Sic Transit Gloria Laptopi

Posted May 14, 2008 9:36 UTC (Wed) by vaib (guest, #48292)
In reply to: Sic Transit Gloria Laptopi by gowen
Parent article: Sic Transit Gloria Laptopi

May be they don't share the same wisdom as you have.
May be they wasted their time while they could have earned big bucks.
May be you and me can't anything more than writing a stupid comment here.
May be you think making slaves is better than hunger.
etc.

Sic Transit Gloria Laptopi

Posted May 14, 2008 10:14 UTC (Wed) by gowen (guest, #23914) [Link] (3 responses)

May be you think making slaves is better than hunger.

It's thinking like this that is the reason OLPC is such a total disaster.

When you think that non-free software is akin slavery, you make decisions like those OLPC per made - allowing your good intentions to be perverted by ridiculous dogma. Manicheism is never a good idea - you end up with well meaning things like "Abstinence only" birth-control programs, which sound however nice they sound in principle, are so divorced from the reality of the world as to be worse than useless..

Rather than concentrating on a product that actually works, and actually helps educate children, you focus on something that is dogmatically correct, but late to the party and almost completely useless when it gets there.

If you really believe that a child with a Windows laptop is less well equipped for learning that a child than a child with no laptop at all, well, I don't think terribly highly of your reasoning. But you are capable of parroting the "M$ is EviL" party line.

Oh, and no-one mentioned "big bucks". Nice strawman.

Sic Transit Gloria Laptopi

Posted May 14, 2008 13:03 UTC (Wed) by Zack (guest, #37335) [Link]

>Rather than concentrating on a product that actually works, and actually helps educate
children, you focus on something that is dogmatically correct, but late to the party and
almost completely useless when it gets there.

I find it hard to apply terms like "dogmatic" to Free Software when I witness the vibrant
mailing lists and support forums. The body of ideas behind Free Software is working. People
*are* sharing and participating. People *are* helping each other. And people *are* enjoying
being in control and self-sufficient.
These are good things to learn, which is why good educators should stress such values.

>If you really believe that a child with a Windows laptop is less well equipped for learning
that a child than a child with no laptop at all, well, I don't think terribly highly of your
reasoning.

I do not find it unreasonable to assume the hidden agenda that comes with windows
pre-installed will significantly hinder actual learning. Even up to a point that just reading
books instead might be more productive than being subverted to become the next generation of
office-users.

The not-so-secret agenda of Free Software embodies values that should be right up any
educators alley. Claiming to drop these values to *increase* education is just odd, to say the
least.

Even though Free Software might be "morally superior" from an ethical point of view, it is the
practical effects of Free Software here that are very much compatible with what is generally
understood as education.

"All software should be Free" doesn't even enter the equation here. And with politics aside,
the practical effects of the four software freedoms alone should warrant enough benefits to
reject non-free software in any educational project of this size.

Sic Transit Gloria Laptopi

Posted May 15, 2008 7:10 UTC (Thu) by lysse (guest, #3190) [Link]

> > Maybe you think making slaves is better than hunger.

> It's thinking like this that is the reason OLPC is such a total disaster.

Slow down, cowboy!

I watched The Corporation again a few hours ago - and my understanding of the comment you
quoted is quite different (consider the justification for Nike's Indonesian sweatshops). Not
necessarily anything to do with the OLPC at all, especially in the context of his other
comments - he seemed to me to be making a broader point.

Sic Transit Gloria Laptopi

Posted May 15, 2008 10:21 UTC (Thu) by ekj (guest, #1524) [Link]

Abstinence only birth-control programs doesn't sound nice in principle.

They sound horrible. Given that the reason people use birth-control is that they want to be
able to engage in intercourse without getting children. Suggesting that they simply refrain
from engaging in intercourse is thus a non-solution to the actual problem people are having.

So, it forces people to choose between two evils: Having children (when you don't want them)
and not having intercourse (when you DO want to)

Pretty silly since it's well-known how people can have both.