I finally found an email I’ve been searching for. This email marks my first interaction with OLPC and my first attempt to get involved with OLPC Content.
Hello, I work with the <snip>; a non-profit organization that does history presentations on the middle ages for schools, libraries and museums in the Pacific Northwest. We do demonstrations and lectures on historical arms, armor and combat of the middle ages and renaissance (Western Martial Arts). I have been hearing about the concept of a sub $200 laptop for education for quite a while (Ballmer among others) and I find if a fascinating concept. So first of all kudos to your group at MIT. I was wondering if you were planning on having any sort of educational materials already loaded on the laptops. Our organization has in the past been asked to be part of educational materials, and we are working towards publishing classroom materials of our own in the next two years. If your group were interested in a few sample history lessons as demonstrations of what your laptop could do; perhaps we could supply you with something both historical and visually interesting. If you have some interest I can be contacted at <snip>
According to the OLPC Timeline, this email dates to before the XO was announced with Nicholas Negreponte and Kofi Annan Unfortunately, OLPC didn’t have Sj yet, so their response was less than thrilling.
Red Hat is our partner and is working on software. The participating countries will also provide their own software. Best wishes, <snip (name removed)>
I could understand brushing me off at such an early phase in OLPC’s development. But the reply was a bit silly all the same. :)