The worldwide recession looks to have taken a bite out of sales of Intel’s Classmate PC, a computer that was supposed to bring the power of, um, computers to the developing world. Since governments have been devoting resources (read: money) to fighting the recession, they have less money to buy “superfluous” items like computers for kids.

Not that it really matters to the Classmate PC’s producers. Orders and margins were already on the low side, so if governments decide not to buy ‘em in bulk anymore, meh, no big deal. Business-wise, at least.

Of course, as Bobby Kennedy once said, you can’t only measure a country’s wealth in raw dollars and cents: what about the quality of children’s “education, or their quality of play”? Spend a few dollars on some computers today, then in a few years you’ve got a better educated citizenry to deal with. That’s the goal, at least.