I'd say OLPC did change the world in a myriad small ways, just not in the big lofty way they imagined.
As other commenters mentioned, it was a direct inspiration for Asus eee PC, which spawned an entire category of netbooks and ultrabooks. I wouldn't be surprised if indirectly it also was a part of inspiration for iPads and Android tablets by letting Apple and others realise there's a strong demand for sub-notebook consumer "computers".
As another commenter mentioned, Raspberry Pi was also in part influenced/inspired by OLPC.
And on a personal note: around 9 years ago I was working on (porting some Linux software to) a touchscreen-capable netbook directly inspired by OLPC. In my spare time, frustrated by the lack of touchscreen-friendly drawing apps I built a small web app to scratch my itch. Several years later, it's used by hundreds of thousands of people worldwide, many of them teachers and kids in elementary schools.
I wouldn't be surprised if there are a lot of people out there with similar stories to tell.
> As other commenters mentioned, it was a direct inspiration for Asus eee PC, which spawned an entire category of netbooks and ultrabooks.
I'd say they were late to the table with a sub notebook design as Toshiba released the Libretto in 1996. Then there were those weird Windows CE mini laptop organizers in the 90's as well. Sharp Wizard, etc.
Wasn't the Toshiba Libretto more like a $2000 laptop? <g> With the Windows CE 'organizers' not that far behind? Sure, hardware was a lot more costly back in the 1990s, but still. (And how could you forget to mention the Palm NetBook?)
From my recollections, the OLPC foundation never set out to create the subnotebook. Size was a factor because of the intended audience, but design considerations such as cost and power consumption were much more important. Contrast that to subnotebooks of the era for western markets, which tended to be rather expensive.
Those were not the only technical design considerations. Durability, sunlight readable screens, and protecting children from theft and surveillance also come to mind. Very few of those things were factors in the subnotebook market that preceded or followed, except for cost. In all likelihood the OLPC drove the development of other low cost portable computers.
>As other commenters mentioned, it was a direct inspiration for Asus eee PC, which spawned an entire category of netbooks and ultrabooks. I wouldn't be surprised if indirectly it also was a part of inspiration for iPads and Android tablets by letting Apple and others realise there's a strong demand for sub-notebook consumer "computers".
Seems like a lot of people forget about the netbook "revolution"
As other commenters mentioned, it was a direct inspiration for Asus eee PC, which spawned an entire category of netbooks and ultrabooks. I wouldn't be surprised if indirectly it also was a part of inspiration for iPads and Android tablets by letting Apple and others realise there's a strong demand for sub-notebook consumer "computers".
As another commenter mentioned, Raspberry Pi was also in part influenced/inspired by OLPC.
And on a personal note: around 9 years ago I was working on (porting some Linux software to) a touchscreen-capable netbook directly inspired by OLPC. In my spare time, frustrated by the lack of touchscreen-friendly drawing apps I built a small web app to scratch my itch. Several years later, it's used by hundreds of thousands of people worldwide, many of them teachers and kids in elementary schools.
I wouldn't be surprised if there are a lot of people out there with similar stories to tell.