[olug] [OT] $100 computer pledge bank

[Rob Townley]

On 11/1/06, Cesar Delgado <cdelgad2 at bigred.unl.edu> wrote:
> Well, I guess the pledge time is over and the 100,000 pledges needed
> never arrived.  Most of you might have heard about the $100 laptop
> that's being developed (http://laptop.media.mit.edu/).  There was a
> pledge drive where they were asking $300 for 1 laptop where the rest of
> the money would play for 2 more to be sent to the areas that have been
> decided upon.  Well, sadly it didn't work.  And reading the posts on /.
> about it just made me even sadder.  Most people are bitchin' and moanin'
> about the cost and how they wouldn't pay 3x for something.  I did, I
> pledge for 2 actually and I'm still a broke college student.  Most
> people on /., I'm quite sure, wouldn't even think twice about spending
> ~$300 on ThinkGeek stuff the first time they went to the website!  But I
> guess I have a different view.  As most of you know I'm from Colombia in
> South America (not one of the countries that are going to get these
> laptops any time soon BTW).  And I guess I've seen the need down there
> so I can imagine quite easily the need somewhere else.  Maybe it's
> harder for some people used to a prety decent public school system to
> imagine a need that big.  Maybe I should hire Sally Struthers to make a
> commertial about it.
>
> I'm disappointed at the community in general right now.  I know, for
> sure, there's more than 100,000 geeks out there.  And I'm sure most of
> them spend way more than $300 on stuff that ends up in a closet.  But
> when asked to help, well.. same as the pledge bank, fell short.  It's
> quite sad.
>
> -Cesar
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i am with yor bro. i was bummed about the notice as well. Only 1300 or
so people signed up out of 100,000.    Would really like to experience
performance on a 500 Mhz Geode designed system with a very well tuned
O.S.  i am very serious. The computer industry thrives on wasting
yesterdays hw.   A 300MhZ CPU can add, subtract, or multiply two
numbers in the time it takes a beam of light to travel 1 meter.  How
did systems get so bloated and inefficient that this is not fast
enough.


Hey, did you have a Halloween party Friday night?   If so, that was an
awesome party.