Comments on: When you can see the giraffe’s eyes, it’s already too late

By: ike

ike — Thu, 03 Nov 2011 20:54:02 +0000

….. firstly, mesh networking at least partially alleviates the need for ISPs and communication infrastructure.
….. secondly, Africa isn't nearly as much of a shit hole as you think….. Somalia, prior to Ethiopia invading with the backing of the United States and African Union in 2005, the 2005 Tsunami and half the worlds navies trying to sink the Somali Volunteer Coast Guard, was actually expanding their infrastructure by leaps and bounds…. also vast improvements in health-care for women and children.
…… thirdly, not all the laptops go to Africa, they also go to Latin America and presumably South East Asia, the Middle East and the Indian Subcontinent……. hell, maybe even Eastern Europe.

By: BigNed

BigNed — Wed, 25 May 2011 21:57:38 +0000

The internet also requires significant infrastructure, not likely to be found in places that have open sewers and run electricity from shanty to shanty via spliced extension cords. And that's in a township on the edge of a resort town in South Africa (major stop on the pro surfing tour) I did some volunteer work in 8 years ago. Assuming you have infrastructure in place, the internet also requires service providers that charge money. The kind of money that people trying to escape mind-numbing poverty do not have.

If, somehow, you solve the problems of infrastructure and affordable service, the internet also requires content in a language that the user can understand. Quick, find me the Xhosa language option in Firefox, IE or Opera. Which leads us to another thing the internet requires…wait for it…wait for it…LITERACY. Which, come to think of it is pretty helpful in using a laptop to begin with. And is in short supply in many of the neediest places in the world.

That's the hell.

By: ara

ara — Mon, 02 May 2011 05:47:05 +0000

what the hell.

the internet is the world's largest resource for education
education helps prevent things like, say, the spread of AIDs

By: Fren

Fren — Wed, 23 Feb 2011 19:05:26 +0000

UR P00TER CAMED WIFF FOODZ BUT I ATED IT

By: Deanish » Check It: HijiNKS ENSUE

Deanish » Check It: HijiNKS ENSUE — Wed, 16 Jan 2008 05:23:27 +0000

[...] When you can see the giraffe’s eyes, it’s already too late [...]

By: honest ape

honest ape — Thu, 20 Dec 2007 23:26:38 +0000

@Joel-
It’s far better when one’s intellectual discourse creates silly comics than the other way around. I don’t come to this site to think about the sad state of the third world. I come to this site for gay wizards and dinosaurs.

By: Alan

Alan — Wed, 05 Dec 2007 03:11:19 +0000

Wind up radios. If you have read about just one example of the impact they can have on a local community such as in terms of regular news updates and how that allows farmers to do something as simple as judge supply and demand get better prices for their crops, then you wouldn’t underestimate the impact of more information and better education then you would be much more optimistic about the potential of OLPC and have a little more respect for the ingenuity of those in developing nations when given half a fair chance.

By: HijiNKS ENSUE a geek webcomic - updated monday and thursday » Blog Archive » Remixes for “When you can see the giraffe’s eyes, it’s already too late” (OLPC comic)

Fri, 30 Nov 2007 04:51:19 +0000

[...] didn’t get a lot of submissions for the OLPC comic remix but I think these two are the some of the best I’ve received so far. With no further [...]

By: Joel

Joel — Wed, 28 Nov 2007 17:15:24 +0000

@Sumit
I think you are right about the kids figuring out how to fix the machines, except I doubt they would have replacement parts available. A cracked LCD can be replaced with a shined up car tire. Ive seen some pretty amazing homegrown ingenuity from developing nations from pics posted online. But theres a pretty big difference in turning an old washing machine motor into a welding torch and having access to IC’s and solder and electronic testing equipment. Who knows?

@Jovin6
If MS decides to donate a $10 version of windows to the intel version (did they? I havent read up on this one) I would expect it to gain massive exposure, but at the same time poorer nations have been migrating to open source software more and more in the last 5 years.

@Denise
I think its pretty cool that my silly comics create intellectual discourse. That said, you ALWAYS need more LOLCats. Here, have this one:

http://icanhascheezburger.files.wordpress.com/2007/11/funny-pictures-pythagora-cat-box.jpg

MATHCAT!

By: Denise

Denise — Wed, 28 Nov 2007 16:39:07 +0000

This thread is getting too political//deep/thoughtful.

It needs more lolcats.

http://icanhascheezburger.com/2007/11/27/zombie-kiteh-want-brainz/