Laptop Charity Dismisses Commercial Sales

Speculation that the so-called $100 laptop could be sold to the general public through eBay has been dismissed by the group in charge of the project.

The One Laptop Per Child initiative, a spin-off group from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, aims to bring hi-tech, low-cost computing to developing economies such as Brazil, Egypt and Thailand. The project says it will begin shipping the "XO" machines - which currently cost around $150 (£76) to manufacture - later this year.

Last week, however, it appeared that the organisation was also considering financing itself by selling the machines to the general public, not just governments.

In an interview with BBC News, Michalis Bletsas, the group's chief connectivity officer, said that OLPC could partner with eBay to sell the computers to western customers at a higher price.

"If we started selling the laptop now, we would do very good business," he said. "But our focus right now is on the launch in the developing world."

But this weekend Nicholas Negroponte, the founder and chairman of OLPC, rejected that claim and said the group had no intention of selling its products to a wider audience.

"Contrary to recent reports, OLPC is not planning a consumer version of its current XO laptop, designed for the poorest and most remote children in the world," Mr Negroponte said in a statement.

The group said Mr Bletsas had made a poor choice of words in expressing the scope of future plans, and that a deal with eBay was not on the cards.

"Many commercial ventures have been considered and proposed that may surface in 2008 or beyond, one of which is 'buy 2 and get 1'. In addition, OLPC is launching the OLPC Foundation later this month, specifically to accommodate the huge goodwill and charity that has surfaced around the idea of a $100 laptop."

BBC technology correspondent Darren Waters, who conducted the original interview said Mr Bletsas's emphasis had turned a "possibility" into something more concrete.

"My story was written in good faith based on accurate quotes," Waters wrote on the corporation's technology blog. Mr Bletsas "had used the wrong words to communicate the project's actions, giving me the sense it was a plan and more than a possibility".

The OLPC project, which is cutting production costs of computers through the use of innovative power techniques and cutting out expensive software, has come in for criticism from some technology leaders. Intel boss Craig Barrett dismissed it as a "$100 gadget", while Microsoft chairman Bill Gates sideswiped the plans by claiming a low-cost machine would not be able to function properly.

"Geez... get a decent computer where you can actually read the text and you're not sitting there cranking the thing while you're trying to type," he was quoted as saying last year.

But Walter Bender, the president of software and content for OLPC, said the outbursts were simply professional jealousy. Last summer, he told the Guardian that the attacks were "transparent" attempts to promote competing products.

"I certainly haven't lost any sleep. We're a non-profit organisation and our mission is quite simple - get laptops to children to learn with. That doesn't mean they have to be our laptops, or our vision of computing or operating systems," he said.