Enter on cue; stage left...Microsoft

Bruce Perens of Technocrat believes that Microsoft must control OLPC because the XOs Sugar interface is "a threat Microsoft can't let stand: the entire third world learning Linux as children, and growing up to use it. And Microsoft is going to get its way."

So in the spirit of change that has characterized OLPC early this year, and as announced by Nicholas and Microsoft in December, OLPC and Microsoft have started testing Windows XP on the XO to the horror of the Linux Community.

My dear friend Ivan Krstić who is at the vanguard of the development says that "The folks running this work on the Microsoft side are good people. They have left no doubt in my mind that they believe in what we’re doing and want to play along. I am also confident we have made the right decision at OLPC by embracing their work instead of stonewalling it."

Having myself been in the middle of the OS2 v Win NT debacle and witnessed the rise and demise of Netscape, I find myself having to agree with Wayan Volta that regardless of Ivan's "Linux rollback feature" when XP is installed on an XO, making Windows available on the OLPC platform may increase its acceptability to Government bureaucrats but sound the death knell of the Sugar interface.