Jason has uploaded the video from Wednesday’s talk: One Laptop Per Child - Yaacov Iland. It’s a long video (about an hour and a half), and you may want to adjust the settings so you’re viewing it at the original size (unless you’re curious about how Yaacov looks pixillated). I apologize for the coughing—that was me, fighting the last of a lingering cold.
Yaacov’s insights were fair and well-presented. Although most of the criticisms OLPC endured recently were due to their dispatch problems, Yaacov digs deeper, asking what problems OLPC was trying to address, what engineering challenges had to be overcome, and what other challenges were still unsolved. It seems the biggest issues yet to be overcome are training for teachers, accessibility to related technologies (e.g. an internet connection, electricity), and language and cultural barriers. For an organization which has said it’s an education project, not a laptop project, I find it odd that they have made so little headway with those challenges in comparison to the work they have completed on the XO laptop itself.
What I find interesting about this situation is that it raises questions of the line between an idea and its realization. What is fair for both the original creator and a creator who builds from that work? And, perhaps more to-the-point, what part of the idea is unique to the realization?
I received my new camera today yesterday and am both glad and sorry I waited so long to buy a new one. Although the price of a good digital camera has finally dropped into my price range, the difference between my new and old camera is astounding.
My old camera is the Pentax Optio LF33. Although it’s quite sufficient for snapshots, I have needed to do all sorts of extra things in the setup of my photos to get decent pictures of my sculptures. I can’t believe how much time I wasted to make up for the camera’s shortcomings.
The A720 passes my intuitive-use test, which basically involves me snubbing the manual (at least until I need to learn the more advanced features, and figure out what that button under the lens does). I did, however, need to pull it out of the box to figure out which way the batteries should be inserted. It wasn’t until later that I noticed the battery icons which were inside the casing, and further down than I expected. The icons were not visible from all angles when looking into the battery compartment.
Opening the cover for the batteries and SD card was quite easy…the first time. The second time, I couldn’t remember how I did it and had that squinty, furrowed eyebrow face while I wondered what I did the first time.
This is much better than the “candid” photos using the Pentax Optio (no flash on left; with flash on right) with equivalent manual settings:
The video feature was a bit frustrating because I initially thought the audio was…well, crap. It turns out that you get static in the background of videos shot with the A720 in some players. It seems Kaffeine (the default player for my installation of OpenSUSE) is one of those players. The video was fine in other players, and I need to figure out how to add a watermark to my videos.
The only thing I miss is having a swivel-display. The Pentax Optio had a display which would fold and twist in many ways.
The A720 has an exposed display, so I’m a bit paranoid about using it before my magical screen skin arrives in the mail. I need to learn to order those at the same time I order new gadgets, because I’m one of those crazy people who are terrified of scratching displays/screens.
