Walter Bender, who was once President of the OLPC movement has moved his sugar to a new project. Sugar Labs will continue the software development, but as Bender stated:

As a separate foundation, we will be able to advance Sugar's development even further and make it available on multiple distributions and hardware platforms.

The company states it enhances the Linux experience with an interface that doesn't inundate people with Application, file or folder structures. The "Activity" will include program and data. Best part is it is all open source.

The OS GUI add-on is definitely based with children in mind. Icons like "Pippy" for Python programming and Tam-Tam for music creation. If you're planning to load up the old computer with a system for the kid, or a new machine like a EeePC or even an OLPC with Linux, this is something to think about.