It seems like 140 million would be enough to create something along the lines of a MIT OCW or Khan Academy-with-testing-centres to earn degrees.

Maybe it's the unrealistic and the naive opimist in me that is saying this--but imagine any person in the world with an internet connection could have access to study for a world-class degree on whatever schedule suits them?

Obviously there are challenges involved, and there will always be a place for research institutions, but it seems to me like if anyone in the world could earn a degree equivalent in rigor to an MIT degree that a lot more would. That would help a lot of people and also propel advancements science and tech.

It seems most of us in tech learned a lot of our most valuable skills on our own--so in other words, labour-intensive education isn't the only way to do it.