Walter Bender speaks out about leaving OLPC, de-emphasis of radical projects

What do you know? The former OLPC head of software and content did indeed resign at least partially over NickNeg's growing fondness of Windows XP. In a recent soul-spilling interview with xconomy, Walter Bender made clear that he resigned his post at the non-profit due to the general de-emphasis of "radical projects like Sugar," the innovative XO user interface which Mr. Bender was unsurprisingly neck-deep in during his stay. Essentially, he felt as if the outfit had stopped trying to "be disruptive" and started "trying to make things comfortable for decision-makers," hence Walter darting out "to do his own thing." Needless to say, the lead developer of Sugar isn't satisfied with seeing his work forgotten, and while details have yet to be worked out, he is looking to "find a new central home for the community of educators and software developers who have been creating Sugar-compatible applications."

[Image courtesy of The New York Times]

[DrXym @ Apr 25th 2008 10:22AM]

I really don't understand OLPC's recent flip flop. The whole idea of Sugar is that it is a kid-friendly surface over the OS for them to use. It is completely irrelevant of what OS is underneath it. Sugar could be running on any OS, but it just happens to be running over Linux.

If they are now extolling the XP, why don't they just junk Sugar entirely and show a regular GNOME desktop on the user? It certainly does not require they switch operating systems in order to change the user interface for something more conventional. It would be cheaper too. Alternatively, maybe something like the Eee PC's tabs would be a better UI - it's still simple but allows real apps to startup and run.

I've also heard criticism that Sugar doesn't work with Flash movies. I do not get this at all. There is a proper x86 Linux Flash player as well as an open source and compatible plugin. Sugar embeds Gecko and Gecko supports either the official or unofficial plugin. I really don't understand why Flash would be missing.

Ultimately they should offer governments a choice - sugar or GNOME and point out the advantages of each. Sugar does look a bit unrefined but it does have one good reason for existing - it would turn off any prospective thieves.

[tekdroid @ Apr 25th 2008 11:05AM]

"Certainly there are a lot of hooks from Sugar into the OLPC hardware, because the hardware itself is pretty special. But while I think that the things that OLPC has done with the hardware are necessary for successful deployment, I think that there are compromises that can be made with other hardware in the short term. So [you could get Sugar running on] other laptops and even other computers."
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I'm a big fan of good software/hardware interaction, so getting the green & white laptop to play with would be great fun as opposed to porting it to other systems, just to see it all in the flesh as it was designed to be - as long as the unit has a revised keyboard :p

Interesting interview. The customer is not always right, I agree.

At the end of the day I hope some of the technologies explored with this thing drift down to 'common' portables.

...and perhaps the most important: the lack of cook-in-the-sun black colour and/or tacky silver/grey painted shells so common in everyday laptops :p

I would kill to:

1) charge and/or run on the sun, and charge so little and get so much power
2) have legibility of text and whatnot in full sun with transmissive / reflective switchable screen
3) have incredible battery life (!)
4) have good durability from shocks and drops and spills
5) have a far lighter/smaller/ more flexible 'tablet'/notebook machine
6) have in-built collaboration tools
7) extremely low maintenance

...like this thing has.
In a few words, this is innovation. Meanwhile the PC industry in general is doing the same old thing as the years roll on.

[Andir3.0 @ Apr 25th 2008 11:21AM]

"In a few words, this is innovation. Meanwhile the PC industry in general is doing the same old thing as the years roll on."

There's a reason for that: Singular OS, Singular control, non-standard Monopoly. Welcome to the world where only one company is legally allowed to "innovate" on your computer.

[johnny5 @ Apr 26th 2008 11:59AM]

"Welcome to the world where only one company is legally allowed to "innovate" on your computer."

Apple?

[Rocketboy @ Apr 25th 2008 11:13AM]

Sugar was a waste of time and resources for OLPC. If you really want to prepare children for the modern world, you need to give them modern tools. Sugar was not.

Of course, if you want to help children that have no food / electrcity / or clean water, that's a better start then giving them a computer.

[directive0 @ Apr 25th 2008 2:17PM]

^Doesn't get it _at all_.

Sugar is far more then some pretty interface thrown ontop of the fedora core. It includes native collaborative features and comes bundled with a powerful set of educational tools. Students need to learn. Sugar in its BETA stages is already far better prepared to give students real LEARNING tools then any small windows variant will be.

We're not trying to help kids in Mongolia read Digg.com or watch Youtube videos (even though they are able to with the XO), we're trying to get them to think critically, really approach math and reading, and become producers of real change in their communities. You know, the important stuff we all take for granted as we load up our forums and image boards.

This isn't some fucking laptop program, its a project that aims to change 3rd world EDUCATION. Its not just a "here have this computer" sorta deal. It's ambitious, fraught with peril, and probably will see more problems then even this one.

Oh and your final comment is great. Just keep repeating that second hand sound-byte. Most of the people with a clue realize that all the current deployments are in areas where the kids have good access to food and water, but no real means of QUALITY EDUCATION. Which -again- is the whole fucking point.

I understand if you are not interested in the program, but at least take a little time to learn about it before spouting off, for fucks sakes.

[Rocketboy @ Apr 28th 2008 3:05PM]

And I'm sure that the built in applications to Sugar could not have been duplicated without starting from the OS up? Right?

Face it, OLPC was nothing but a way for NickNeg to get his name in the history books. It was a legacy for him. All you need to do is listen to some interviews of him regarding the OLPC, and it becomes clear as day.

OLPC is a square peg that is trying to be forced into a round hole.

[Bosco @ Apr 25th 2008 12:30PM]

I don't believe any of this. It sounds like a publicity stunt to make Napolean Negroponte seem like he has a modicum of business sense.

[cynyc @ Apr 25th 2008 1:45PM]

I have lost all faith in OLPC. The "give one, get one" promotion was a complete disaster on the administrative side. (see below)
Now they keep losing key people. They are clueless on how to run this properly. I thought Intel was just greedy or mean or both when they jumped ship, but I think there is more ineptitude behind closed doors than we even hear about. I was reluctant to tell my story below because it's such a great cause. But it is time to see that this isn't going right at all. What a disappointment.

(I ordered on the first day of the promo, then received an email that I would get mine before Christmas. Then I received an email in December apologizing that it won't arrive before Christmas as promised. New ship date: January 15th. Then got an email end of January saying that they can't ship to my address, even though they had the correct USPS formatted address. They asked to be contacted at a phone number, which was to be operational a week later, which it wasn't. When I finally got somebody on the phone mid February, they said they could possibly deliver end of March... I canceled the get, which was finally refunded a week ago. I let them keep the give donation and surely hope some child actually got one!)

[directive0 @ Apr 25th 2008 2:33PM]

You donated to a charity, and part of the deal was they'd get you a laptop. They missed the deadline, they fucked up. Their bad! A non-profit organization, understaffed and doing the impossible (producing a completely new computer, writing the software, running an education program, AND getting their message and product out to both the people that need them, and just the privileged that wanted them) and yes, they fucked up. And just to clarify, I was a g1g1 donor too, and mine arrived at the end of March just as they said. Hope you enjoyed your refund, wish you had done it sooner maybe mine would have arrived earlier.


And oh hey, while yours was still being assembled at Quanta, guess who got the priority shipment with the money you donated?

http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Ulaanbaatar

Thats right, the kids that actually fucking needed them, the people this whole project was started for!!! So while you were blowing a fuze over a cheap computer that you wanted to surf the web with, OLPC was actually delivering on their promises that mattered and doing something worthwhile for a child you will never meet. But its not as if you bothered to research any of this. You really just wanted a laptop, so when it didn't arrive it HAD to mean the program was just a cluster fuck, I mean if _I_ didn't get mine, surely no one else did. Jeeze.

This ineptitude everyone seems to like to imply exists within OLPC, well maybe it exists, but so far OLPC has delivered on almost everything they said they would do. Maybe a bit late, maybe a little more then they thought it would cost. But they delivered. Where is the classmate PC deployment? Or for that matter ANY deployment from ANY other computer education program in the developing world?

[cynyc @ Apr 25th 2008 3:42PM]

Wow, who's blowing a fuse here?...

I'm not quite sure why you feel the need to sit on a high horse. If I just wanted a laptop I would have waited and got one at cost, like you, my friend. I was planning to donate the second one, too and I ended up buying one in time for christmas and pass it on. But that is besides the point. I have no doubt that they're meaning well, (then I would have asked for my donation back) but that is not enough!

I happen to work closely with a non-profit organization and therefore I know how vital it is to communicate with your donors, have your accounting in order and deliver on your promises. It is the impression you are creating that counts and people will judge you by that. OLPC is messing up so badly on PR that their whole model is at danger. They have lost countless donors and goodwill. And THAT is what's so disappointing, that they're bungling they're own great idea. This could have been huge, but unfortunately it's a mess.

[directive0 @ Apr 25th 2008 8:16PM]

You have missed the point entirely. You and every other person who pissed and moaned throughout the entire G1G1 ordeal. And yes I am blowing a fuse, because I am tired of the MINORITY painting this horrible picture of OLPC for the people who's opinions may actually effect its performance.

G1G1 was not an indicator of the vitals of the program, its a poor metric for anything other then how piss poor OLPC's ability to ship single laptops to tens of thousands of people is. Something that will NEVER come up in the field where they are dealing with single orders of the same number. And when we're looking at the effectiveness of a program such as these, what matters is the deployments in the field. That is what the program is about. So really, the fact that you have lost any faith in OLPC isn't what gets me, hell I even agree with it to a certain extent. The current snafu's internally are a great indicator that there is a shared common goal that they can't agree on and things are breaking down. Problem is, OLPC is bigger then what's going on in the US, there are deployments all over the world that are PROVING that this program can and does benefit and work.

And here you are using the G1G1 fuckup as some kind of proof positive that the whole thing has gone to hell. I don't know what charity you worked for, but I feel pretty safe in saying that whatever it was it did not do anything even approaching the scale and ambition of OLPC. I agree that G1G1 was a disaster, no hyperbole. But thats a little like NASA building a second rate Schooner. Sure it's concerning, but it's hardly a good indicator of how effectively they can accomplish their actual purpose of putting a human in orbit.

This isn't JUST about giving laptops to children, there is a greater sweeping movement at work here. And if you take the time to look past their inability to smoothly and easily do something that even the largest most driven companies find difficult, you will see that there is a lot of good being done with the money you donated. Had you have been a little more patient, you might have even been able to contribute and participate. It is your loss.

[Chuck Burgess @ Apr 25th 2008 2:02PM]

I had no trouble receiving the two that I'd ordered on separate dates.

[mediaphile @ Apr 30th 2008 9:14PM]

@directive0

I'm not sure why you have to be such a dick. You should really calm down.

The guy said he lost faith in the program. You said you agreed to a certain extent. End of story.