Re: [school-discuss] Basel Action Network

["James P. Kinney III" <jkinney@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

On Sun, 2008-06-29 at 03:31 -0700, Joel Kahn wrote:
> I don't know how many of you are familiar with the work that
> the Basel Action Network has been doing to try to stop the
> dumping of high-tech waste in the developing world:
> 
> http://www.ban.org/
> 
> While I was able to find a couple of mentions
> of FLOSS on the BAN web site . . .
> 
> http://www.ban.org/ban_news/2005/051212_bite_dust.html
> 
> http://www.ban.org/ban_news/2007/070801_rebooting_canada.html
> 
> . . . I was wondering how much work the FLOSS community has
> been doing more recently to help deal with these issues.

Lots! Considering that most open source systems can run on yesterdays
hardware, that prevents a flood of tech trash from going to the
recyclers. From my experiences in schools (they hang onto everything
until none of it works at all) to large companies (replace desktop
system on a rolling 3-4 year basis) to government (US only - buys lots
of usually the lowest cost systems whether they are any good or not -
lifespan is not a factor except for servers) the ever-increasing
wizard/guification/"no need for training" mentality is pushing the tech
waste production cycle. The Western (bad) mentality of "disposal" is
going to bite us financially, politically and socially (if it's not
doing so already).

The software engineers are making the desktop pretty and easy (usually!)
and that requires more hardware to do the thinking for the lugnut in the
chair. Each iteration (and FLOSS development is no exception to this)
adds more buttons and widgets and gee-gaws and gee-whiz. Every widget on
the tool bar requires cpu and RAM to keep it there. The icons we use to
start the browser aren't just pictures. They require polling
periodically to see if they have been pressed. cpu, ram, power and
cooling.

Tech waste? Lazy is the main cause of it. Are we doing more with the new
machines that replaced the ones now being stripped by 8-year olds in
Bangladesh? No. But we are doing it faster so there is more dead cpu
cycles between mouse actions. 

The next wave (maybe 2 waves out) of hardware improvements will address
some of these issues: multi-core cpu's that can power off unneeded
cores, extreme under-clocking for power savings during low use sessions,
pure web only applications that only require a browser and network
access (not that browsers are super-efficient but Firefox 3 is a good
leap forward) thus lowering the hardware requirements (and thus
encouraging reuse of older systems).

As can be seen from my focus on this, I am concerned about the growing
trash pile(s) and the power consumption. At my house we have more
computers than people. I am converting all of this mess to thin clients
to chop down power and simplify maintenance. All of the useable older
machines gt wiped and reinstalled with the most appropriate Linux distro
and donated as a full system to a worthy cause (charity, disabled
person, shelter, etc) along with some face time to help them get up and
going with it.
> 
> Joel
> 
> 
> 
>       
> 
-- 
James P. Kinney III          
CEO & Director of Engineering 
Local Net Solutions,LLC                           
http://www.localnetsolutions.com

GPG ID: 829C6CA7 James P. Kinney III (M.S. Physics)
<jkinney@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Fingerprint = 3C9E 6366 54FC A3FE BA4D 0659 6190 ADC3 829C 6CA7



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