My interest in the OLPC project was recently boosted by an opportunity that came up for writing applications (or "activities", in XO-lingo) for it. That ended up going nowhere, but my interest remained.

I'll refrain from commenting on how ground-breaking it is and all that. There's enough of it going on. I won't even tag this post  "python" ;).

However, it seems from the latest news that not only the laptop's price has gone up, but that it needs (somewhat quickly) more orders to be viable.

Dr. Negroponte has repeatedly stated that there are currently no plans to put the laptop on the market. From an Ars Technica article:

Michalis Bletsas, chief connectivity officer for the project, told the BBC that the industry should be thinking less about pushing technology designed for the Western world on the rest of the planet, and more about developing technologies specifically for the developing world. "The way to do it is not to try and deploy tried and trusted technology but to try and develop technology specifically targeted to the developing world," he said.

Fair enough. You don't want to sell an unfinished product to regular consumers, and you don't want to finish the product aiming at regular consumers. But what about making it available for hackers? Individuals, universities, NGOs and others might be willing not only to pay more for XO, but also to contribute, test and develop for the project. They (we!) would probably even put up with paying up front and waiting some time until it arrives. What could top getting free expert workforce, other than getting paying expert workforce?

The Developer's Program seems like a nice option, but its resources are limited and apparently only hardware geeks are getting any actual hardware these days.

Let us help you, dr. Negroponte! We'll pay for our own hardware, and for that of others. Emulation is just not the same thing. Give us a gadget to play on and we might just make it viable for you.

Pretty please?