Fancy a laptop for US$399? How about two for that price? Then start counting down the days to November 12...

In an effort to kick-start the One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) project -- a scheme designed to make rugged, low-cost computers available to children in developing countries -- the organisers are promoting a "give one, get one" scheme to potential First World users. For a fortnight from November 12 you'll be able to buy two laptops for US$399. One will be sent to you w
hile the other will go to a child in a developing country.

I think it's a brilliant scheme and have already put my name on their mailing list. And that's not just an act of charity. (Or because the wee beastie runs Linux.) I really believe there's a market for simple-to-use, low-cost computers. A huge market. I mean, what do most people use a PC for? Email, web browsing, instant messaging, word processing... and... um... that's about it. So why do we need all that expensive complexity when a cheap "appliance" would do the trick?

I'm no audiophile. I just like to drop in a CD and hit the Play button. You're probably the same. Yet people in the computer industry seem to forget that's how most folk in the real world would like to use computers. They just want to switch-on and go.

And the OLPC's XO Laptop -- to give it its official name -- ain't no turkey. "The XO laptop can do many things that a $1000 dollar laptop can not. For instance, the XO’s screen can be viewed as clearly as a newspaper in broad daylight. Also the wireless range of the XO is several times longer than your average laptop. Plus the XO laptop does not have any mechanical parts like a fan or a hard drive, which are by far the most common source of hardware failure in a laptop. The XO is more rugged, resistant, and power efficient than any computer on the market today."

What's more it can be recharged by solar cells, or foot-pump or pull-string powered chargers. Oh, and it's waterproof too.