During a community meetup in 2019, before the entire world got turned upside down by the COVID19 pandemic, we announced our commitment to financially support Linux and open source development as well as to promote open source software whilst contributing to closing the digital gap. I believe we’ve done good on the first portion of this commitment – over the past 12 months we made donations to 5 mobile Linux projects, financially supported a number of FOSS initiatives (most recently the upcoming Linux App Summit) and helped individual contributors in their endeavours. As a side-note, I’d like you to know that this is just the beginning – we have extensive plans pertaining to community support in the near future. Stay tuned.
We did, however, have to set aside our scheme to give back to society due to the chaos that the pandemic stirred up. For the past 18 months the key focus of PINE64 and the Pine Store was to keep production going while actively facilitating development. This effectively left very little space for any other activities. Now, whilst the manufacturing situation isn’t exactly great, we at least have a good idea where we stand. As a result, we also feel that there is a little more wiggle-room for extracurricular activities; it is time to do good on the second portion of our commitment made in 2019.
We have 100+ original 11.6” Pinebooks which we wish to donate to a worthy cause. The Pinebooks are running an excellent mainline OS image by Manjaro, featuring an accelerated KDE Plasma desktop. While the Pinebook is no speed demon by any stretch of the imagination, this tailored build makes it rather snappy and perfectly viable for light workloads, such as: running educational software, browsing the web, using the LibreOffice suite, terminal work, etc,. It is also a sturdy laptop, one which you wouldn’t worry about handing to a child, with a long battery life and all the necessary connectivity for completing aforementioned tasks.
We’re now turning to you for ideas; we’re looking for a suitable partner – a not-for-profit organization, which would get these Pinebooks into the hands of people who will benefit from them the most. Anything goes, and all ideas are welcome. There are, however, two things you need to be aware of making your suggestions: 1) the not-for-profit organization needs to be recognized by the US Internal Revenue Service (IRS) and 2) have some degree of logistical capabilities, as the laptops are in the US, State of California.
We obviously would much prefer to work with an organization that shares the open source community’s values and ideals, but ultimately we’re open to working with anyone striving to better the circumstances of those in need. Any organization working towards closing the digital gap is worthy of a consideration.
Please, leave your suggestion in the comments. We will make sure to review all viable suggestions thoroughly.
If you represent an organization which you believe fits our criteria and fulfills the cooperation requirements, please contact us directly: info@pine64.org.
Thank you in advance!
– – –
Want to learn more or have additional questions regarding this scheme? – you’re welcome to reach out to me directly in the chats:
40 responses to “Help us help others”
The Rural Technology fund(https://ruraltechfund.org) does good stuff. They are a 501(c)(3) organization, so all donations are fully tax deductible.
this seems like a great cause.
Alternatively, I would suggest One Laptop Per Child (https://www.onelaptopperchild.org/) who are doing great work in South-America.
I was going to suggest this also but you beat me to it. Rural US often lags way behind most urban centers, particularly in tech subjects. If I could vote for this, I would.
The Rural Technology fund (https://ruraltechfund.org) does good stuff. They are a 501(c)(3) organization, so all donations are fully tax deductible.
We can help and support HRD
Maybe give it to WWF or Greenpeace.
I think they have many tasks that not need very strong laptops and every Dollar they don’t spend on hardware is a Dollar more for our Planet.
Free Geek in Portland, OR, USA does a fantastic job getting computers to people in need, including providing training and tech support. They tend to refurb machines and load them with Linux Mint.
If these laptops in particular aren’t right for the service they provide, they should be able connect you to the right organizations. Hope that helps!
https://www.freegeek.org/about
GNU Project/FSF
GNU Guix Project
GNOME Project
You should sell them to people who want to buy them.
That is the BEST way to help the world.
Please consider @girlsintocoding by Avye & @helenevirolan who are dedicated 100% to bring #tech to underrepresented groups
#WomenInSTEM
#womenintech
I would like to use this laptop for some development activity with Rockchip SoC.
With ARM64 and laptop, combination it seems great.
Refugee camps in turkey, lebanon (or somewhere else) run by the international red cross. They’re running schools. I’m sure the kids would appreciate a pinebook.
Unicef is currently working on solar powered kits to keep kids connected to their school teacher.
This sounds tangential to the on-going work with the Giga effort, together with UNICEF and the ITU. https://gigaconnect.org/
Caritas good organisation, help for poor country, solid feedback.
I’ve sent an email to the “Harlem: Laptop Initiative for Students in Need” (https://gofund.me/6f7ba21b) informing them of your program and asking them if they thought students could find support for Linux laptops.
I’ve been dealing with Plan International for 10+ years. They are a very dedicated charity focused on helping children all the way through to adulthood. Besides their individual sponsorship programs they also have corporate partnership programs with educational vocation https://plancanada.ca/ways-to-partner
So far they have focused on classical education but Pine64 could jumpstart their technology education program 🙂
Disability Voices United https://disabilityvoicesunited.org/ is a California-based organization (501c3) directed by and for individuals with developmental disabilities and our families, advocating for
• Choice and control
• Equity and accountability
• Meaningful outcomes
They would definitely be able to get the laptops into the hands of underserved individuals who would put them to good use.
Thanks for everything you are doing!
Fundacion Zamora Teran is one of the last standing supporting OLPC. They are helping teachers to become better prepared for digital age and they can use some laptops. They are also looking for OLPC hardware replacement. They are registered as 501c
We work with diverse groups across the globe, with empowering children as a high priority.
I lead a middle school Linux club called the Penguin Corps at Aspen Academy in Savage, MN. Our young technologists learn about the values of free and open source software, as well as technology skills. When the COVID-19 pandemic shut down our school, the Penguin Corps refurbished used/donated laptops to provide to our students for distance learning, ultimately putting over 300 computers in front of our kids and closing our school’s digital divide.
Now that our students are back in school, I am on the lookout for more hardware so that we can better equip our middle school teachers in their classrooms. I want to provide classroom sets of 25 laptops each for 4 or 5 of our middle school teachers, so that they can provide better electronic instruction to their students. Having laptops come from Pine 64 will help to free up some of our older donated computers so that we can continue to provide them for our students to use at home.
Our school is a public charter school and is a 501(c)(3) organization in the United States.
Therefore, I am throwing my hat in the ring. My team could use your help. Thank you for your time and consideration.
For more information about us, you can also go to our Youtube channel: https://www.youtube.com/c/PenguinCorps
You can also check out The Linux Club Guide, which I wrote to help other schools establish Linux clubs of their own. It is at: http://www.linuxclubguide.com
Kiedyś był taki program w laptop.org czyli OLPC
1-1 kup jeden i drugi z małą marżą możesz kupic wybranej organizacji.
(nawet na amazonie mozna bylo kupic ich sprzet)
Tu zrobiłbym tylko pewna modyfikację. Przy zakupie zaznaczamy jaka organizacja dostanie sprzet. niech decyduje sponsor a nie jakas organizacja nawet tak sławetna jak wasza. Proste zasady, a ja np. bym wysłał dla Caritas jeden laptop czy dwa.
Oczywiście czasem to jest problem, trzeba by dostosowac laptop dla dzieci niewidzacych, albo zając się lokalizacja oprogramowania w języku, którego jeszcze nie ma (czesty problem misji). Ale po to jest społeczność.
Można było by tez poprosic te organizacje by zrobiły tez coś u siebie. Niech dadza link do waszej strony ze sklepem, lub u siebie dadza link do zakupów. My wpłacamy np. do Caritas a jeden laptop wysyłają na nasz adres z potwierdzeniem wplaty za drugi, który możemy odliczyć od podatków.
Bonjour
Nous sommes très intéressés par votre offre.
Nous aidons au quotidien des demandeurs d’asile et des mineurs étrangers arrivés seuls en France, près de Montpellier. Nous faisons des cours de Français et avons besoin d’ordinateurs… Si possible avec des claviers français…
Bien cordialement.
Il n’y a pas de clavier français. À moins qu’il ne s’agisse d’un clavier avec des caractères français comme celui-ci : https://klawiatura.files.wordpress.com/2010/08/keyb-fr0.png
Poir utiliser un clavier français, pensez vous que cette solution soit possible ?
https://shop.mchobby.be/fr/raspberry-pi-3/477-mini-clavier-ergonomique-azerty-sans-fil-3232100004771-riitek.html
Merci de votre réponse
Yves
https://interconnection.org/
Makes information and communication technology accessible to under-served communities around the world.
INTERCONNECTION IS A 501(C)3 NON-PROFIT ORGANIZATION
Definitely Free Geek in Portland, they are good folks!
There are a lot of great ideas here already! I love the idea of giving them to an organization that helps get underrepresented groups into coding/tech.
The Council of the German city of Dortmund has announced that it’s embracing free and open-source software, wherever possible. The Document Foundation reports: The Dortmund Council has declared digitalisation to be a political leadership task in its Memorandum 2020 to 2025. In the course of this, two central resolutions for free software were passed on February 11, 2021, for which the minutes were published on March 30: – “Use of open source software where possible.” – “Software developed by the administration or commissioned for development is made available to the general public.”
https://news.slashdot.org/story/21/04/02/1957213/open-source-software-becomes-a-standard-in-dortmund-germany
I live at the astralship, a non-profit trying to leverage technology towards a better humanity.
We work with local organic farms developing automation using open-source technologies as well as a plethora of art and science projects produced by our community.
I can honestly say that just one of these would be a real asset for us.
We are a group of teachers, students, and parent volunteers who repurpose older computers with Linux. To date, we have helped more than 14 000 families with improved access to computers to support learning. This is our mission as we are UN Sustainable Development Goal Global Ambassadors.
If we had even more computers or LCD displays or RAM cards or HDs, then we would more easily be able to provide more families in need with a free computer to support their learning.
We are in Ontario, Canada and are partnered with a charitable organization called letsgettogether.ca
Ali is the director of this charity.
We can be reached at:
Andrew Dobbie
andrew.dobbie@peelsb.com
dobbieandy@gmail.com
@A_Dobbie11 (Twitter)
Ali (Let’s Get Together)
Alison from Let’s Get Together alison@letsgettogether.ca
Charitable organization website:
http://letsgettogether.ca/
Cooperation Jackson has been building a self-sustaining solidarity economy in Jackson, MS for years. They operate many programs: https://cooperationjackson.org
CARITAS
Sell them and donate the money for a good cause.
You should team up with these guys!
https://www.opensourceecology.org
I know I am late to the party on this one, but if you could just send one of these to mara/sndwvs ( http://slarm64.org/ ) then the Slackware/slarm64 image for the Pinebook would be much more stable. Just a thought, but a serious one. Thanks….
Organization, which helps kids and young adults get out from homelessness: https://podrugie.pl/ – They need laptops because they see education as the best (in the long-term) way to give them strenth, independence and ability to create happy-healthy family in the future.
Hello,
I am the president of a non-lucrative 1901’s French law association called “Eulalie” that promote to youngs and adults scepticism and philosophy. We’re two teachers that are promoting a active sense of education and we’re also teaching on the importance of other peoples for self-developpement as well as the language developpement. That often leads us to show open-sourceness as a exemple of concrete application of a non-capitalistic system that lead to quality. Having just one Pinbook for our association would be extremely good for us, has we would be able to both use it for our association as a tool, and as a exemple.
We’re very small (two persons), but we operate since two years already. You can freely contact me if you wish to have exemples of our courses as well as all the administrative proof that may be needed.
Sincerely
Nevermind, we do not meet the requirements. Don’t hesitate to clean both of those messages.
Kids on computers set up linux computer labs in schools in the global south. I went on one of their trips. It’s a great organization.