[plug] Re: Computer Bank - please dont give them away.

[Tamara Thompson]

That is a brilliant idea!  Perhaps keeping the project small at first, and focussed at a specific audience would help launch it. 
 
I wonder if your equivalent of "Junior High" (12-14yrs) and High School would be a good place to start a Linux club?  That way you offer the "courses" and pc's to a variety of kids from all different backgrounds?  

I can imagine such a project growing into a club where the kids themselves eventually help others put hardware together and teach each other about Linux.

Tamara

>>> "Buddrige, David" <david.buddrige at mitswa.com.au> 01/05 9:35 PM >>>
One idea I could think of to avoid problems of people getting pc's and then
selling them is to offer them thus:

1. Offer "free/cheap linux/computer training courses"
2. On "graduation" you receive a free pc.

This seems to me to be an easy way of sorting out those who are really
interested - also solves the problem of people getting a pc and not knowing
what to do with it...

regards

David Buddrige

> -----Original Message-----
> From:	Mike Holland [SMTP:myk at golden.wattle.id.au] 
> Sent:	Wednesday, January 06, 1999 11:51 AM
> To:	plug at linux.org.au 
> Subject:	[plug] Re: Computer Bank - please dont give them away.
> 
> David,
> I'm afraid that to really achieve something with this project will take
> a lot of effort.
> 
>    Consider how the better charities operate. Goods are sold at low
> prices in Op-Shops. If they were given away, I can assure you people
> would take as much as they could get and sell it for peanuts to second
> hand dealers. The low prices in op-shops are enough to stop such waste,
> but not too much for the poor to afford.
> 
>   Just giving away PCs will lower their value If they wind up in 
> cash-converters the next day, you will be lucky, because the buyer
> will probably be a poor person getting a cheap computer and _wanting_ it.
> 
>   Who are the beneficiaries? Poor kids who make it to University might be
> sufficiently motivated to just need the kit you describe.
> Are you thinking of single parent families, Aboriginies, unemployed,
> disabled, the "working poor"?
> 
> Most "lower socioeconomic" kids will have real problems, and need
> lots of support if they are ever to get into Linux. The home environment
> is likely bad. They would need somewhere to go. A computer room in the
> community hall? Perhaps with lockers for their PCs, and shared monitors
> (bolted firmly to heavy tables). Volunteers from Computer Bank to help and
> supervise.
> 
> Or would the strategy be to seek out those who only need financial help?
> 
>  I fear that getting hardware is the easy bit, but may achieve little
> more than a warm feeling by itself.
> But there must be huge numbers of unused 486s out there in industry,
> which companies might be persuaded to see as a cheap way to get some
> good publicity.
> 
> 
> 
> On Thu, 31 Dec 1998, David Buddrige wrote:
> 
> > 1. We obtain and build computers ready to go with Linux.
> > 2. Put with Computers, some basic instructional material to allow
> > new-user to get started.
> > 3. Put contact details on instructional material (for more help, contact
> > XYZ?)
> > 4. Give computers to various organisations to distribute to various
> > persons/families in need.
> 
> 
> Mike Holland <mike at golden.wattle.id.au>            Perth, Australia.
>                           --==--
> For perfect happiness, remember two things:
>         (1) Be content with what you've got.
>         (2) Be sure you've got plenty.