To read all comments associated with this story, please click here.
Well, neither has come to market, so all we have are rumors. He might have been right, he might not.
I still think the XO and Classmate PC are aimed at different markets.
Hopefully this will help. I mean, I want to see the XO succeed... but that doesn't NECESSARILY require that nobody else does.
All the geeks who keep looking at the XO and saying "Oh, I want one" can get a ClassmatePC or Eee instead.
Edited 2007-07-13 21:49
"I still think the XO and Classmate PC are aimed at different markets."
both being low cost, low power laptops, aimed at education, aimed at developing countries, and sold to Governments, in large quantaties. Clearly they are the same product type.
But your right they are different, one if driven by wanting to improve the world, and the other by Evil.
ctually thats pretty much sums up what Negroponte problem with Intel.
Don't believe it. In my opinion, Negroponte is really just pissed off because Intel can provide a better economy of scale than he can -- and this would make Negroponte's OLPC uncompetitive in the market for bargain basement PCs.
How do we know he didn't attempt to?
If we were talking about a solely business-oriented venture, then I would agree. But in this case, I highly doubt that the OLPC project would even exist if typical business thinking was the sole motivation. I have no illusions that it's entirely altruistic, but it does seem like one of those rare situations where large corporations are at acting out of enlightened self-interest. As opposed to the standard wisdom of "make as much money as possible, with as little effort as possible, and do it quickly as possible - long-term consequences be damned."
In that context, I think that Negroponte and many others saw the Classmate PC as Intel's attempt to make a quick buck by undermining the OLPC project. Especially put in context with the fact that Intel's chairman publicly criticized the OLPC project back in 2005 - the cynical take on it at the time ("Intel thinks OLPC is a bad idea because it doesn't use Intel hardware") certainly seems to have been validated.





Member since:
2006-01-06
... should have brought in Intel from the start. He could have shopped a spec to both Intel and AMD, and got them to compete against one another. As for his whining about Intel trying to destroy his project, he's essentially complaining about competition which, in my book, is BS. Intel's conduct would have only become predatory if it (1) dumped at or below cost, or (2) shut Negroponte or his suppliers out of market channels. There is no evidence that Intel did either of those things, so Negroponte is complaining about nothing at all. Still, it was wise to bring in Intel.