Khan Academy and BitTorrent Partner to Distribute Educational Videos | Hacker News Reader

Khan Academy and BitTorrent Partner to Distribute Educational Videos

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162 pointsaudreyw21 comments

If this adds legitimacy to the BitTorrent protocol, then the greater good is served.

As for the BitTorrent app ecosystem, that's a real chicken-and-egg situation. People are looking for Khan Academy videos and then use BitTorrent to facilitate that. Not the other way around.

If you listen to this interview by Techzing with th creators of a "web tv show" Pioneer One, they talk about how releasing it on Bittorrent has given them access to many new people and new lead gen.

(Also I note they mention in it in the blurb) http://techzinglive.com/page/643/102-tz-interview-pioneer-on...

Assuming Khan do a "nice bit of self branding" at the start or end of the video with the link, then I can only see this being a plus, it also keeps the videos more in the public domain, instead on youtube, for instance... I believe ultimately it will bring them more exposure.

This is good news for the people who watch these videos sped up. It's amazing how much more engaging some speakers are when you watch a video at, say, 1.4x the normal speed.

That's also what I do with the podcasts I listen to. 1.35x is my default though ;-)

The files go from my podcatcher directly into sox for conversion. Sounds a lot nicer than the speedup mechanism provided by my mobile media player.

time sox --single-threaded -S "${FILE}" -t wav - tempo ${TEMPO} | lame -h -V 4 - ${NEWFILE} || exit 1

id3cp --v1tag "${FILE}" "${NEWFILE}"

Does anyone know of a way that doesn't need a conversion to WAV first?

They already have all the video files in a .torrent on their website. I downloaded part of it the other day to brush up on trig.

the torrent file is at : http://code.google.com/p/khanacademy/downloads/list

Three words... "substantial non-infringing use".

Very nice.

I rather see academic books for free on the web, I am not much of a video guy, no time even for a one minute youtuber. Kudos to the Khan Academy for their effort, but more is needed in the free ebooks arena.

Even a combination of both would be nice. Videos/lectures have value, but I'm more likely to use a "tangible" electronic document like an e-book or a white paper.

Wouldn't it take you more time to read a topic in a book than view a 5 minute video?

Generally not, no.

Khan's fairly good at explaining stuff, but I have to view all of his material at double speed -- otherwise the repetitions and "uhm"s would be too bothersome. Same content could be delivered in half the time if written and read.

Bingo! The quality of the information is high but the presentation quality is, ah, um, has room for improvement.

Transcribing the narration and converting the "chalkboard" to text/svg/flash/whathaveyou would be a huge win.

You could give it a try.

Khan Academy's math videos are a fantastic supplement to a textbook and a somewhat dry professor. They have really helped me with my Linear Algebra class. Sal's "think about this way..." teaching method can really illuminate difficult concepts.

I don’t personally support the "I rather see academic books for free on the web" attitude, nonetheless my site is an iteration of this idea (math only). Take a look: http://inperc.com/wiki/index.php?title=Category:Courses

I feel videos are more hopeful for the people seeking help on these topics.

I have been watching several dozen videos from Kahn. I am surprised on how much efficient the videos are. You actually hear and see how the problems are resolved. If you are reading you have to jump between the text and the equations.

Here, exactly what I mean:

http://www.fhsst.org

I'm a student and the Khan Academy is saving my ass because a) he's a better instructor than my professor and b) the rewards and achievements make it really fun to "play the game" (read: learn high level mathematics). Of all the textbooks I've had over the years, I cannot think of one that has presented the information as clearly and practically as Mr. Khan has.

Seems like this puts Khan Academy at risk given the idiots at Homeland Security--- guilt by association with BitTorrent

I don't think that it will become a problem. BitTorrent enjoys widespread use for legal purposes like distributing Linux distros, open data, etc. Homeland Security hasn't caused any trouble for legal downloads yet.

The bigger dangers are firewalls and ISPs that throttle or block BitTorrent traffic.

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