Apple Considering Bid to Provide 15 Million iPads to Turkish Schools

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Wow I wish Canada would buy 15 million iPads for schools.

That's a lot of clams!

I hope Apple can ship that many iPads.

This would be a great deal for Apple and Turkey. 15 million iPads is a large amount (even when spread over 4 years), plus the article said that Turkey has some manufacturing plants. That means Apple would be able to produce more iPads, probably create jobs there, etc.

Off topic (sorry), but I have an uncle who's Turkish. Great guy, total schmoozer. He's very proud of his country.

maattp said:

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Wow I wish Canada would buy 15 million iPads for schools.

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Didn't the Canadian government (I guess I'm assuming you're Canadian, or at least familiar with what's going on in Canada) start a program a couple years ago to provide government officials/employees iPads? How is that going for them? I read they were expecting costs of government to go down and efficiency to go up... I'm all for technology being used to make government better. "We have the technology..."

Too bad Turkey is about to block most of the useful internet.

12,000 pages blocked and hundreds of keywords blocked from search.

guzhogi said:

Off topic (sorry), but I have an uncle who's Turkish.

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Classic.

madmanmax3000 said:

Too bad Turkey is about to block most of the useful internet.

12,000 pages blocked and hundreds of keywords blocked from search.

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Well, censorship hasn't worked too well for most of the world that's tried it lately. Access to information (even when restricted) seems to tear down walls (my optimistic view of the Arab Spring).

I guess accession to the E.U. isn't as big a pull as it used to be but seriously, Turkey, you're never going to get in if you keep acting up like this.

madmanmax3000 said:

Too bad Turkey is about to block most of the useful internet.

12,000 pages blocked and hundreds of keywords blocked from search.

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Interesting. I'm actually headed to Istanbul in a couple of weeks for a vacation. Just don't block my airline check-in ability and I'm a happy camper.

re original article

what...turkey doesnt want the hp tablets best buy cant give away?

I wonder what tablet MS/Intel would propose ...

maattp said:

Wow I wish Canada would buy 15 million iPads for schools.

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That's like half the population of Canada.

GOOD. Let the Turkeys allow their kids to surf porn and play games all day long instead of learning. Give us books.

dwman said:

Interesting. I'm actually headed to Istanbul in a couple of weeks for a vacation. Just don't block my airline check-in ability and I'm a happy camper.

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"Joey, have you ever been in a Turkish prison?" - Captain Oveur: Airplane!

Sorry, couldn't resist.

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Interesting. Anybody know Apple's general ratio of educational sales? Perhaps even a breakdown of figures by country?

dwman said:

Interesting. I'm actually headed to Istanbul in a couple of weeks for a vacation. Just don't block my airline check-in ability and I'm a happy camper.

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May I suggest visiting the Blue Mosque, the Hagia Sophia & the Grand Bazaar? Great, beautiful places.

cms2 said:

Classic.

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Thanks. My uncle's pride for his country rubbed off on me a bit so whenever I see anything about Turkey, my interest goes up a bit.

Damn lucky turkeys! When I was in school we used tablets... stone tablets. My homework looked like the 10 commandments.

Lesser Evets said:

GOOD. Let the Turkeys allow their kids to surf porn and play games all day long instead of learning. Give us books.

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Right because there is no way to block kids from porn sites or being on the Internet.

Priorities

Yeah Apple, i hope they win the contract, but the real story here is that a second world economy is investing more technology dollars into its public schools and its youth than any State in the US, and these kids will be competing with all of us within ten years.

The Turkish Government is trying to figure out how to put technology into public schools and the hands of their kids. While congress & the corporatists are trying to figure out how to kill public education in the US.

Lesser Evets said:

GOOD. Let the Turkeys allow their kids to surf porn and play games all day long instead of learning. Give us books.

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Yes, that's the only thing computers/tablets are used for. Imagine how well Blue Gene/P plays Crysis!

flipperfeet said:

Yeah Apple, i hope they win the contract, but the real story here is that a second world economy is investing more technology dollars into its public schools and its youth than any State in the US, and these kids will be competing with all of us within ten years.

The Turkish Government is trying to figure out how to put technology into public schools and the hands of their kids. While congress & the corporatists are trying to figure out how to kill public education in the US.

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Yeah, it's a shame. I work in public education as an IT guy. It's not just them not wanting public education, it's the whole recession/economic stuff, too. Last year, we went from having a tech in each of our 7 elementary schools & admin building to 1 tech for every 2 buildings (so 8 techs to 4). Darn budget issues! Fortunately, I'm at one of 2 middle schools and we stay at the same building the whole time.

[Major rant] Plus, at the end of last year, the technology department had to make a choice: do the building level techs get a 13" MBP and an iPad or a 15" MBP, no iPad. We got the 13" + iPad. But what I hate is we have this program called 32 & U where 32 teachers get training from Apple on iLife/iWork and then they teach the other teachers. The 32 of them got 15" MBPs and iPads. So you're saying they could afford to pay about $70,000 for the 32&U people, and could afford the extra $5400 for the 4 elementary & 2 middle school techs because of budget concerns? [/Major rant]

More thinking like this need in US

MacRumors said:

Government officials had previously indicated that the tablets themselves must also be produced in Turkey.

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It would not hurt to have a little more thinking like this with companies bidding on government contracts in the US. Quite simply...create jobs and the associated tax base so we can afford to buy your products.

I see this and don't think "Aww those kids will be SMART" ... because I was a kid, and using a calculator didn't make me smart, actually doing the work did.
And we all know these will just be used primarily for entertainment, to play with (don't even TRY to claim otherwise).

My main thought about this is; "Interesting... Apple apparently has SEVEN AND A HALF BILLION dollars to burn".
As a shareholder, I'd rather see that money go to either product development, or to reducing costs and prices of the expensive hardware.
And as a iPhone owner, I'd like the same. :-/

2 Replies said:

I see this and don't think "Aww those kids will be SMART" ... because I was a kid, and using a calculator didn't make me smart, actually doing the work did.
And we all know these will just be used primarily for entertainment, to play with (don't even TRY to claim otherwise).

My main thought about this is; "Interesting... Apple apparently has SEVEN AND A HALF BILLION dollars to burn".
As a shareholder, I'd rather see that money go to either product development, or to reducing costs and prices of the expensive hardware.
And as a iPhone owner, I'd like the same. :-/

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As you evidently have never experienced an iPad or technology being used for anything other than entertainment, it is pointless to debate this or point out that just putting a Google like search engine in the hands of anyone extends by several orders of magnitude what can be covered in a text book or the cache of knowledge a teacher may hold.

As the executive team at Apple has managed to take the company from having less than 6% of the computer market to the being the highest valued company in the US in just a little over a decade, I'll trust their assessment of how Apple should use $7.5 billion of their $70+billion reserve. You assume that this investment would address none of the goals you outlined, a very un-Tim Cook scenario. Further as the iPad is not only the price but manufacturer-margin leader they are already performing examplarily for their share holders as well as consumers.

rdowns said:

Right because there is no way to block kids from porn sites or being on the Internet.

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you see yourself on the mirror. do you need porn books?

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Lesser Evets said:

GOOD. Let the Turkeys allow their kids to surf porn and play games all day long instead of learning. Give us books.

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probably you need books after porn surf till today

Apple will probably give them an ipad 2, even after ipad 3's and 4's are released. Apple would also get another manufacturing facility for cheap if they do this. I'm pretty sure this is why they are interested in such a deal.