To me the most significant event is that of a magazine giving a way a computer.

For me something like NVidia Jetson is a far more significant (and useful) development than the ever-shrinking bubblegum stick computers that simply aren't that useful. Yes, it costs 100x more but there's no comparison when it comes to what you can do with one.

And, if that's too much, how about something like this for $39 (includes CPU):

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157...

or this for $59 (includes CPU):

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813138...

of this one for $99 with a quad-core 2.4 GHz Intel CPU:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157...

No doubt that a $5 stick computer has huge value for educational purposes and in some parts of the world it's going to make a HUGE difference. Bravo for that.

Yet, we still need a keyboard, mouse (maybe) and a screen. Because the Pi Zero has an HDMI output the cheapest monitor you can buy is likely to be in the $80 to $100 range:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16824112...

In other words, this is great in that now the cost of the computer has become a rounding error in the total cost of everything you need to actually make it useful.

In other parts of the world if you are going to be in computing the difference between spending $5 and spending $100 is zero. If you have an iPhone in your pocket (very likely) you or your parents can certainly afford to spend $200 on a computer.

Every single kid in the FRC robotics team I mentor has a smart phone and a laptop. If they want to hack on some hardware it'd be no problem for their parents to buy them a $200~$300 setup. You can buy a whole new mini laptop for that kind of money.

Same token, every single kid in the FLL team I mentor owns one or more Lego Mindstorms kit at $350 a piece.

Maybe what I am saying is this: What I would see as having more impact in education (again, the economic in other part of the world are different) isn't necessarily a cheaper computer. A race to the bottom with a crippled $1 computer isn't what is keeping the kids I interact with from having access to technology and computing. No, what's keeping them from entering is a lack of motivation due to a decidedly uninteresting process.

When I was a kid I had to work hard to have a computer. I had to build it out of chips. Wire-wrap it. Bootstrap it with assembler. Write my own Forth. Write my own text editor. Learn about electronics and software. Build my own floppy disk controller board, etc. I was challenged and had to engage in discovery and there was no internet to hold my hand.

I am not sure what the modern equivalent to this might be. I find that things like Pi, for some kids, make things so easy that they are bored almost instantly. Once they get the thing up and going there's nothing to do or whatever it is they can do gets complicated and messy very quickly.

At the other end of the scale I see kids absolutely ripping it with Scratch on their laptops. It's fun, interesting and challenging enough with some guidance.

I don't have the answers. Just a brain dump from working with about 100 kids of different ages and levels of motivation in two robotics programs.