pedagogies, without technologies, or perhaps with the help of radio and television if the teacher is comfortable with them. The other two days might be spent with computers: at home, if the home has a computer--perhaps using a pen drive, as Paperless suggests--or using a community computer which might be in a telecenter, or a library, or in the school building. The growth of open universities, with all instruction at a distance,suggests that some day Tom's vision of a school without walls may be practical. We might want to go there in stages rather than all at once. Steve Eskow On Sat, Sep 20, 2008 at 9:03 AM, tom abeles wrote: We are in a transition period where multiple solutions make sense rather than one size fits all. One of the issue to understand is that cost keeps coming down for digital products. Right now I can have a basic cell phone which will take a micro chip with 4GB. Cells are already available with most of the technology needed to deliver basic internet type services, even to being able to test. The cell is a ubiquitous device even in developing countries. So computers to lap tops to cells is a natural migration both in capabilities, cost and availability both on wireless and wifi delivery. Thin clients such as Sarah suggests, or variance thereof is what happens with google doc's and other server-based software, even in developed countries- safe/secure and not dependent on keeping data stored on portable media except for off-line
Re: [DDN] PhD research on OLPC
We are in a transition period where multiple solutions make sense rather than one size fits all. One of the issue to understand is that cost keeps coming down for digital products. Right now I can have a basic cell phone which will take a micro chip with 4GB. Cells are already available with most of the technology needed to deliver basic internet type services, even to being able to test. The cell is a ubiquitous device even in developing countries. So computers to lap tops to cells is a natural migration both in capabilities, cost and availability both on wireless and wifi delivery. Thin clients such as Sarah suggests, or variance thereof is what happens with google doc's and other server-based software, even in developed countries- safe/secure and not dependent on keeping data stored on portable media except for off-line purposes. OLPC is, as both Sarah and Alan suggest was based on the old model of a brick-space synchronous, age-defined cohort model for learning- bricks mapped into clicks from K-20. We need to rethink educational models first and formost rather than thinking about mapping click space technology into brick space thinking. Learning should be anytime/any place- some maybe synchronous in groups but most, given the exigencies of daily and seasonal life, particularly in countries where even students need to contribute to family income, need the flexibility offered by virtual technology. The problem is that the learning model has to change and the tech can help. But thinking about thin clients, portable media and other soft/hard tech will be limited if the models do not also change. tom tom abeles From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: digitaldivide@digitaldivide.net Date: Fri, 19 Sep 2008 14:06:52 -0700 Subject: Re: [DDN] PhD research on OLPC A more practical approach is community computers (in contrast to personal computers) available in a school, church, community center, etc., where everyone in the village can have access. It is much more reasonable to provide internet connection for one such community computing center than for personal laptops. A good model is a thin client/server model, in which one powerful server would serve programs and internet access to many thin clients with limited computing and storage capacity. (Community users would have their own pen drives for storing their own files.) We (Pangaea Network) are testing this idea in Ghana in Asante Akim district. Sarah Blackmun-Eskow President, The Pangaea Network 290 North Fairview Avenue Goleta CA 93117 805-692-6998 [EMAIL PROTECTED] www.pangaeanetwork.org -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Paperless Homework Sent: Friday, September 19, 2008 5:02 AM To: The Digital Divide Network discussion group Subject: Re: [DDN] PhD research on OLPC Dear Caroline, What you are doing is exactly what our project is about. We believe that a practical approach should be the way rather than fancy ideas about One laptop per child for the developing countries. It isn't practical even in developed countries much less developing countries. It is in this direction that we have created a simple tool to create small sized tutorials and exercises to enable such multimeda contents to be saved in diskettes or Pen drives. Yes even diskettes can accommodate multimedia contents. So in the end the entire extra financial need of the students would be digitally connected would be the cost of a pen drive. It can contain the entire contents for the whole life of the students that is our aim. Computers, students would know how to get access to for those students without computers. The good thing about OLPC project is the development of low cost units and its low power needs with longer hours of operation. To use OLPC for each child in developing countries... it would never come to pass. An interesting article about our concept of Practical tech not high tech www.paperlesshomework.com/surf Currently we have tremendous response to our free for schools initiative in Malaysia. We would extend it to other developing countries including China, India and Indonesia which practically form nearly half the world's population. If we succeed here , our job is done. See videos of our contents here www.paperlesshomework.ning.com/video Want to really close the digital divide? Join us. It is the ONLY such project in the world. Regards Alan Foo www.paperlesshomework.com www.paperlesshomework.com An elearning solution for rural areas where online/CDs cannot reach. Get the latest happenings through paperlesshomework tool bar www.paperlesshomework.communitytoolbars.com --- On Thu, 9/18/08, Caroline Meeks [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: From: Caroline Meeks [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: [DDN] PhD research on OLPC To: The Digital Divide Network discussion group
Re: [DDN] PhD research on OLPC
Hi Magda When one goes into an electronics store one finds many choices in PC's based on price/needs. When the military wants a laptop, they don't know where they will be next and they do not want to have a million choices because the troops and equipments have to be everywhere. But, we know that even though we ave laptops in harsh conditions around the developing world, not everyone needs to have the equivalent of a machine that can go anywhere at any time. The OLPC is an engineering marvel designed by academics and those who wanted to create one bullet proof machine to go anywhere under any condition rather than a platform that could be easily manufactured and modified for the specific need. And that is what they have done. I know that where we work, a low cost pc that could be based on any model in local stores in the US would work well for a large majority. Unfortunately OLPC is the HumVee of laptops and your concerns are well taken. Next stop? cell phones. cheers tom tom abeles Date: Sat, 6 Sep 2008 18:54:28 + From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: digitaldivide@digitaldivide.net Subject: Re: [DDN] PhD research on OLPC Thank you all the members of the list for your kind answers! I will try here to discuss some of the topics that have been raised: Tim: the OLPC is said to be a quality tool for children of the developing world but what you pointed out is very true: people living in rural developing areas are going to appreciate any kind of technology that could be presented to them, as they do not have any alternative. So, the point is: why not offering them the technology that we all use everyday (a standard laptop) instead of a tool created to be a “laptop for the third world”. I am not sure that I agree with Satish when says that the OLPC is more advanced than a normal laptop, as it is thought as a game for children who aren’t failiar with technology. It was proved by a recent research held from IBM that PCs and laptops introduced in primary schools as “games” where making children ask why they do not have “normal” PCs and laptops, as the ones that they saw in other contexts. That is to say: are we sure that it is right to create a “game” of the first laptop that those children are going to use, just because they have never seen a laptop before? What’s the difference between the OLPC and the laptop that Taran suggested or the Asus EEE, which have now the same price than the OLPC one but are “serious” laptops? Thank you all for suggestions, Magda --- Ven 5/9/08, Satish Jha [EMAIL PROTECTED] ha scritto: Da: Satish Jha [EMAIL PROTECTED] Oggetto: Re: [DDN] PhD research on OLPC A: The Digital Divide Network discussion group digitaldivide@digitaldivide.net Data: Venerdì 5 settembre 2008, 21:39 Magda, There is a bit of difference between making a PC and a learning PC for children. What we know as OLPC, without a dozen feature it has that do not come bundled with any other laptop, can be manufactured below $100. But add ruggedness, no moving parts, mesh networking, dual boot system, a screen that works well under the sun, a keyboard that is spill proof, a built in camera, a swiveling screen and an e-book feature and we are talking a serious package. retaining costs at $200 after adding all that narrated above and more is a feat in itself.. So OLPC is no ordinary laptop and the next version will be to laptops what i-phone is to cell phones and for less.. That said, we should encourage every initiative to reduce costs as the lower price points will undoubtedly increase the reach of computing, opening every newer frontier with drop in prices.. Thanks Magda Pischetola wrote: Dear collegues, I've been reading with great interests your posts in the latest months and now I'd like you to ask your opinion about a topic that is going to be an important part of my research. I am doing my PhD in Italy with a project on the Digital divide from the point of view of Education. I am studying how can education reduce the DD with media literacy and how teachers can help children to achieve a good level of the so-called digital skills, to access ICT and Internet and to produce development. Now, this year I will follow a field research in a primary school where teachers are going to introduce the OLPC laptop as a tool in their method of theaching. Then, in the new year I'd like to compare the results to another area of the world (I'm thinking of Buenos Ayres, Argentina). I'm asking to you all what you think - out of any preconcept that I might share - about the initiative of OLPC in the world (if it is a goof initiave or not and why) and which aspect would you stress in a field research like this one (e.g. skills of the teacher, self-learning of the child, creativity and flexibility of the project, etc.). I will appreciate very much your help. Thank you
Re: [DDN] Google Insights - social networking
I am not certain that I am in agreement with Maria Laura's definition which appears to be tautological in nature. I am also not certain that engaging in an intellectual reparte makes sense in a list where the unspoken belief is that closing a digital divide is the sine qua non for leveling the economic (and hence all others) playing field. Deal and Development are Humpty Dumpty terms ( a word means what I want it to mean). Perhaps Deal has a pejorative connotation while Development has perceived positive sensibility? Debatable! Maybe a little time, a deep breath and some philosophy/humanities to temper those standing at the ready with their Blackberry might make sense? Right now the US education system is so enamored with educating for the science/tech/engineering/math that programs for the humanities and social sciences are being mothballed. Tour the developing world and look at the Development skeletons, like Shelly's Ozymandias- the result of Deals. tom tom abeles Sarah Blackmun-Eskow wrote: What's the difference between a development phenomenon and an economic deal or phenomenon? --- ...An economic phenomenon can be almost anything related to markets, and therefore transactions. The word deal refers to this transaction view. Development, on the other hand, involves a value judgment. A development phenomenon means that something good or desirable has taken place, and different groups may make different value judgments as to the desirability or goodness of a phenomenon or situation Maria Laura -- _ See what people are saying about Windows Live. Check out featured posts. http://www.windowslive.com/connect?ocid=TXT_TAGLM_WL_connect2_082008 ___ DIGITALDIVIDE mailing list DIGITALDIVIDE@digitaldivide.net http://digitaldivide.net/mailman/listinfo/digitaldivide To unsubscribe, send a message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the word UNSUBSCRIBE in the body of the message.
