Information Society Watch

January 4, 2008, The Economist

The One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) program was conceived to providing computing power to a majority of the world's children in order to bridge the digital divide. Two years on, the article takes a step back and looks at the outcomes of the project as it has its first release. It concludes that the XO laptop developed by the programme suffers from serious shortcomings in usability and stability. Thus OLPC may fall significantly short of its ambitious goals. However, it has led to many of positive developments, including forcing others to innovate in order to address the less visible markets. Overall OLPC will be remembered as a pioneering project in conception rather than execution.

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