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Opinion
Is 'Responsible Computing' an Oxymoron?
4/12/2007
I am eager to hear stories about those kids getting in touch with the broader world and proving once and for all that all kids are bright kids. Aren't you? Sure, there have been some issues in the development of the product and in getting the various government agencies to pledge to purchase and distribute the 2B1s, but those have all been things that were getting in the way of it happening, not things that pointed to problems the kids might cause once they had their laptops.John Dvorak doesn't care much for the project, as he elucidates in an essay in Marketwatch titled (and subtitled) "The $100 Laptop: What Went Wrong: Assessing the true cost of a futile effort to equip the Third World." His argument is subheaded: "Slick Looks, but High Prices," "Electricity First, Laptops Second?" and "Dangerous Distraction." I hope (and think) that he's wrong: For example, he cites "Stanford journalism lecturer and Africa watcher G. Pascal Zachary" as saying: "The real problem is lost mind share. The people are harmed because these sorts of schemes are sopping up mind-share time of the people who might be doing something actually useful."
Me, I think the mind share being wasted is those of the kids and can't wait until they get their hands on these things.
But other see larger dangers in the OLPC project. Here's the "takeaway" from an article on engadget:
The One Laptop Per Child Project aims to distribute as many as 100 million $100 laptops to kids around the world in its first year alone. That's heartwarming--and extremely dangerous. To achieve the economies of scale necessary to meet that price point, the devices will be identical, a situation that is rife with potential security issues. If the machines can be hacked, a huge botnet army may be created. At the Toorcon conference this month, hackers were asked to break the 2B1 laptop that will be used. In addition to the identical innards, the machines will transmit code in a mesh configuration from one machine to another and serve as each others' backups. This approach will make the distribution of the malware easier for hackers.Interestingly, in the short discussion thread following the lead to this article, as many people seen interested in getting their hands on a 2B1 machine as in discussing the dangers. If you want to read more about the security on the 2B1 machines, you can read about "Bitfrost" here.
One poster did have a science fiction view of a potentially bad future from the OLCP project. "Russ" wrote:
Flash forward to a post-apocalyptic Mad Max-styled era: Botnetted OLPCs litter the landscape trying to push advertising for pig-manure fuel and death-battle arenas down your throat.
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