OLPC Leader Jumps Ship As Windows XP Nears

Boston (dbTechno) - One of the leaders of the One Laptop Per Child Foundation has jumped ship. The colleague of founder Nicholas Negroponte, Walter Bender, has decided to call it quits. This comes as OLPC moves towards adopting the Microsoft Windows XP operating system.

The original idea behind OLPC was to offer a $100 laptop to children in schools where they could not afford the technology.

The OLPC has had a rough run since its start though, as the cost of its laptops has been around the $200 price tags since launch. They have also failed to get the laptops in as many childrens’ hands as they had hopes.

Bender leaving OLPC marks the thrid high-profile team member to jump ship. He already has new plans to build on the XO’s software, known as Sugar. He hopes to get it to run on Linux computers outside of the OLPC’s XOs.

This comes as Negroponte stated that very soon, he expected the XO laptops to have a dual-boot option. This is going to allow users to run Microsoft Windows XP on the XO laptops, or Sugar.

The biggest problem many have with this though si the increased cost to the laptop, as some believe it would only put them farther away from offering a true $100 machine.