The $100 laptop closer to reality

[mailinglist at endosquid.com (Brendan)]

On Thursday 29 September 2005 11:17 am, Anthony Gabrielson wrote:
> On Thu, 29 Sep 2005, Ben Jackson wrote:
> For $100 you can have the laptop, and then with the pdf version of a
> text book for $25ish and always have the most up to date version - thats
> great.  Seems like a good way to go to me.  Do students these days really
> write past the fifth grade?  In a day where I have read that many
> universities consider undergrad libraries obsolete, this seems a logical
> progression.

Yes, logical if you want the dumbest kids in the world.

Why are American kids getting dumber? Instead of technology being pushed into 
every crevice, we need some research that conclusively says where it's 
needed, and where an actual book is better. Mostly, this is going to be used 
for IM to other kids. Of course, some of them are going to learn more with a 
laptop, and I guess we'll just depend on those kids making it to adulthood to 
run the country.

The book monopoly/lobby/scam-artists are never, ever going to allow a 25 
dollar, self-updating PDF file. Forget that dream, when they are making 
100-150 per book, per student, per class. No way are they going to ditch 
*that* revenue-stream.

Remember, all the great achievements in nearly every subject have all been 
achieved with actual books teaching actual students. Kepler didn't have the 
newest Toshiba. Galileo didn't IM his buddies to tell them about the bowling 
ball experiment and Copernicus didn't leave a .doc attachment saying he 
wanted to posthumously publish his works.

We need more teachers that are held to higher standards while making more 
money, teaching fewer kids, not throwing technology against the wall and 
hoping something sticks. We *have* the solutions to the sliding scale in this 
country and it's green, hires more teachers with horn-rimmed glasses actually 
*sitting* with students until they get it.

Who is going to teach the teachers to use these magical laptops? Who is going 
to make them crack/hack-proof? What kind of IT infrastructure will this 
introduce? What happens when a worm is develops that races through the 
monoculture of non-updated laptops with WiFi? No no, don't do any research 
into it, just buy some cheaper laptops. That's the answer. A third of these 
kids are failing the MCAS Math portion, so let's get them IM'ing with their 
friends. That'll solve the problem. Hey, on a camping trip with boring 
parents? Use that crank to power your 4-hour IM session to Susie about what 
Reese Witherspoon was wearing at the Oscar's...and how she looked "So cute" 
in those shoes. ;-)

I'm 27 and I'm as technical as you can imagine. I owe nearly everything I know 
to people smarter and more patient than I am...and to books.

Of course, I'm not a kid, and I would buy two of these things in a second. 
And of course, this is all just my opinion. Feel free to disagree.

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