And the Soap Opera Continues…

Today on Laptops for the Young and the Restless Intel’s Bruce Sewell responds in The Wall Street Journal to One Laptop Per Child’s plea that Intel is at “fault” for the break-up. His op-ed, entitled Wait Just a Minute — Intel Isn’t the Bad Guy Here, states directly:

“OLPC decided the Classmate PC was causing OLPC less success and threatened to throw us off its board unless we killed it. Intel could not and would not withdraw support to the governments and small-computer manufacturers in developing countries who are buying and building the Classmate PC.”

Just as we suspected. Intel would not leave its “other woman” the Classmate for the XO laptop. Perhaps, OLPC’s helmsman Negroponte didn’t realize how many low cost laptops — not only the Classmate — would play follow the leader to his XO.   From the Asus EeePC to the Everex Cloudbook, Negroponte will have a lot more doors to knock on in 2008. Sure they aren’t going after the kids of developing world but what will stop a U.S. school from going with one of the alternatives? Kevin Maney of Portfolio says it the best, “… O.L.P.C. only wanted to change the world. They didn’t realize they would be changing the tech industry’s balance of power as well.”