Is Chairman of Intel a jerk!

[ROM-DOS]

Is Chairman of Intel a jerk!

Peter Apps reporting for Reuters on a press conference in Sri Lanka by Craig Barrett, chairman of the world's largest chip maker, has quoted Barrett as saying;

"Mr. Negroponte has called it a $100 laptop -- I think a more realistic title should be 'the $100 gadget'"

"The problem is that gadgets have not been successful."

"It turns out what people are looking for is something is something that has the full functionality of a PC, Reprogrammable to run all the applications of a grown up PC... not dependent on servers in the sky to deliver content and capability to them, not dependent for hand cranks for power."

Schoolchildren in Brazil, Thailand, Egypt and Nigeria will begin receiving the first few million textbook style computers from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) media lab run by Nicholas Negroponte from early 2006.

United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan has welcomed the development of the small, hand-cranked lime-green devices, which can set up their own wireless networks and are intended to bring computer access to areas that lack reliable electricity.

Is Barrett a jerk or just jealous there is no Intel inside!

How the heck does Barrett know World's poorest don't want a '$100 laptop'?

Full story here;

World's poorest don't want '$100 laptop': Intel

[resopalrabotnick]

well, simple, even the poorest of the poor 'want' a dual pentium 4 extreme edition syatem with sli video and dual 22 inch panels, high speed internet etc. etc.. what they're getting is 100 dollar laptops.

[dlewis23]

well, simple, even the poorest of the poor 'want' a dual pentium 4 extreme edition syatem with sli video and dual 22 inch panels, high speed internet etc. etc.. what they're getting is 100 dollar laptops.

of course they would, if i was really poor i would not want a $100 laptop, that would just make me look even more poor because i have to have this really cheap computer, i don't think the chairman of intel is a jerk.

[tonyswhirl]

Is Barrett a jerk or just jealous there is no Intel inside!

How the heck does Barrett know World's poorest don't want a '$100 laptop'?

Yeah - I think the green monster is showing his head!!!!!

[tonyswhirl]

of course they would, if i was really poor i would not want a $100 laptop, that would just make me look even more poor because i have to have this really cheap computer, i don't think the chairman of intel is a jerk.

Hell - I will take a 100 dollar laptop right now - prob better then the one I am using - And I will crank it in from of everyone - dont care if I look poor

[just-]

please lets not get offensive to wards Mr. Craig Barrett, in the end he is one of my bosses and no i don't think he is a jerk

maybe just a bad intervetion you can have some of those unlucky moments in ur life

[resopalrabotnick]

Hell - I will take a 100 dollar laptop right now - prob better then the one I am using - And I will crank it in from of everyone - dont care if I look poor

that is a whole other issue. i'd love to have that power cord free sucker. just to take it out when the guy sitting across from me watches his machine die due to lack of power, crank it and rock on while he sits there, powerless. mwahahahaha.

[compuworm]

Shame on you ROM-DOS,

Mr. Barrett is only looking after the needs of the world's poorest.  How the heck does Barrett know World's poorest don't want a '$100 laptop'?  I will tell you how he knows,  just look at the Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs Pyramid (see attachment).  The man is only trying to help and look after the welfare of those less fortunite then him.  The man is a saint for god sake!

[ghostmaster]

LOL comp

[resopalrabotnick]

ok, all things aside, has anyone considered the fact that these 100 buck laptops are going to be a major financilal problem for the poor countries? they have to blow what little hard currency they have to pay it to some us companies for a laptop that looks like something that got rejected from the my first sony design contest. great. just bloody great.

[ROM-DOS]

Intel working on rugged PC: Craig Barrett

Tuesday, 06 December , 2005, 08:24

New Delhi: The Intel design team in India is working on a computing platform for the Indian market, according to the Intel Chairman, Craig Barrett.

"It will be dust-resistant, would have the ability to work on car or truck battery and will be aimed at the rural market," he said.

"In the past few years, PC prices have been dropping from $2,500 to less than $500. But the key issue is beyond the absolute cost... things like financing, connectivity and content on local languages," said Barrett.

On when Intel would make available the design for the proposed `Community PC', an official said the company was already doing pilots with the IT Ministry.

___________________________________________________________________

Is Intel afraid that people will come to realise that you dont need a $500+ processor to surf the web, and you can get by just fine with 4 year old technology?

Or would Intel just love to sell a $500 ' Community PC' to a poor man?

____________________________________________________________________

MIT Media Lab works towards helping kids, though toys and other material that are aimed at learning, primarily constructionist in nature.

It has been well proven that constructionist learning goes a long way towards building analytical and engineering related skills - while it may not be the only thing towards that end, it definitely helps.

Now, for a constructionist learning environment, you need tools that they can experiment with. What better way to do this than computers? However, a $2000 computer for a kid is quite obviously not a good idea, so MIT went ahead and developed a cheaper alternative.

Do you know why they can be networked? Because one of the fundamental needs behind education is to have some means of collaboration and team work. Do you know why they have all those USB ports? So that they can be extended upon - a lot of MIT's toys (such as Flow Blocks) are toys that interface with the computers. It's important for folks to be able to add on to these computers, and build new things - whether it's for a farmer in a developing nation using it for weather prediction or whether it's a kid who's adding stuff for class.

This is not a gadget ~ this is a tool.

If anything, it's a nice way to help bring technology to the needy, and give them a chance to explore what we've come to take for granted.

[compuworm]

Perhaps just perhaps too much emphasis is being placed on learning through computers.  They are indeed a great tool but really how much to we actually learn and what is it that they help us learn.  I remember a Harvard study some years ago now (I tried to find it) where two large groups of freshmen engineering college students participated in this study. 

One group could use computers (as is standard in most colleges) in their course of study throughout college and the second had no use what so ever of computers.  I suppose they (Harvard) fell back to a 1950's model of education where the emphasis was more hands-on?  At the end of the college, post graduation, testing of both groups included giving each engineering group (as I remember) the same set of problems  solve. 

Again one group had computers to aid in their problem solving whereas group two did not.  Testing took place at the same.  The results where amazing not only did the hands-on group solve all there testing problems proposed by the Harvard group but they also accomplished it in given time frame.  Engineering group two could not solve a single problem in the given time frame.

In the end (again as I remember) the study concluded that computers can't or has a diminished ability to help us to learn how to model in our minds.  It seemed that tactile and sensory experience gained  by group two, such as having to use their minds to see, rotate, and their hands drawing models of the objects, more clearly helped them to focus their minds thus giving them greater problem solving abilities. 

Please don't get me wrong, I love computers and I am not knocking them.  Hell, I own two laptops, and three desktops.  Further, my memoirs of the study go back a long way so I apologize if any of the details are incorrect.  In inclusion, I don't believe the World's Poorest need computers to get connected.  Hell, isn't just staying alive a rather large issue.

A hundred dollars might as well be a million to them and where in the world would they get it?  Here in lies the greatest question to be answered .  Where would seeminly penniless people get money to pay for a  one hundred dollar laptop?  Who would be behind making sure they got that money and why? 

Your Friend,

compuworm

[resopalrabotnick]

the countries governments are expected to buy them, just as (iirc) the governor of MA was looking into buying one for each of the states students.

as to the question, do they need a laptop to learn with, it depends.

if there will be digital versions of textbooks available for them at no cost, then it is indeed a good investment. let's say the life expectancy of the thing is 4 years. take a textbook at 10 dollars. each year, an average student needs what, 8 or 9 textbooks? that means the laptop can reduce the cost of learning materials by 75 percent over its lifetime. not bad at all.