Birmingham, AL totally confused by OLPC purchase
By Nilay Patel 
posted January 23rd 2008 6:34PM
posted January 23rd 2008 6:34PM
We knew we were in for some rough chuckles when Birmingham, Alabama signed up to provide an OLPC XO to every K-8 student last December, but we didn't think they'd be this silly from the get-go: apparently the mayor's office, which negotiated the deal, is now saying the school board needs to add WiFi to every school for the laptops to work. That's news to us -- the mesh-networking XO was designed to be used in rural parts of the developing world, after all -- but we're still puzzling out what mayoral advisors John Katopodis and Bob McKenna meant when they said they're "trying to make the whole city WiFi," or where they got a quote of $39 per school to enable wireless access. Of course, the only response from the school board was one member who worried about students accessing porn -- which seems to be a real theme with the XO -- but for some reason we're not at all surprised that bureaucratic officials have totally missed the point of the OLPC project.[Thanks, Jay]
Wow. There are sme ignorant comments in the linked blog. My faovite:
"The thing does not use Internet Explorer as the Internet browser, so very few web pages on the Internet will work."
Wow. I'm having some typing issues this morning.
Neither Birmingham nor Hoover will ever be what Parkwood is. Parkwood till I die homie!
I was just trying to find a good sunday brunch and lucked on to this site. I photographed Gov. George Wallace in the statehouse and had drinks with his wife Cornillia at the Governors Mansion ...with her mother Ruby as well. My hair was shoulder lenght and might have been braider with a bell tied on, I can't really remember. Larry Langford was a budding reporter for our local news station, chanel 13. All this brings me to comment on one thing. Look how far we have come. Is he a crook and an idiot...maybe. let's remember 2 percent of congress is either indited or in jail as we speak. The fact that each of your comments have come online says something and that each is passionate about having computers for these kids is admirable. I just want a good Chinese buffet on Sunday. Please... let's never forget how far we have come, before we fight about how far we still have to go, Make good days, Charles Walton