Sales of the $100 laptop (which is up to $188) for children in third world countries have been slow so the makers of the laptop have decided to try to jump start sales by selling them in America at a two for one price. You buy two laptops and the second one gets sent to a child in the third world. The price of the second laptop is tax deductible.

With orders for its rugged XO laptop falling short of its initial goal, the One Laptop Per Child project announced today that it would let consumers in the United States and Canada buy the cute computer for a limited time.

In an interview last week, Nicholas Negroponte, the former MIT Media Lab director and founder of the so-called $100 laptop initiative, conceded that he had not locked in the 3 million orders that he once said were necessary to trigger mass production.

The new “Give 1, Get 1” initiative could be the antidote, he said, by helping to spread the project.

For a limited two-week span in November, people will be able to buy two laptops for $399, one for the buyer and one for a child in a developing country.

They say they will be able to ship by Christmas. I think it would make a great present for a small child who wants a laptop like their older siblings. They sound pretty rugged and are built to withstand the climate and conditions of a third world country. And the child will get a valuable lesson in sharing their abundance with kids who don’t have as much.