The reaction of educational institutions and companies to Khanacademy and Wikipedia

Everybody knows Wikipedia, Khanacademy (which is supported by Microsoft) is also becoming more and more famous. Both of these sites are built to provide free information/education to all the people. Also both of them are non-profit organisations.

I was wondering how did the educational institutions and companies, who profit on education, react to these websites, as basically these websites are killing the industries. The sales of different textbooks, encyclopedias and training programs has decreased after these sites came to existence. Did they get lots of lawsuits and overall critisism?

I have tried to google about it, but have not found much information about it.

The reason why I am asking it, is because I am trying to create a similar website and am interested what kind of obstacles may I expect. The concept will be same, free education, although the way how the site provides it, will be quite different. It will not be illegal in any way, just different from the ones that exist. And what is one of the largest differences is that it will not be non-profit organisation, but the product it provides will be free of charge.You can bring parallels with different app companies, who provide free apps, yet profit. Although the main purpose of the site will not be maximising the profits, which a common purpose of most capitalistic not non-profit organisation.

The thing is, I am afraid of what will the reaction be towards my project. The copyright laws are becoming more and more absurdic, which means such sites may have quite some lawsuits, especially if they piss off some bigger companies and especially in the beginning, at least I personally, would have no resources to deal with lawsuits.

Thank you for your replies in advance

Copyright laws eh? Depends what you're wanting to do and how you're wanting to do it.

There are plenty of educational/documentary websites out there which embed other peoples content and turn a profit from ad revenue, donations, if you were thinking along that line? If you host offshore it's possible, but becomes increasingly different to find a decent network for advertisements, as legit companies want little part of websites like that.

But any sort of online website library of videos, text, what have you - if that's the sort of thing you're considering - is going to run into legal problems sooner or later.

There would be ways to side-step the law, to an extent. Embedding content which is hosted elsewhere is one. But that's not a guarantee.

There are hordes of websites online, some fairly big, providing embedded media content that isn't there's. equally there's examples of websites doing the same thing that have been pulled, owners taken to court.

ATS in an international community, what flies in Uzbekistan might not fly if you're a US citizen. Hence, a lot of websites that provide access to illegal content, they're hosted on offshore servers, their domains are non-us domains. Mega has gone live again with a .co.nz domain(nz), most websites for movies and tv shows now are .eu, .whatever

You're playing with fire so be ready for the burn.

apart from that, you should ask a professional.

When my son or daughter are doing their homework, they are not allowed to use Wiki as a source. It has to be a "mainstream" source such as NASA, or another established scientific journal if the subject is science or space. Other subjects follow the same criteria, has to be established "official" source.

Originally posted by GrandStrategy
Copyright laws eh? Depends what you're wanting to do and how you're wanting to do it.

There are plenty of educational/documentary websites out there which embed other peoples content and turn a profit from ad revenue, donations, if you were thinking along that line? If you host offshore it's possible, but becomes increasingly different to find a decent network for advertisements, as legit companies want little part of websites like that.

But any sort of online website library of videos, text, what have you - if that's the sort of thing you're considering - is going to run into legal problems sooner or later.

There would be ways to side-step the law, to an extent. Embedding content which is hosted elsewhere is one. But that's not a guarantee.

There are hordes of websites online, some fairly big, providing embedded media content that isn't there's. equally there's examples of websites doing the same thing that have been pulled, owners taken to court.

ATS in an international community, what flies in Uzbekistan might not fly if you're a US citizen. Hence, a lot of websites that provide access to illegal content, they're hosted on offshore servers, their domains are non-us domains. Mega has gone live again with a .co.nz domain(nz), most websites for movies and tv shows now are .eu, .whatever

You're playing with fire so be ready for the burn.

apart from that, you should ask a professional.

I will not go into details, but it will be text-based, but the way it is presented,especially the design, is the main difference from any other similar project. The information will be much like any textbook - scientific knowledge mixed with self explanations, again a bit differently from textbooks. As far as I understand, common scientific knowledge (formulas, proofs) is not considered protected by any copyright law and every source I will use, will be referenced + permissioned by its creator. I have already gotten several oral permissions, when I am starting will also get these on paper.

I am from a EU country, although the laws round here are not very strict, especially copyright. Right now, as far as I know, even torrent/program downloading is not considered illegal (or is just not followed by the government), as long as it is not used for commercial reasons.

I am also planning on going to get some professional legal advice for it. Right now just doing the research around similar projects.

OP-- my take is this:

Much as the the RIAA and the MPAA may feel about torrent sites, I'm sure the textbook companies and educational institutions aren't in love with the fact that there are now so many free sources of knowledge out there. In many cases, quite extensive knowledge. I dare say I've learned more via the internet than I have through most of my formal education. (I also happen to be one of those weird guys who finds science interesting, among other things, and enjoys learning.)

On the other hand, the educational institutions (and related, supporting businesses like textbook publishers) do have an ace up their sleeve that groups like the RIAA and MPAA do not have-- A "monopoly" on Higher Education.

It is true that for some professions, or in some situations, it may be possible to get a sufficiently "high level" and well-paying job with the just the knowledge inside your head, and the skills at your fingertips. For example, when starting as a low-level lab assistant, and working your way up to being a full-fledged lab technician (not the best example, but it's off the cuff...) However, as we all know, to even get your foot in the door in most places, or any kind of recognition whatsoever, you need a little piece of paper saying you have a "degree" or a "certificate" from an accredited educational institution.

Learn all you want outside the context of a school program (and I recommend you do) but unless you have a way of getting your foot in the door, or getting some kind of major recognition, you may be somewhat limited in career choice unless you have a nice shiny degree working to your advantage.

but with so many out their already.
what can you offer that others dont?

you need to have site hosted like wikileaks.
so they cannot Get at you to easily.

Links to other site to add to the info would be good.
good luck.

I can't speak for the educational community as a whole, but I can speak as an individual educator.

Wikipedia and Khanacademy are not in the same category, in my opinion. Wikipedia is edited by the public at large and contains as many mistakes as it does correct information and isn't accepted as a source for scholarly work due to its nature.

However, Khanacademy contains instructional information created by people with a solid background in the field and is a much more scholarly endeavor. I often suggest Khanacademy to students who come to me for suggestions in extending their studies or who need additional resources for comprehension, mostly those who are no longer in my class or are seeking information we don't cover in that class.

I have extreme respect and admiration for what Khanacademy has accomplished and see it as one of the most valuable resources out there for people who want to learn more, refine their skills or go back and learn what they may have missed while in school due to youth and carelessness or lack of desire at that time.

It's also a great tool for teachers in the classroom and can be used to show a different perspective or approach that some students may prefer. We all have different learning styles and it's up to the teacher to address every style they possibly can to ensure the success of their students. Not every student will be successful with Khanacademy, but some will thrive with it. Not every students will be successful with any given method and we must be open to using as many approaches as is reasonable.

They are two very different products. Khanacademy provides process and practice in learning a skill, Wikipedia is only a collection of statements and opinions concerning events. I discourage the use of Wikipedia and insist that students use at least two other sources to support whatever they may find there. It's not trustworthy because it can be edited by anyone with internet access and the verification of their statements isn't always conducted as it should be. I encourage the use of Khanacademy as the information contained there is from a group of people who are trained and hold degrees in the field. There is a big difference.

Originally posted by Cabin

I will not go into details, but it will be text-based, but the way it is presented,especially the design, is the main difference from any other similar project. The information will be much like any textbook - scientific knowledge mixed with self explanations, again a bit differently from textbooks. As far as I understand, common scientific knowledge (formulas, proofs) is not considered protected by any copyright law and every source I will use, will be referenced + permissioned by its creator. I have already gotten several oral permissions, when I am starting will also get these on paper.

I am from a EU country, although the laws round here are not very strict, especially copyright. Right now, as far as I know, even torrent/program downloading is not considered illegal (or is just not followed by the government), as long as it is not used for commercial reasons.

I am also planning on going to get some professional legal advice for it. Right now just doing the research around similar projects.

Information is only as good as its source. If you have no accredited expertise in the field you are providing information from, you will not be accepted as a source. Khanacademy is provided by experts in the field who are accredited, Wikipedia is from the public at large. That's why Khanacademy is accepted and Wikipedia isn't.

If you have no degree, no expertise and no accreditation, your site will not be accepted. If you do, it may be. Very simple in that aspect.