Talk:OLPC myths

Flash vs HD

Since the Gb cost of Flash memory is much higher than that of a standard HD, wouldn't it be much better to have a hard drive? More storage capacity, at a comparable price. Flash is OK, but too expensive.

But Flash is much more robust in the context of our deployment. A broken high-capacity HD is not of much use. Walter 02:04, 5 May 2006 (EDT)

Didn't the specs say that it had USB ports? When they need hard drives I'm sure USB hard drives will be available.--FazzMunkle 23:18, 8 September 2006 (EDT)

Just tightening up the wordings, clearing up potential misunderstandings and adding some entries

I added one more that I see a lot of. That of value judgements placed on this project simply because companies like Microsoft have come up with their own ideas.--FazzMunkle 14:21, 19 March 2006 (EST)

The recycling myth/misunderstanding entry

I figured it should be elaborated on and the original dealt with two distinct issues of recycling/disposability, one possibly answering the other. I hope I kept the original spirit of the entry.--FazzMunkle 11:21, 21 March 2006 (EST)

Elaborated on the "more harm than good" myth.

I figured some exploration on why people think this was in order.--FazzMunkle 11:44, 21 March 2006 (EST)

Just want to advise people against personal opinion

A few times in the added text it looked like the additions were more from personal opinion than from impartial observation. But it doesn't look like it. Nevertheless there is the possibility that from our personal belief in this program may come opinions from emotion that may color this list of myths as more propoganda than a list of missunderstandings and factual corrections. Let's keep a certain discipline when maintaining this list for future notes of mind. It's ok to list shortcomings as well as advantages of this project/program. After all, the honest and frank person can gain the most reverence when all is said and done.

I myself have entered into this with opinions borne more out of emotion than facts, but ever since the initial entry I've strived to keep things as informational as possible with a clinical mind and vocabulary. While keeping things concise yet still getting the right information across without confusion or chance of taking things out of context by those against the project/program. It would behoove us to keep it this way. If we've made factual or judgement errors in our entries, we're all there to back each other up without feeling bad about it. :-) That's how a wiki works. heh.--FazzMunkle 07:14, 26 March 2006 (EST)

When this page was first proposed, it was suggested that every effort be made to cite sources for both the myths and the "facts." This sort of discipline might help with the all-too-human tendency to let emotion color the discussion. Walter 04:13, 7 June 2006 (EDT)

Yeah, that's what I was hoping. Some people would know what I was talking about and edit to provide sources. One of the frustrations is that I've heard many of these myths and read many of these myths, but I'll be darned if I can find those sources again. I was only able to cite a couple sources.

But feel free to modify or delete any myths you might not think are too realistic or that might not be widespread.--FazzMunkle 15:25, 7 July 2006 (EDT)

This laptop will do more harm than good

A technology is never "simply a tool". Technology is never neutral; it embeds within its design the desires, assumptions, and beliefs of its maker. Thus the development of the laptop contains within it a particular Western view of how people learn and how society should be run. Do we want to undertake this form of technological imperialism when, as you've said, there are many languages and cultures that seem to be "dying out"? Given that the laptop, at least in the forms that I've seen, uses an English-style keyboard, I cannot see how its use will help revive dying languages. As well, I would contend that the need to close the "digital divide" is still debatable; can we not imagine another world that is not so infused with technology? Something that is developed from the bottom-up, instead of outside influences coming in with some sort of top-down, imposed program. ---nak

Where is the evidence dying languages are harmed by computing? Walter 07:04, 21 July 2006 (EDT)

Erm... *scratches head* I'm not sure who made that entry/edit about languages and I don't really have an answer for it in order to edit it. If it's wrong then correct it if you know it's wrong or if you can find evidence it's true. It was an interesting theory, I just didn't know enough to know if it was an actuality. The original entry was concerned with more the digital divide between cultures.--FazzMunkle 23:27, 8 September 2006 (EDT)

Please keep comments to the discussion area.

I see there was a comment inserted into the middle of an entry that addressed the entry itself. If you think it could be worded better, please edit it. If you want to comment on an entry, quote it and enter it into the discussion page. I'll leave it up so the originator of the comment can make the changes or the comment can be moved without having to dig in the history. Someone else can try to "massage" the comment into the entry if they want to if they think it was a valid concern. Heck, even change the entry to something different if you want. You might make better sense than I ever could. ;-) I'm not trying to be a stick in the mud, I want to respect the opinion of whoever commented. It's just inefficient to have comments in the middle of the main article.--FazzMunkle 23:39, 8 September 2006 (EDT)

Question about the brackets [ & ]

Is this a hint to include the text within with the rest of the related entry? If it is I'll gladly include it as part of the main entry in each entry. No problem there.--FazzMunkle 23:46, 8 September 2006 (EDT)

Reuters have withdrawn the story.

The laptop does not have internal storage such as a hard drive.

This link no longer points to anything; is this a problem ? Should the stories be copied onto this site for reference purposes? Unfortunatly, the wayback machine has only a pointer to the story not it's body.

"In some cases we do in fact see intolerable performance."

Could you please be more specific? --Walter 03:56, 18 September 2007 (EDT)

Proceed every myth with "False" - How to improve this page on myths

Quoting from User:SvenAERTS: "Read the Debunking Handbook to understand how to properly respond to questions from objectors, and read the relevant research on communication, a collection of which can be found in the bibliography of the Debunking Handbook. --Quozl 01:11, 6 September 2013 (UTC)."

Yes this is a better phrasing. I wanted to show I concur with your vision as per "Debunking Handbook".

But I don't see an edit button on this page. --SvenAERTS 10:55, 20 January 2014 (UTC)

The page is locked so that only administrators can edit it, so sorry, you can't edit it. As it is a page specifically designed for factual response to myths, it should not be used alone for debunking. It already triggers the overkill backfire effect for any objector. Making it any larger would increase that effect. If there are any factual errors in the page, please mention them in new sections of this talk page. If the page doesn't do enough advocacy for you, then sorry, that's not what the page is for. --Quozl 23:48, 20 January 2014 (UTC)

Wasn't contemplating on wether the list is too long or too small. I was just wondering as the official pages managed by OLPC on this wiki normally have a green bar stating that and this one didn't. That's all I wanted to signal. Sorry? --SvenAERTS 02:16, 21 January 2014 (UTC)

Okay, green bar added, thanks for letting me know. The green bar is caused by use of the OLPC template, and page locking is a separate function. --Quozl 03:23, 21 January 2014 (UTC)

The titles are the links to the pages on the topic. So if we alter the title and make it proceed by the world e.g. False, then the pages don't link to the page with the content anymore. Is there any automated way to solve this issue? --SvenAERTS 10:55, 20 January 2014 (UTC)

Only two section titles were links to articles on other web sites. The links had broken, the referenced articles were no longer available on the other web sites. So I have removed the links. --Quozl 23:48, 20 January 2014 (UTC)

I noticed later on indeed it was only 2 titles / myths that went to I assumed dedicated or relevant pages with the correct info. It remains my conviction to place "False / Falsehood" in front of every myth because if you jump to the section using the navigation / table of content, one might not see the title "Myth" anymore. --SvenAERTS 02:16, 21 January 2014 (UTC)

I don't think that matters; few people use a table of contents in that way, Myth appears in the browser location bar as part of the URL, in any tab title for a browser with multiple tabs, and the user should have known they were on the Myth page before they clicked. --Quozl 03:23, 21 January 2014 (UTC)

We expect billions of kids and olpc and OLPC members to read these pages in a near future, don't we? "and the user should have known they were on the Myth page " ... yeah, they should have, but there's so many reasons why they don't. Well I can't put a "False" in front of every page. I rest the case here. --SvenAERTS 08:40, 21 January 2014 (UTC)

No, I would not expect billions of kids or others to read these pages in a near future. Firstly because they wouldn't want to, and secondly because the server would not be able to deliver them. --Quozl 05:16, 24 January 2014 (UTC)