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Why Intel and OLPC Parted Ways
Posted by
Zonk
on Sun Jan 06, 2008 09:13 AM
from the so-the-drama dept.
from the so-the-drama dept.
runamock writes "The New York Times has an article that sheds some light on why Intel left the OLPC board: 'A frail partnership between Intel and the One Laptop Per Child educational computing group was undone last month in part by an Intel saleswoman: She tried to persuade a Peruvian official to drop the country's commitment to buy a quarter-million of the organization's laptops in favor of Intel PCs. Intel and the group had a rocky relationship from the start in their short-lived effort to get inexpensive laptops into the hands of the world's poorest children. But the saleswoman's tactic was the final straw for Nicholas Negroponte.'"
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News: Intel Resigns from One Laptop Per Child Project 338 comments
theodp writes "Reportedly angered by the One Laptop Per Child project's demand that it curtail work on its Classmate PC and other cheap laptops, Intel has resigned from the project's board and canceled plans for an Intel-based OLPC laptop. Intel's withdrawal from the project comes less than six months after the chip-making giant earned kudos for agreeing to contribute funding and join the board of OLPC. It's the latest blow to the OLPC, whose CTO quit earlier this week to launch a for-profit company to commercialize her OLPC inventions."
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The poorest (Score:5, Funny)
Intel is all kinds of Wrong. (Score:5, Insightful)
Expect to hear all the usual "Intel is a business" bullsh*t that always comes up.
What has to be remembered is that Google is a business, Red Hat is a business, News Corp is a business too, and yet none of them actively tried to sabotage the OLPC foundation they had contracted to be a part of. Somehow they can justify their participation to the stockholders, but Intel can't? Intel was acting competitively before they joined the OLPC foundation in July of last year. After that time they continued to do so, only now they had access to a lot more information about XO potential buyers. Their behavior was despicable and only further enforces my decision long ago to buy AMD processors exclusively.
Adding insult to injury, Intel holds a press conference call announcing the decision to split, without informing the OLPC board. Read through the stories from last Thursday. The olpc foundation had no response because they were shocked.
They recovered nicely in my view with this official response. http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Intel#INTEL_RESIGNS_FROM_OLPC [laptop.org]
I hope Negroponte & company sues for breach of contract.
Re:Intel is all kinds of Wrong. (Score:5, Informative)
INTEL RESIGNS FROM OLPC
We at OLPC have been disappointed that Intel did not deliver on any of the promises they made when they joined OLPC; while we were hopeful for a positive, collaborative relationship, it never materialized.
Intel came in late to the OLPC association: they joined an already strong and thriving OLPC Board of Directors made up of premier technology partners; these partners have been crucial in helping us fulfill our mission of getting laptops into the hands of children in the developing world. We have always embraced and welcomed other low-cost laptop providers to join us in this mission. But since joining the OLPC Board of Directors in July, Intel has violated its written agreement with OLPC on numerous occasions. Intel continued to disparage the XO laptop in nations that had already decided to partner with OLPC (Uruguay and Peru), with countries that were in the midst of choosing a laptop solution (Brazil and Nigeria), and other countries contemplating a laptop program (Mongolia).
Intel was unwilling to work cooperatively with OLPC on software development. Over the entire six months it was a member of the association, Intel contributed nothing of value to OLPC: Intel never contributed in any way to our engineering efforts and failed to provide even a single line of code to the XO software efforts - even though Intel marketed its products as being able to run the XO software. The best Intel could offer in regards to an "Intel inside" XO laptop was one that would be more expensive and consume more power - exactly the opposite direction of OLPC's stated mandate and vision.
Despite OLPC's best efforts to work things out with Intel and several warnings that their behavior was untenable, it is clear that Intel's heart has never been in working collaboratively as a part of OLPC. This is well illustrated by the way in which our separation was announced singlehandedly by Intel; Intel issued a statement to the press behind our backs while simultaneously asking us to work on a joint statement with them. Actions do speak louder than words in this case. As we said in the past, we view the children as a mission; Intel views them as a market.
The benefit to the departure of Intel from the OLPC board is a renewed clarity in purpose and the marketplace; we will continue to focus on our mission of providing every child with an opportunity for learning.
Power consumption (Score:5, Informative)
See the power consumption data [wikipedia.org] for the laptop. It runs a 2W (versus 10-45W for a normal laptop) in normal mode and down to 0.3W-0.8W when in "e-book" mode. Running that against the battery data [laptop.org] which reports 16.5-22Watt-hours gives a normal-usage of 8 to 11 hours, or e-book usage for 20-73 hours.
You can also get a pull-string charger [engadget.com] for when there is no supply.
This isn't comparable to companies supplying old hardware as a goodwill gesture: the OLPC has been thought through and planned for these situations from the beginning.
There are interesting parallels to this elsewhere (Score:5, Insightful)
In lesser-known areas, where state utilities commissions have allowed utilities providers (power and communications) to not develop a region, smaller, independent groups and coops have opted to fill in the need for their own profit and non-profit interests only to face opposition from the very utilities providers that refuse to service the areas themselves.
"The Electric Car" has been stopped and stalled many times by the opposition of big auto makers time and time again.
There are probably many other examples of established big business opposing small business in doing things that they themselves are unwilling or uninterested in doing... any come to mind? An under our "free market capitalist idealism" it's rather hard to imagine why big business would even care? It's because big business isn't interested in "free market capitalism." They want no competition of any kind and they want to charge as much money as they possibly can for their goods and services as possible.
These are really good examples of what big business is truly about. Every time you hear an argument about "free markets" being wielded by big business, I hope you consider what big business is truly all about.
(For example, the free market argument was given by Enron as the reason to remove or reduce government controls over the power industry and following that, every single state that allowed it suffered from ridiculously high power costs and even power shortages and irregularities in quality and delivery. The free market doesn't work EVERYWHERE and isn't the answer to EVERYTHING. And it certainly doesn't apply when there are human _needs_ at the consumer side of the counter. Utilities, food and medical care need heavy regulation to keep the nations of the world healthy and it's precisely the lack of strong enough regulation of the US medical industry is in the 'unaffordable' state it's in and before someone points to the US medical system as being the most advanced in the world, I hold it has nothing to do with the lack of regulation or the possibility of higher profits and everything to do with their exploitation of research done in public learning institutions... research not available to the public itself.)
Don't get mad, get even! (Score:5, Informative)
But my second, more constructive thought was "what can I do to help OLPC?" and I easily found two great answers.
1. Donate. [laptopgiving.org] For just $200, you can give an XO laptop to a child in a developing nation. It immediately makes a difference in the life of one child, and it's an opportunity for the XO to prove itself. Our donations no doubt will drive future sales for OLPC. Donations are entirely tax-deductible (Question: does anyone know they're tax-deductible for Canadians?).
2. Develop. [laptop.org] If you're a programmer, you can donate some of your time and work on an XO Activity. There's already a pretty impressive array of available software [laptop.org], but there's lots of room for work, and this is one way that OLPC can really differentiate itself. Think about it: thousands of passionate hackers contributing quality free software, all targeted at this machine. That's something that Intel and Microsoft will never be able to compete with because no one else is ever going to be passionate about Classmate & Windows.
Let's make a difference!
Re:The NYT headline is a bit inflammatory... (Score:5, Insightful)
Intel wants to sell PC's. They don't care who gets them. For Intel all the feelgood stuff is just a means to an end.
OLPC doesn't care about selling PC's. ALL they care about is who gets them. For OLPC all the business stuff is just a means to an end.
Re:The NYT headline is a bit inflammatory... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:The NYT headline is a bit inflammatory... (Score:5, Insightful)
Part of the OLPC, whether spoken directly or not, is that old "give a man a fish and he eats for the day, teach a man to fish and he eats for the rest of his life." There are plenty of charities and organizations built around the notion of "feed the children." I'd like to say "those bases are covered" but perhaps not as well as people would like. (You'll find their local governments are often the ones getting in the way of the 'feed the children' successes... some for good reason, some not.)
But as long as these 3rd world nations do not grow intellectually, they will remain the starving, dependent children of world.
If OLPC was intending to make a profit, there were many decisions that could have been made along the way that would have reflected that end. They made decisions and continue to make decisions based on their mission -- a charitable one. It's okay you choose not to believe in it. It's often hard to believe in something that's not profit oriented these days.
Re:The NYT headline is a bit inflammatory... (Score:5, Interesting)
Maybe in favour of Intel? A more accurate headline, but one that could be construed as inflammatory would be:
Intel attempts to subvert efforts to get computers to children.
"the Intel machines it's trying to sell will still go to the same target audience as the OLPC units"
For about twice the price. Which means half the number of units.
"it's not like they suddenly hate kids!"
Well, no. They just dont like kids quite as much as they like money.
I don't particularly dislike Intel, but in this case I must say I find their behaviour offensive. This will go on their permanent record and get weighed in for future purchases.
"I'd love to see other devices like the EEE PC tailored towards developing nations in the near future."
In the long run, paving the ground for this device class is without a doubt the greatest contribution of the OLPC project.
Re:Intel just sucks. (Score:5, Insightful)
Isn't that just some Godwin variant? [wikipedia.org]
AMD, Apple, IBM, Intel... these are just companies trying to outsmart the competition. You don't seriously think the Intel board sat down and said, "hey let's maliciously fuck-over the OLPC project"? That would take a special brand of evil, the kind that is only occurs naturally in Redmond.
Re:Intel just sucks. (Score:5, Insightful)
Your comment might have been intended as humor, but it's currently marked "insightful" so I'm responding to it on that basis (if not for your sake than for the sake of anyone who does think it's insightful).
Aside from the specific choice of language, you really think it's far fetched? If so, then let me spell it out for you: YES, Intel could well have had meetings where they explicitly planned to do things in breach of either the word or spirit of their arrangements with OLPC, aka "maliciously fucking over" their partner. Intel is a for-profit American corporation. Not even outright breaches of contract are off-limits for corporations; they'll do it every time they think it will make them more money than holding to a contract would.
It is far more plausible that Intel planned this all the way up the ladder than that this one salesperson just decided to be a maverick and try to subvert things without any approval from management.
I'd hate to think you're more comfortable hiding behind the posture that technically, nobody at any Intel meetings used the specific words "maliciously fuck-over".
Re:Intel just sucks. (Score:5, Insightful)
The fact is that not all people, and not all companies, are willing to do anything (and everything), regardless of law and morality, in order crush their competition. What you are suggesting, really, is "why single out individuals who act badly". What this means is that acting badly should be the status que. No.
Re:Intel just sucks. (Score:5, Insightful)
Intel didn't sit down and say "let's screw over OLPC", they said "hey, we could lose money here". Companies will abuse monopolies, but Intel doesn't have a monopoly-that's the point; they did what a monopoly WOULD do. What M$ does isn't a special brand of evil, it's merely a particulary voracious approach toward getting and maintaining market share. See the similarities here? Before AMD became a force, Intel did exhibit some very M$ like behavior.
Intel missed an opportunity. If they got their chips into the OLPC, they could have turned it into a huge PR campaign and gained name recognition in vast areas of the world that have no idea who they are. Besides, OLPC is a nonprofit deliberately trying to bring low cost computing to areas of the world that have little or no access to the current market. Why didn't they have a Classmate program BEFORE OLPC existed?
Shame.
Poor management by CEO Paul Otellini (Score:5, Informative)
Intel employees I've met have gone further than that. They are saying that the management of Intel CEO Paul S. Otellini [wikipedia.org] is reprehensible. They say he is socially unskilled. They are saying he creates dissension and reduces morale among Intel employees by creating adversarial situations.
Certainly Otellini's handling of the One Laptop Per Child initiative could not have been worse. It was as though he said to himself, "How can I get billions of dollars worth of free publicity for Intel, all negative?" Intel's actions have created the impression that Intel wants to kill acceptance of the OLPC so that it can kill the OLPC project and then raise prices on its own products.
Anyone thinking of buying an Intel consumer product should know that Intel had a consumer products division in 2001 and decided to close it: Intel axes its consumer electronics unit [zdnet.co.uk]. Why? In my opinion, the Intel Consumer Products Division was extremely poorly managed.
Also, Intel's marketing has been incredibly poorly managed. At one point, Intel was trying to sell processors by giving away dolls. Typical reaction: "Could this be the end of the bunny ads? We sure as hell hope so..." [theregister.co.uk]
There is no evidence that I can see that Intel is managed better today. Here is an April 2006 example I found quickly: Intel's consumer fumbling [zdnet.co.uk], in which Intel is trying to sell products using an unpronounceable trademark.
Re:Intel just sucks - Agreed (Score:5, Interesting)
In my experience, there are tons of people in the business world like Mr. Negroponte. We don't hear about them for two reasons. First, they tend to be small business owners. Second, they tend not to do heinous things. The news goes for interesting stories, which excludes the small fry doing something nice for someone else.
Re:Intel just sucks - Agreed (Score:5, Insightful)
In my experience, there are tons of people in the business world like Mr. Negroponte. We don't hear about them for two reasons. First, they tend to be small business owners. Second, they tend not to do heinous things. The news goes for interesting stories, which excludes the small fry doing something nice for someone else.
Business is not based on good or evil but profit and loss. One should never expect business to do anything but maximize its profits. To control byuiness, one needs laws that make it profitable to do good and unprofitable to do evil. That means costs for business should include the externalities, such as production of greenhouse gases, now subsidized by government.
Re:Intel just sucks - Agreed (Score:5, Insightful)
There are lot of companies, which actually kinda see huge connection between doing good and getting profit. If it wasn't so, there won't be PR, there won't be ads, there won't be customer psyhology courses, Bs for different marketing types, etc. It is all connected and it comes back.
Problem is different. It is not ethical versus material. It is long term versus short term. It pays back to be good in long term, for sure. But in short term, sometimes it doesn't.
And it all boils down to "stupid" human survival instinct - it wants all now, it wants very strong guarantee now. Not tomorrow, not even after one hour. If human just acts, not thinks, it will choose short term survival as it's primary goal.
p.s. "stupid" in brackets means - I don't know how to solve it, it's natural and if people live like that, who am I to judge.
Re:So they're a normal corporation, eh? (Score:5, Insightful)
He made them an offer, and now Intel piggybacks on his effort and tries to weasel a deal to have more expensive machine, meaning that fewer children will get access to an educational machine (but hey, Intel gets to make more millions in profit, which is what really matters, huh?).
And all you can do is rehash free market dogma to support the people who are undermining a non profit charity effort in order to divert the money involved to their own greedy pockets.
Re:So they're a normal corporation, eh? (Score:5, Insightful)
Negroponte can forbid Intel sell their boxes? No! Can Negroponte ask for them to actually deliver what they promised? Yes! Intel promised to streamline OLPC and Classmate PC, create OLPC XO-2 with Intel tech, not try to block OLPC sales for now, and lot of other things which they actually NOT delivered. Instead of that, sales person from Intel slammed OLPC behind the back of OLPC to OLPC customer, while being on board of OLPC!
I just wander who "capitalist dreamer" mod you up. Because you actually have NO clue what you are talking about. Check facts please before be so very elitist about corporations.
Re:No surprise here (Score:5, Insightful)
As a stockholder you are never asked about whether you want your corporation to behave well.
As a stockholder you are given an annual meeting, with buffet and speeches and an opposition which seldom raises questions like: why does this bank finances this oppressive regime? why does this corporation infiltrate and boycott this humanitarian program? To make me earn more? If I want to earn more no matter the ethics, I'd be a criminal. Especially in the criminal's paradise Italy has become.
Re:No surprise here (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm sick and tired of this hard-nosed extreemist capitalist view. It's bullshit, pure and simple. Take a look at what you're actually saying - competing with and screwing over a charity is really bad form. You people need to remember that capitalism is NOT PERFECT, and worshipping it's principles as if they were the most fundamental rules in the universe is really dumb.
Intel did a stupid thing (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, but lowering costs does improve the bottom line. How much of the Classmate's cost is software? Remember, Microsoft isn't a charity either. Intel has no reason to help Microsoft, they could make an Intel computer at a lower cost with 100% free software in it.
Besides the cost of software itself, no matter if it's $3 or $300, Linux runs on lower hardware specs than Microsoft products. The XO needs extra memory to run a version of MS-Windows, which means still more cost.
Re:No surprise here (Score:5, Insightful)
Unfortunately, State Attorneys General have forgotten this.
Re:Why is everyone going after Intel? (Score:5, Insightful)
I hope you sleep well on your pile of blood money.