Windows and OLPC

I've been following this issue for a while and word on the street (or should I say web?) is that a windows based OS is coming to the XO machines. I must say that I'm intrigued by all of this - for both positive and negative reasons. Some of which, I'll explore here in order to give you all a sense of how I came to my overall conclusion.

Positive:

• Opening up the XOs to other operating systems rather than Sugar is a smart move. Not everyone can handle Sugar (due to frustration or otherwise). Its nice to allow people more freedom of choice.
• It also will bring in more of a userbase. Much more people are into using Windows rather linux and so by using that OS you'll also see the general interest of the computers increase greatly.
• This little thought just occurred to me: While creating Sugar to make things simple for kids across the world was a great idea, I can't help but to think that it may handicap them later on when they try to use more mainstream computers. I think that exposing them to different environments as they are being taught with the XOs would be a better method.
  

Negative:

• The project itself may become more corporate than originally planned. There is a chance that the goal may be lost in the shuffle.
  
• Along with the possible consequence of a lost vision, it may end up turning off people that already are very involved with the current movement. People that have already done so much work for the community, thus it would be a shame to see them leave.

Yet still, overall I think that despite Microsoft being the so-called "evil empire", having the OS on the machines would be an interesting thing. It would - hopefully - open all of this new to new people and new ideas. All of which, would help to bring the project closer to its goal. Well, in my little perfect world, at least. Can't wait to see what really happens...