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Maryland will hand out 133k Chromebooks to the public

statescoop.com

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Re: Maryland will hand out 133k Chromebooks to the public

#41

Post by kube-system »

LargeTomato wrote: post #35
kube-system wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When we're talking about fixing outlier issues in society, efficiency is sometimes counterproductive to the goal of addressing problems that exist at the fringes of society. Universality is sometimes better at addressing the problems at the extremes. For example, some restaurants may be really efficient at providing a meal for $5, but the people who need a soup kitchen the most don't have $5.

[flagged]

The populist desire to exempt "crackheads" from every social service is why we have so many crackheads.

Re: Maryland will hand out 133k Chromebooks to the public

#42

Post by ricksmith1962 »

sokoloff wrote: post #21
pton_xd wrote: post #9

I think it'd more effectively go into the appropriate hands by at least charging some nominal amount. Advertise that anyone may visit the public library and purchase a subsidized internet-capable device for $20. Or $5. Free just has no chance of being an efficient distribution.

Exactly this. The amount of wasteful greedy/hoarding behavior that is induced by free and is curbed by charging even $20 is quite high. Charging 50% of the going resale rate is probably enough to prevent hoarding and substantially curb resale. That might be slightly too much for the aims of the program, in which case adjust as needed, realizing that you're trading off one outcome for another.

They’re not just going to hand them out to anyone who asks for one.

Re: Maryland will hand out 133k Chromebooks to the public

#43

Post by adventured »

Spent most of my life living in Maryland. This isn't going to go well. The results will be very mediocre. After the fact they'll say: well at least they tried something.

It's just like burning $27 million.

They need to focus on the education and severe crime problems in and around DC + Baltimore. Nothing is getting much better in Maryland for the poor until that improves. This is a temporary 1/4 of 1% improvement maneuver (temporary as in the benefit won't last a year). Make improvements to two dozen schools instead; or pay hundreds of teachers $10k more per year to do these very hard (and sometimes very dangerous) jobs.

Re: Maryland will hand out 133k Chromebooks to the public

#46

Post by cheeseomlit »

kube-system wrote: post #41
LargeTomato wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

The populist desire to exempt "crackheads" from every social service is why we have so many crackheads.

If we provide social services to crackheads what do you think they'll spend the money on? Not crack?

Re: Maryland will hand out 133k Chromebooks to the public

#47

Post by graphe »

night-rider wrote: post #38
throw555chip wrote: post #8

The following Dell laptop would be better than a vendor locked in Chromebook: https://www.dell.com/en-us/shop/dell-laptops/inspiron-15-lap...

> a vendor locked in Chromebook Choose your poison. Macbooks are tightly knit with Apple and phone home, but are absurdly expensive and people pay for the privilege of getting spied on. Same with Chromebooks: we're just another datapoint for Google, and much more data is collected. Why not hand out Thinkpads flashed with Trisquel Linux[0]? (A Libre Linux that respects privacy?). And don't get me started on Windows 10…

What normal person wants a Thinkpad with Trisquel Linux? If you market the Chromebook as a general purpose coreboot compatible laptop (since 2013) and give them no OS I'm sure the same person that wants a Thinkpad would be even happier.

Re: Maryland will hand out 133k Chromebooks to the public

#48

Post by verisimi »

"The housing department partnered with HP Inc. and Daly Computers, a Mid-Atlantic IT services firm, to supply the Chromebooks. It also partnered with the University of Maryland’s TechExtension, which provides free, one-on-one tech support to any Marylander seeking assistance with a device."

This is a good as it gets - a part of governance structure giving something back.

Re: Maryland will hand out 133k Chromebooks to the public

#49

Post by javier_e06 »

The major issue I see disadvantage groups face is that in government agencies and school system people are expected to navigate and fill forms, sign documents, submit documents. This can be done on phone but is very difficult. The government should make sure that in the so called chromebooks a user can download a pdf document, edit it and sign it and submit it. If agencies and schools stick to Google Docs and Google Drive, then is a complete solution that works. Everything else is a big if.

Re: Maryland will hand out 133k Chromebooks to the public

#50

Post by explaininjs »

orangepurple wrote: post #26
graphe wrote: post #17

Instead of creating jobs, or trying to help businesses, let's buy 133,000 laptops because lack of Chromebooks are what are holding people back. 28 million can't be spent better than buying Chromebooks.

In all, over the last decade, the [teachers] union spent $6,448,327 on travel expenses. That comes out to an average of $53,736 a month, every month, for 10 straight years. How does that fulfill the union’s tax-exempt mission to “elevate the quality of public education for all students”? That amount does not include "Conferences, conventions, and meetings." https://foxbaltimore.com/news/project-baltimore/marylands-te…

The real question is whether the state standards should be expected to apply to inner city schools. The knee jerk reaction is to say yes of course how could they not, but that ignores all sorts of socioeconomic context that goes into education.
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