OLPC laptops set to hit Australia

Australia is set to get its very own OLPC arm, to deliver XO laptops to schoolchildren across the country.

The first hints of the Australian launch surfaced at linux.conf.au in Melbourne, with the organisation hoping to build support for the project amongst the open source community.

"We announced the OLPC Australia organisation at the open source conference because it is both an educational and open source project and because we wanted to build up the technical community around its launch," project organiser Pia Waugh told ZDNet.com.au.

OLPC Australia will be launched soon, Waugh said, adding that its Web site -- www.olpc.org.au -- will be up and running shortly.

"The general Australian community will be taking part in a little while," Waugh said.

Seventy XO laptops were also given out at the Linux conference last week but Waugh said the giveaway was a linux.conf.au initiative independent of OLPC Australia, meant to create interest around the project.

Talkback

Stupidity = "I thought the idea of these devices were third world countries who were starved of content, access technologies etc etc, not for the first world where education, health etc are all pretty much taken for granted."
In first place,"third world" conditions are not restricted to certain countries or continents, this conditions exist everywhere in the world, even in the so called "first world" countries, Australia being one example and the USA with its 44 000 000 poor another.
The example Uruguay gave the world with the IMPLEMENTATION of computers into the education system, and not simply giving away computers to EVERY child at school, but actually CREATING a coherent educational plan, where computers play an intrinsic part in the National curriculum, ought to be imitated universally. Not only those computers were given for free to every child (not necessarily poor children) attending public primary and secondary school , but also providing FREE INTERNET CONNECTION . Not bad for a "third world" country with 99% literacy (literacy here meaning actually people able to READ AND WRITE, not only the percentage of school attendance)
Australia should look around for better examples of educational systems in the world without the blinkers of race or language.

aediaedi September 21st, 2010
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