It’s only a matter of time until internet access is as ubiquitous as television and radio.
“But that is changing incredibly quickly, faster than most people realize. “An enormous amount of learning goes on outside the formal framework, and kids learn more on their own than they do in school – that is really quite a critical observation it makes a big difference.” While the Wikimedia Foundation’s Wikibooks project is working to write free textbooks and educational resources for students in deprived areas, Wales agrees that the lack of access to the internet is now the biggest barrier to study. “It has become more important than ever that we teach students how to do research, and how to evaluate different sources of information,” he says. “We do have some staff,” says Wales, “but in terms of writing entries, it’s volunteers of all kinds who get involved, ranging from young people who get very interested in a topic and find that they have something to contribute, all the way to retired academics who still want to be a part of the intellectual community.”īut Wales – who taught at Auburn and Indiana Universities while studying for a PhD (which he never finished) – believes there’s much more to education than the “old-fashioned” teaching of facts by rote.
This site is possible thanks to the support of a dedicated, well-informed community a model that schools can seek to emulate through their own online knowledge sharing. No homework assignment is complete without a visit to the site, and while many teachers will see its ubiquity as a double-edged sword, its role in advancing the sum of human knowledge is beyond doubt. Wikipedia revolutionized online learning and continues to dominate the sector, taking millions of visitors each month down its ‘rabbit-hole’ of links to discover new ideas, places, people and information. And that’s why it became successful so quickly, because this grand big vision really excited people.” “This is not something we expanded into it is where we always wanted to be.
“That original vision has always remained complete,” says Wales, whose first web project, Nupedia – an encyclopedia of free, expert-written content – launched in 2001. It started with a single, stark vision of co-founder Jimmy Wales: “Imagine a world in which every single person on the planet is given free access to the sum of all human knowledge.” Twelve years, and 30 million articles (and counting) in 286 languages after its launch, the Wikipedia website is one of the most prominent and influential learning channels anywhere in the world.
Co-founder of Wikipedia and the Wikimedia Foundation, USA
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