But Microsoft’s software—Windows, Works, and Office—is bundled to sell for two to three times the cost of O.L.P.C.’s entire machine. “We’re hoping to get software on it in the future, but we’re not there yet,” Poole says. ­Microsoft, which makes the software that runs 90 percent of the world’s personal computers, obviously feels it must do something. In Beijing in April, Gates announced a $3 version of Windows for students in developing countries. In September, Microsoft finally got its hands on working O.L.P.C. XO machines and started trying to figure out how to jerry-rig Microsoft software so it is compatible. “Typically, we don’t take new hardware and do work to integrate Windows, so we’ve got an unusual challenge here,” Poole says. It’s clear Microsoft would not go to such extremes unless it was in red-alert mode.

As of late 2007, Microsoft had yet to find a solution. O.L.P.C. doesn’t seem too worried about getting Microsoft’s help, though Negroponte says it would be wrong to shut out Windows if, indeed, his laptop is supposed to be open to any software.

Meanwhile, PC manufacturers have seemed less alarmed, judging by their halfhearted efforts. Michael Dell made a trip to Shanghai in March to announce his plan to sell cheap desktops only for the Chinese market. The Dell models will cost $300 to $500—not a huge discount from buying a low-end desktop at an Office Depot in Peoria. “Today there are 1 billion people online worldwide, and many of the world’s second billion users are right here in China,” Dell said at the press conference. “We intend to earn their confidence and their business.” In August, Lenovo—the Beijing-based PC maker that bought I.B.M.’s personal-computer division in 2005—introduced its $200 desktop PC for the Chinese market. The other top-three PC maker, Hewlett-Packard, hasn’t announced plans for a competitive version.

In an insurgency, revolutionaries are often backed by powerful entities that want to foment trouble for the powers that be. O.L.P.C. receives funding from A.M.D., Google, and open-source software company Red Hat. While A.M.D. loudly and proudly hates Intel and would like nothing better than to elbow its rival out of the next-billion market, on the record its executives are conciliatory about Intel’s decision to help rather than hinder O.L.P.C. “We’re delighted Intel chose to reverse its thought process,” says A.M.D. executive Dan Shine of Intel’s decision to support O.L.P.C., without a hint of sarcasm. Google, which offers free online competitors to Microsoft’s Word, Excel, and PowerPoint software, is in position to challenge Microsoft’s applications business, and Red Hat is also a well-known Microsoft-baiter.

Inveneo receives funding from A.M.D. and Cisco. As a company that makes networking equipment, Cisco aims to get as many people as possible on the internet. Funding Inveneo and other projects in developing countries helps to accomplish that goal while spreading positive vibes about Cisco’s brand.

So, yes, the race combines business strategy with various levels of social responsibility. Ask around the community, and Cisco and A.M.D., in particular, have garnered respect for sincerely wanting to improve people’s lives. Cisco, founded in 1984 in crime-ridden East Palo Alto, California, has had social responsibility built into its corporate culture from the beginning. Hector Ruiz, the chairman and C.E.O. of A.M.D., grew up poor in Mexico and often speaks of his drive to help others who are growing up in comparable circumstances. Ruiz launched A.M.D.’s 50x15 program—which set a goal of getting 50 percent of the global population online by 2015—years before Negroponte announced his  $100-laptop dream.

The overlapping of business and philanthropy creates a powerful dynamic in this case. Strategic concerns drive tech companies to serve markets they might otherwise have ignored. “We want these efforts to make business sense,” says One Economy’s Ramsey. “If they don’t, they’ll just be one-off things.”

But nobody expects this to be a one-off. One Economy, Inveneo, and O.L.P.C. only wanted to change the world. They didn’t realize they would be changing the tech industry’s balance of power as well.