Talk:XO Giving

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I've seen Mr. Negroponte's story on "60 Minutes," and have press releases about the project. I advise a group of college students who raise money for the Zambia Open Community Schools program, a program for students too poor to attend government schools. It seems like this is exactly the population the project is designed for . . . but I'm gathering that the only way to serve a relatively small program (we've raised ~$150,000 over several years, all of which has gone directly to the ZOCS program). Is the "Buy One, Give One" program the only way we could connect olpc to the children in and around Lusaka, Zambia?

Using testing for expectation management

MitchellNCharity 12:43, 18 October 2007 (EDT) My understanding is an xogiving site rewrite is in progress, addressing expectation management by emphasizing the laptop is a "gift" in return for your donation. Here is an additional, complementary, expectation management idea - invoke testing. The software they receive will unquestionably be quite buggy. But we should be able to change some "Oh, _another_ bug. :( How disappointing/annoying." to "Oh, another bug! Another opportunity to contribute to the project and the world!". And at the same time contribute to expectation setting.

At least when doing one-on-one demos with people on the street, it's possible for their feelings towards bugs to go either way. Disappointment, or, turning proudly to their friends, "Hey, *I* helped find a bug!". It's something I experience myself. Perhaps some key factors include 'not being surprised', 'not getting stuck', and 'a feeling that the situation is improving'. The 'not getting stuck' is more a "creating a support model for xogiving folks, who don't have a school/city full of xo peers, perhaps by facilitating community formation", and thus off topic for this note. But the surprise, and moving towards bug finding as a positive thing, we can start addressing now.

With something like

The software will likely be buggier than much commercial software.

As part of your getting this gift, this early release of the laptop, it is our hope that you will note and report the many bugs you encounter, helping us prepare for and support, the pilot schools and initial deployments around the world.

Possible extra bits:

...by (downloading and) running the "testing and bug reporting application"... Basically, the testing team's Test activity.

Observing that children, at least in communities, can find ways around many bugs, but can't do anything with hardware and software they don't have, we have been focused getting key features more or less usable, for our user and developer community to build on.

bug reports will help... us, and the community of developers. <-- emphasize community aspect

More

• There seems a default expectation among people that they will be delivered by Christmas.
• The keyboard is too small for most adults to touch type. This needs to be made clear, lest the purchaser be surprised. Perhaps a photo with a large adult hand? Actually, some older children report it small in trials. I've no idea what the range is. The site should provide guidance.
• The laptop is slow. My one-liner is "It's like a laptop from several years ago. Faster than most current handhelds, but several times slower than current mainstream laptops".
• There has been a lot of news coverage of the "the battery lasts all day!". We are far from that. Which was fine when it was long-term vision pr. But not now. We should give detailed and real numbers for battery life, else wild expectations will bite us. It's an FAQ when doing demos.
• Detailed list of what you get, with picture. No crank.

MitchellNCharity 12:43, 18 October 2007 (EDT)