Salman Khan at TiEcon 2011

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Kind: captions
Language: en

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Sal: So what I want to do today,

00:00:09.315 --> 00:00:11.689
since this is conference
on entrepreneurship,

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I thought I would give a
little bit of a background

00:00:13.534 --> 00:00:15.739
on the story of Kahn Academy started.

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I think some of you all
might be reasonably familiar.

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Actually, before I even
start, how many of you all

00:00:19.153 --> 00:00:21.813
have been to the site or
watched a Kahn Academy video,

00:00:21.813 --> 00:00:24.054
oh, very good. I think we have a very high

00:00:24.054 --> 00:00:26.904
penetration in our demographic.

00:00:28.519 --> 00:00:32.382
I think it'll be
interesting because I think

00:00:32.382 --> 00:00:34.923
the story of Kahn Academy,
more than almost more than

00:00:34.923 --> 00:00:36.632
entrepreneurial stories is kind of a,

00:00:36.632 --> 00:00:38.291
I don't want to say accidental,
I want to think that

00:00:38.291 --> 00:00:40.898
some of it was somewhat by design,

00:00:40.898 --> 00:00:42.066
but it has been this kind of

00:00:42.066 --> 00:00:44.423
organic process and it's
still not 100% clear

00:00:44.423 --> 00:00:46.669
where all this is going to
lead to, although it seems

00:00:46.669 --> 00:00:50.335
like it could lead to
something pretty exciting.

00:00:50.335 --> 00:00:54.761
We could rewind back to
2004 and I was an analyst

00:00:54.761 --> 00:00:57.055
at a hedge fund in Boston.

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My aunt and uncle and
their children, my cousins,

00:01:01.556 --> 00:01:02.937
were visiting me from New Orleans.

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It was right after my wedding.
I got married in New Jersey,

00:01:04.677 --> 00:01:07.223
went back to Boston, and
they were visiting me and the

00:01:07.223 --> 00:01:12.196
oldest of the children,
Nadia, she was 12 years old.

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It was 4th of July weekend in Boston,

00:01:13.920 --> 00:01:15.686
I don't know if any of you
all have been to Boston,

00:01:15.686 --> 00:01:18.601
they have a nice 4th
of July fireworks thing

00:01:18.601 --> 00:01:20.530
over the Charles River, and
I distinctly remember while

00:01:20.530 --> 00:01:25.221
we were waiting for
the fireworks to start,

00:01:25.221 --> 00:01:29.030
I was just killing time by
giving my family brain teasers,

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the kind of brain teasers, a
good interview question at Google

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or whatever, and I don't
know if you all have ever

00:01:36.007 --> 00:01:37.606
done this with your family,
but some people say,

00:01:37.606 --> 00:01:40.492
"I don't care, I don't want
to think right now," but

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I distinctly remember Nadia,
she was 12 years old and

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she was like, "Don't tell me the answer.

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I can figure it out. Can
they see each other ... ?"

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At 12 years old, she was
tackling these brain teasers

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as well as any 25 year old
computer science gravita

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that I'd ever interviewed before.

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I remember the next day, we
were touring the colleges

00:02:05.774 --> 00:02:09.386
and we went to MIT and I
remember telling Nadia,

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"I'm pretty impressed
by how well you tackled

00:02:12.029 --> 00:02:13.261
a lot of those brain teasers yesterday.

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You should think about MIT."

00:02:15.909 --> 00:02:18.561
I remember right when I
said that, my aunt gave a

00:02:18.561 --> 00:02:20.784
a little look to my uncle,
and I wasn't sure what that

00:02:20.784 --> 00:02:22.536
look was about, maybe
it was something else,

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completely unrelated,
but I remember that look.

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The very next morning, my
aunt and other auntie told me,

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"Sal, thank you so much
for believing in Nadia.

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It really means a lot.
You're like a big brother to

00:02:37.011 --> 00:02:40.317
my children and a role
model, but I thought I would

00:02:40.317 --> 00:02:42.645
let you know that Nadia's
actually having trouble in Math.

00:02:42.645 --> 00:02:44.219
She's gotten great grades,
she's a straight A student,

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but she just took a placement
exam and she did not

00:02:47.288 --> 00:02:51.370
place into the standard track
where you take Algebra in

00:02:51.370 --> 00:02:53.705
8th grade and so on and so
forth, she got placed into

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a slower track.

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I said, "That's impossible.
She was tackling stuff way more

00:03:02.973 --> 00:03:06.217
abstract and deep and
thought-provoking two nights ago

00:03:06.217 --> 00:03:08.843
than anything that you
could imagine covering in a

00:03:08.843 --> 00:03:10.672
6th or 7th grade Math class."

00:03:10.672 --> 00:03:14.572
So when Nadia woke up, I
said, "Nadia, I have trouble

00:03:14.572 --> 00:03:17.255
believing this, what
do you not understand?

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Why do you think you didn't
do well in the placement exam?

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It was unit stuff, converting
kilograms to grams and

00:03:23.632 --> 00:03:28.609
all the rest." I said, "Nadia,
I'm 100% you can tackle that,

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so what do you say when
you go back to New Orleans

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and I stay in Boston, after
my work and after your school,

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I tutor you? We do
something over speakerphone,

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We'll figure out a way to be
able to see what each other,

00:03:38.800 --> 00:03:39.967
what we're writing all that that."

00:03:39.967 --> 00:03:43.378
We started using Yahoo Doodle
and we started doing this.

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It was kind of fun for me
... Even while I was at the

00:03:46.799 --> 00:03:51.007
hedge fund, when anyone
works at a hedge fund, you

00:03:51.007 --> 00:03:52.961
kind of have a rationale
for why you're doing it,

00:03:52.961 --> 00:03:57.092
(audience laughter)

00:03:57.092 --> 00:03:59.160
although I do have an argument on how

00:03:59.160 --> 00:04:00.715
it actually does contribute to society,

00:04:00.715 --> 00:04:04.653
but that would take me
longer than this talk.

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But I used to tell my friends,

00:04:06.135 --> 00:04:09.099
"I want to do this job
long enough so that I could

00:04:09.099 --> 00:04:11.633
save enough money that I could
start a school on my own terms."

00:04:11.633 --> 00:04:12.866
That was always something
that was a little bit

00:04:12.866 --> 00:04:14.736
in the back of my mind, I
didn't really have a sense of

00:04:14.736 --> 00:04:18.186
what that would mean, but it
was like a life ambition for me.

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So it was fun for me to
tutor my cousin because

00:04:20.964 --> 00:04:27.465
could start to warm up and
help my cousins in the process.

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The first month was difficult.
I remember with Nadia

00:04:30.113 --> 00:04:35.719
it was like, "x plus 3 is
equal to 10. What is x?"

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Her answers were always
like, "7?" or I'd say,

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"If you have 2 kilometers,
how many meters?"

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She'd say, "2,000?" and I
was like, "Are you sure?"

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It was this thing, she was
a smart girl, but she just

00:04:49.136 --> 00:04:53.016
had no confidence.
Anything outside of Math,

00:04:53.016 --> 00:04:56.084
her brain was engaged, as
soon as she got a formal

00:04:56.084 --> 00:04:59.400
Math problem, it's like
she didn't want to think.

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There's a couple of things
that I had done early on and

00:05:01.478 --> 00:05:04.111
I don't talk a lot about this
because the videos are what

00:05:04.111 --> 00:05:09.220
Khan Academy got most known
for, is I want to make

00:05:09.220 --> 00:05:11.311
something for Nadia so that
I can make sure she has

00:05:11.311 --> 00:05:13.777
100% proficiency of the core
stuff, so that she doesn't

00:05:13.777 --> 00:05:17.508
answer every question
with another question.

00:05:17.508 --> 00:05:19.919
So I wrote this little thing,
this little Java Script

00:05:19.919 --> 00:05:23.732
question generator for her
that will only give her

00:05:23.732 --> 00:05:25.958
as many units, problems as
necessary until she should

00:05:25.958 --> 00:05:29.804
get 10 in a row or as many
basic Algebra or exponents,

00:05:29.804 --> 00:05:32.498
any of these core skills.

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The next day on our tutoring
session I would say,

00:05:35.710 --> 00:05:37.722
"Did you do the problems?"

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She'd say, "Oh yeah, I did them,"
and I didn't really believe her,

00:05:40.001 --> 00:05:45.810
so I put a database behind
it so I could keep track of

00:05:45.810 --> 00:05:48.046
when she did the problems,
how much time was it

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taking her and all the rest,
very simple stuff at this point.

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Then I started making
one module after another.

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This was literally a
dedicated software effort for

00:05:56.001 --> 00:06:00.164
one 12 year old at the time.

00:06:00.164 --> 00:06:03.339
She eventually did progress
through the tutoring and

00:06:03.339 --> 00:06:07.025
the software which, the videos
aren't even on the radar

00:06:07.025 --> 00:06:07.919
at this point.

00:06:07.919 --> 00:06:10.201
Then I started to tutor
her younger brothers,

00:06:10.201 --> 00:06:12.484
more and more family
members, it was kind of this

00:06:12.484 --> 00:06:15.121
fun thing ... Sometimes when
I'd call up a distant relative,

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I was like, "Can I tutor your
kids?" they thought that there

00:06:17.264 --> 00:06:20.767
was some type of strange catch to it.

00:06:20.767 --> 00:06:23.601
They're like, "Sal must not be doing
well in this hedge fund thing."

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Fast forward now to 2006,
I have this cohort of

00:06:30.235 --> 00:06:33.857
20 or 30 kids around the country
that different times though,

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I still had a day job and I
would come home and I would

00:06:35.936 --> 00:06:38.562
try to tutor them all
and do these sessions.

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I would try to do these
conference calls with more than

00:06:40.599 --> 00:06:43.471
one student, that got tricky.

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I vented at a dinner party and
one of my buddies, [Zooly] says,

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"Why don't you just record some
of your lectures on YouTube?"

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I said, "No, not YouTube.
That's for dogs on skateboards.

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That's not for serious mathematics."

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Then I went home and once
I got over the idea that

00:07:03.515 --> 00:07:10.720
it wasn't my idea, I
decided to give it a shot.

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I put those first YouTube
videos up there; I think it was

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"Greatest Common Divisor"
or "Least Common Multiple"

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and I started doing a bunch
of them, 20 or 30, the same

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stuff that I was covering
with my cousins at the time,

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and a couple of things happened;
I joke about this a lot,

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but it's absolutely true, the
first feedback I got from my

00:07:26.854 --> 00:07:29.023
cousins was that they
liked me better on YouTube

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than in person. (laughter)

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I'm hoping it's only an
education tutorial context,

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but it actually makes a lot
of sense; they could pause,

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they could repeat ... There's
a lot to be said about

00:07:43.523 --> 00:07:45.641
human interaction, there's
a lot to be said about

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human mentorship and
think they value that.

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They value the fact that their
cousin, who was in Boston,

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who had a job, who was
married, took the time out

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of his day to care about their lives.

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That definitely was a positive for them,

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but I could tell just from
my interactions that the

00:08:00.387 --> 00:08:02.860
actual tutoring sessions
was super stressful.

00:08:02.860 --> 00:08:04.930
No one wants to say that
they don't understand.

00:08:04.930 --> 00:08:07.144
No one wants their cousin to feel like,

00:08:07.144 --> 00:08:09.614
"Maybe Nadia isn't worth the time," or

00:08:09.614 --> 00:08:11.527
"Maybe she's wasting my
time," so all of a sudden

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they could do it in a
destressed environment.

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When we had our live sessions,

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it was just really for questions.

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The other thing that
happened is I started getting

00:08:20.848 --> 00:08:24.309
letters from people. I just
randomly put it on YouTube

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I remember that first time
YouTube says do you want to

00:08:26.087 --> 00:08:28.075
make these private or public? I was like,

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"I don't care, Public," and
other people started to watch.

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At first I was suspicious
because I told four cousins

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to watch the video and six
people would watch it, like,

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"Who are these two people
that are watching my videos?"

00:08:42.077 --> 00:08:44.498
I don't know if you ever saw
"Julia and Julia" where she

00:08:44.498 --> 00:08:46.137
wrote a blog and she keeps
refreshing it to see if

00:08:46.137 --> 00:08:48.793
people are watching, that was me in 2006.

00:08:48.793 --> 00:08:53.279
All of a sudden, it became
clear that definitely people

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who I wasn't related to
were watching the videos

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and then they started to comment,

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they started to say, "Thank
you," which that by itself

00:09:01.581 --> 00:09:02.939
is huge because I don't
know if you've seem most of

00:09:02.939 --> 00:09:04.767
the comments on YouTube,
(audience laughter)

00:09:04.767 --> 00:09:10.747
they're not all G-rated.

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Frankly, I think if I was a
physical teacher, just to get a

00:09:12.831 --> 00:09:14.329
thank you from a student
every now and then,

00:09:14.329 --> 00:09:17.473
that's a pretty powerful idea,
but I would start getting

00:09:17.473 --> 00:09:19.945
these thank yous, but then
the comments would be like,

00:09:19.945 --> 00:09:21.859
"I was going to flunk Algebra
and now I'm the top student

00:09:21.859 --> 00:09:23.754
in Algebra because I
watched those four videos."

00:09:23.754 --> 00:09:26.564
I was like, "My God, I was
sleeping or taking a nap or

00:09:26.564 --> 00:09:29.503
shaving or something and this
person was able to learn Algebra.

00:09:29.503 --> 00:09:31.846
That's a pretty profound idea!

00:09:31.846 --> 00:09:35.598
You can imagine, I just got
excited and I just kept going.

00:09:35.598 --> 00:09:38.071
When I started off, I
didn't think this was ...

00:09:38.071 --> 00:09:40.813
There was something in my head that said,

00:09:40.813 --> 00:09:42.609
"This is a neat idea. I
can make that video on

00:09:42.609 --> 00:09:45.486
Least Common Multiple once
and it's there forever.

00:09:45.486 --> 00:09:48.054
My cousins can use it and
even if no one else uses it,

00:09:48.054 --> 00:09:49.528
it's kind of a nice little
thing for the family.

00:09:49.528 --> 00:09:51.468
Maybe my grandkids
could eventually use it,

00:09:51.468 --> 00:09:52.966
or my great-great grandkids.
It would kind of be like

00:09:52.966 --> 00:09:55.830
this neat thing and maybe
... maybe in the future,

00:09:55.830 --> 00:09:59.966
other people might actually
want it, so I just kept going.

00:09:59.966 --> 00:10:02.313
Actually I was building out
the software at the same time.

00:10:02.313 --> 00:10:08.125
The software's funny because I
made up all of these modules,

00:10:08.125 --> 00:10:13.964
and as you can tell, a lot of
this has come out of being lazy.

00:10:14.702 --> 00:10:16.929
I got tired of assigning
the modules to my cousins.

00:10:16.929 --> 00:10:19.541
Before I was like, "Okay
Nadia, now you've gotten

00:10:19.541 --> 00:10:21.623
ten in a row on this, you're
now ready for this module.

00:10:21.623 --> 00:10:23.057
Now that you've gotten ten in
a row for negative numbers,

00:10:23.057 --> 00:10:24.619
you're now ready for fractions."

00:10:24.619 --> 00:10:26.065
That got tiring for me, so I set them up

00:10:26.065 --> 00:10:28.710
in this kind of graph
structure, so it would

00:10:28.710 --> 00:10:30.476
automatically assign them.

00:10:30.476 --> 00:10:31.413
Once you got ten in a row on this,

00:10:31.413 --> 00:10:32.495
you're now ready for these modules.

00:10:32.495 --> 00:10:33.287
Once you get ten in a row on those,

00:10:33.287 --> 00:10:35.539
you're now ready for those modules.

00:10:35.539 --> 00:10:37.460
I said, "Look, this is kind
of a neat graph structure."

00:10:37.460 --> 00:10:39.144
I had it visually displayed for myself

00:10:39.144 --> 00:10:40.984
so I could keep track
of all these modules,

00:10:40.984 --> 00:10:43.326
so let me have my cousins look at them.

00:10:43.326 --> 00:10:44.539
Once again, they liked that.

00:10:44.539 --> 00:10:45.991
They could see where they were going and

00:10:45.991 --> 00:10:47.596
what they needed to do to understand

00:10:47.596 --> 00:10:49.168
to eventually get to Trigonometry or

00:10:49.168 --> 00:10:51.981
eventually get to Geometry, or whatever.

00:10:51.981 --> 00:10:54.914
I had that out there and this is probably

00:10:54.914 --> 00:10:57.397
thing not to do if you're trying to ...

00:10:57.397 --> 00:10:58.623
And I wasn't trying to start a business or

00:10:58.623 --> 00:10:59.760
a not-for-profit at this point,

00:10:59.760 --> 00:11:03.957
but that software alone
got so popular by 2007

00:11:03.957 --> 00:11:08.028
that it was taking down my
$50 a month web hosting.

00:11:08.028 --> 00:11:10.332
My brilliant entrepreneurial mind said,

00:11:10.332 --> 00:11:12.539
"Oh, then I'll just turn it off (laughs)

00:11:12.539 --> 00:11:18.688
instead of paying $100 a month."

00:11:18.688 --> 00:11:21.254
That happened, the video
traffic kept growing;

00:11:21.254 --> 00:11:23.933
hundreds, thousands, ten thousands,

00:11:23.933 --> 00:11:27.457
until you fast forward to 2008 ...

00:11:27.457 --> 00:11:29.149
And then something
interesting, even across,

00:11:29.149 --> 00:11:31.121
some interesting things started to happen.

00:11:31.121 --> 00:11:33.260
I started getting letters from teachers.

00:11:33.260 --> 00:11:35.296
Once again, this is just for my cousins,

00:11:35.296 --> 00:11:37.231
you know, whatever ... But
teachers started saying,

00:11:37.231 --> 00:11:40.649
"You already gave the
lecture on adding fractions.

00:11:40.649 --> 00:11:42.181
I don't have to give the lecture anymore.

00:11:42.181 --> 00:11:44.097
Now I'm assigning these
for my students and then

00:11:44.097 --> 00:11:46.834
I use my class time, the
teacher's class time,

00:11:46.834 --> 00:11:49.456
to actually interact with my
students, to actually kind of

00:11:49.456 --> 00:11:51.293
flip the classrooms so now students can do

00:11:51.293 --> 00:11:55.346
homework while they're in the room and

00:11:55.346 --> 00:11:57.370
get the lecture at home
at their own pace,"

00:11:57.370 --> 00:11:59.101
and get all of the benefits
that my cousins had,

00:11:59.101 --> 00:12:01.443
the reason why they
liked them to begin with.

00:12:01.443 --> 00:12:04.071
So you fast forward to
2009 and this whole thing

00:12:04.071 --> 00:12:06.370
just kind of got too exciting.

00:12:06.370 --> 00:12:09.293
I had trouble focusing on generating Alpha

00:12:09.293 --> 00:12:13.286
in my day job and this
is probably the fourth

00:12:13.286 --> 00:12:16.875
iteration where I was
tempted to quit my job.

00:12:16.875 --> 00:12:19.750
The previous three, we kind
of looked at our finances

00:12:19.750 --> 00:12:22.539
and said, "No, we can't,"
but by the fourth,

00:12:22.539 --> 00:12:24.260
we're like, "You know,
it wouldn't be completely

00:12:24.260 --> 00:12:26.777
ridiculous to try this out for a year."

00:12:26.777 --> 00:12:28.712
My rationale was at
this point, I was like,

00:12:28.712 --> 00:12:31.620
"There is something here,"
because at this point,

00:12:31.620 --> 00:12:33.534
I was getting hundreds of letters a day.

00:12:33.534 --> 00:12:35.205
These were not letters of someone saying,

00:12:35.205 --> 00:12:36.232
"This was nice to have."

00:12:36.232 --> 00:12:37.793
"This helped me review for an exam."

00:12:37.793 --> 00:12:39.038
Some of these letters were like,

00:12:39.038 --> 00:12:40.982
"This is the reason why I
could go to college," or

00:12:40.982 --> 00:12:42.533
"This is the only reason why I'm able to

00:12:42.533 --> 00:12:44.724
pass class X, Y or Z."

00:12:44.724 --> 00:12:46.284
It sounds like there's something here,

00:12:46.284 --> 00:12:47.841
I made the decision to
make it a not-for-profit,

00:12:47.841 --> 00:12:49.535
just because really, I
wanted as many people

00:12:49.535 --> 00:12:53.284
as possible to use it, so I was thinking

00:12:53.284 --> 00:12:57.808
there's so much worry
about education right now,

00:12:57.808 --> 00:12:59.196
let me just keep doing it.

00:12:59.196 --> 00:13:00.692
I took the most naive approach to

00:13:00.692 --> 00:13:03.342
starting a not-for-profit or
really starting a business,

00:13:03.342 --> 00:13:04.646
I just kept making videos and hoping

00:13:04.646 --> 00:13:06.921
someone would notice.

00:13:06.921 --> 00:13:09.557
In 2009 I did that, you fast forward ...

00:13:09.557 --> 00:13:13.146
Luckily by May, June,
July, August of 2009,

00:13:13.146 --> 00:13:15.561
people began to notice.

00:13:15.561 --> 00:13:17.582
Google brought me in, they said,

00:13:17.582 --> 00:13:20.138
"A lot of our engineers,
a lot of our people here

00:13:20.138 --> 00:13:22.023
like to use your videos with their kids.

00:13:22.023 --> 00:13:23.524
Would you be willing to talk to us?"

00:13:23.524 --> 00:13:27.561
I go to Google and
halfway into the meeting,

00:13:27.561 --> 00:13:32.143
they're like, "So what would
you do with $2 million?"

00:13:32.143 --> 00:13:34.638
I said, "Is this in an
education context or

00:13:34.638 --> 00:13:38.414
just a broader question for
what I would do ..." (laughter)

00:13:38.414 --> 00:13:42.358
Very different answers!

00:13:42.358 --> 00:13:44.925
But it was clear it was about education.

00:13:44.925 --> 00:13:48.503
I said, "You know, I
would ... well, beyond

00:13:48.503 --> 00:13:52.740
giving myself a salary, I would build out

00:13:52.740 --> 00:13:54.459
that software platform that I started off

00:13:54.459 --> 00:13:56.297
for my cousin so that students can all

00:13:56.297 --> 00:13:58.049
work at their own pace,
so that teachers can

00:13:58.049 --> 00:13:59.795
get data and analytics
on what the students

00:13:59.795 --> 00:14:03.107
are up to, so that we
could take this model

00:14:03.107 --> 00:14:04.568
that these teachers had already started

00:14:04.568 --> 00:14:06.743
experimenting with, this model
of flipping the classroom

00:14:06.743 --> 00:14:10.098
and kind of supercharging
it with a software.

00:14:10.098 --> 00:14:12.428
If you have the software,
now whether you're

00:14:12.428 --> 00:14:14.794
at home or you're at
school, every kid could work

00:14:14.794 --> 00:14:16.412
at their own pace. In the same classroom,

00:14:16.412 --> 00:14:19.078
you could have kids doing 5th grade Math

00:14:19.078 --> 00:14:21.717
and kids doing Trigonometry.

00:14:21.717 --> 00:14:24.139
The teacher's role will
now not be to grade papers,

00:14:24.139 --> 00:14:26.292
not to be a lecturer, but to spend

00:14:26.292 --> 00:14:29.060
every moment of their time
interacting with students,

00:14:29.060 --> 00:14:31.362
and having the students,
every moment of their time,

00:14:31.362 --> 00:14:34.011
not sitting passively in
a room waiting for the

00:14:34.011 --> 00:14:36.753
period to end, but to actually
interact with each other

00:14:36.753 --> 00:14:38.415
and maybe tutor each other."

00:14:38.415 --> 00:14:41.064
They liked the idea.

00:14:41.064 --> 00:14:44.096
It looked like that funding
process was happening,

00:14:44.096 --> 00:14:47.221
although that didn't
happen until later on.

00:14:47.221 --> 00:14:48.361
This is a lesson I learned,

00:14:48.361 --> 00:14:50.335
I only have one experience in this,

00:14:50.335 --> 00:14:52.187
but it's like one of these things where

00:14:52.187 --> 00:14:54.180
there's a period of time where you think,

00:14:54.180 --> 00:14:55.801
"Boy, someone needs to notice this," and

00:14:55.801 --> 00:14:57.809
you think you're doing
something that's pretty cool

00:14:57.809 --> 00:15:00.552
and your customers or
your students or whatever,

00:15:00.552 --> 00:15:02.975
it's like this is a life-changing thing,

00:15:02.975 --> 00:15:05.085
and you're doing it, but
no one else is noticing.

00:15:05.085 --> 00:15:07.347
At some point, nine months into it,

00:15:07.347 --> 00:15:08.636
I was getting pretty insecure.

00:15:08.636 --> 00:15:11.961
I was getting like, "I need
to start updating my resume."

00:15:11.961 --> 00:15:13.940
I don't know if the hedge
fund will hire me back

00:15:13.940 --> 00:15:18.303
because I've done this flaky
thing and all of this stuff,"

00:15:18.303 --> 00:15:19.971
but then once all of a sudden it did hit,

00:15:19.971 --> 00:15:23.192
it was kind of crazy
because it was literally

00:15:23.192 --> 00:15:27.726
in the same ... Google looked
like that process was going,

00:15:27.726 --> 00:15:30.782
Ann and John Doe, actually
they were the first

00:15:30.782 --> 00:15:34.834
to say, "You at minimum deserve a salary."

00:15:34.834 --> 00:15:38.391
In August of 2010, so this is very recent,

00:15:38.391 --> 00:15:42.302
this is like last year, I
think it was July or August,

00:15:42.302 --> 00:15:44.788
I get a text from Ann.

00:15:44.788 --> 00:15:46.136
She was at the Aspen Institute saying,

00:15:46.136 --> 00:15:47.702
"Bill Gates in front of 2,000 people

00:15:47.702 --> 00:15:49.875
talking about you right now."

00:15:49.875 --> 00:15:53.380
I said, "That prankster Ann!" (laughter)

00:15:53.380 --> 00:15:55.617
or maybe that text was
sent to the wrong person

00:15:55.617 --> 00:15:59.044
because it was a very surreal idea, but

00:15:59.044 --> 00:16:01.770
later on, about two weeks later,

00:16:01.770 --> 00:16:06.080
I got a call from Mr.
Gates' office saying,

00:16:06.080 --> 00:16:08.381
"You may or may not
know, but Bill is a fan.

00:16:08.381 --> 00:16:10.706
He uses these videos
himself and he uses them

00:16:10.706 --> 00:16:13.297
with his kids," and immediately
when they said this,

00:16:13.297 --> 00:16:14.734
I'm like, "I gotta review
some of those videos

00:16:14.734 --> 00:16:20.176
and see what I said." (audience laughter)

00:16:20.176 --> 00:16:22.155
But he said, "He would like to
meet if you have some time."

00:16:22.155 --> 00:16:26.214
I was literally staring at a blank
calendar. (audience laughter)

00:16:26.214 --> 00:16:28.299
I was like, "Oh yeah, I think I can move

00:16:28.299 --> 00:16:31.441
a few things around." (audience laughter)

00:16:31.441 --> 00:16:35.751
"We should be able to
figure out something."

00:16:35.751 --> 00:16:37.381
We met and he asked how
we could support ...

00:16:37.381 --> 00:16:39.708
I was like, "You know, it would be nice

00:16:39.708 --> 00:16:44.966
to 'come out of the closet'," so to speak.

00:16:44.966 --> 00:16:47.962
I was recording in the closet ...

00:16:47.962 --> 00:16:50.503
And so he supported us,
we got office space,

00:16:50.503 --> 00:16:53.126
we have a team, and
then Google came in and

00:16:53.126 --> 00:16:56.316
now we're essentially a
team, we're eight people now,

00:16:56.316 --> 00:16:57.680
we're based in downtown Mountain View and

00:16:57.680 --> 00:16:59.711
we're building out this software platform

00:16:59.711 --> 00:17:03.132
and videos, I keep
making videos to kind of

00:17:03.132 --> 00:17:05.629
provide an education for anyone anywhere.

00:17:05.629 --> 00:17:06.966
We started a pilot in Los Altos.

00:17:06.966 --> 00:17:09.632
Once again, we didn't
think our strategy was

00:17:09.632 --> 00:17:11.213
go into classrooms right from the get-go,

00:17:11.213 --> 00:17:13.869
we were focused on the end student,

00:17:13.869 --> 00:17:15.373
the millions of students
that are out there right now,

00:17:15.373 --> 00:17:17.700
2 million students using it
on their own every month,

00:17:17.700 --> 00:17:19.134
but Los Altos came to us and said,

00:17:19.134 --> 00:17:20.131
"What would you do in a classroom if

00:17:20.131 --> 00:17:21.212
you had carte blanche?"

00:17:21.212 --> 00:17:23.042
We said, "Look, we're building this thing,

00:17:23.042 --> 00:17:25.167
every kid work at their own pace."

00:17:25.167 --> 00:17:26.427
We didn't think they'd be into it,

00:17:26.427 --> 00:17:27.403
but the next day they said,

00:17:27.403 --> 00:17:29.836
"Yeah, can we start in two weeks?"

00:17:29.836 --> 00:17:30.954
So we have two 5th grade clases and

00:17:30.954 --> 00:17:33.212
two 7th grade classes in Los Altos now.

00:17:33.212 --> 00:17:34.248
It's been pretty tremendous.

00:17:34.248 --> 00:17:35.802
I think all of the
indicators, we could talk

00:17:35.802 --> 00:17:39.839
maybe more about that later,
have been very positive.

00:17:39.839 --> 00:17:42.264
Just to give a little bit of a clue of

00:17:42.264 --> 00:17:47.131
the power of this is,
very recently a reporter

00:17:47.131 --> 00:17:48.797
came to one of the classrooms to just do

00:17:48.797 --> 00:17:51.466
a story on us, and she saw a 5th grader in

00:17:51.466 --> 00:17:53.911
one of those classrooms
doing Trigonometry.

00:17:53.911 --> 00:17:55.544
Just sitting there doing
Trigonometry problems,

00:17:55.544 --> 00:17:59.210
you know, very casually and
the reporter's very impressed.

00:17:59.210 --> 00:18:00.919
She sits down next to
the 5th grader and says,

00:18:00.919 --> 00:18:05.499
"So do you think this is 5th grade Math?"

00:18:05.499 --> 00:18:08.070
The little girl had a
very mischievous look

00:18:08.070 --> 00:18:11.695
on her face and she goes,
"No, I think it's 6th grade."

00:18:11.695 --> 00:18:14.647
(audience laughter)

00:18:14.647 --> 00:18:18.508
So now going forward, I think
our strategy is two things;

00:18:18.508 --> 00:18:21.890
and our strategy, frankly,
changes every week,

00:18:21.890 --> 00:18:23.190
but the strategy is two things;

00:18:23.190 --> 00:18:24.558
build out our software platform,

00:18:24.558 --> 00:18:27.224
we're actually translating
it to ten languages

00:18:27.224 --> 00:18:28.772
so it can reach more than just

00:18:28.772 --> 00:18:30.381
the English speakers of the world,

00:18:30.381 --> 00:18:32.396
build out the software
platform, so right now,

00:18:32.396 --> 00:18:34.726
the exercises go deep, they go into ...

00:18:34.726 --> 00:18:36.204
You saw in the video, they
go into Vector Calculus

00:18:36.204 --> 00:18:38.163
and Biology and college
Chemistry and History

00:18:38.163 --> 00:18:40.835
and all the rest, but have
the exercise platform,

00:18:40.835 --> 00:18:43.358
first go through K through Calculus,

00:18:43.358 --> 00:18:45.686
and then beyond that, college-level Math

00:18:45.686 --> 00:18:48.056
and Chemistry, Biology,
Physics, all the rest ...

00:18:48.056 --> 00:18:51.342
And build out what we're
doing in these schools.

00:18:51.342 --> 00:18:54.585
Over the next year,
we're going to to about

00:18:54.585 --> 00:18:57.137
10 to 15 schools and school districts to

00:18:57.137 --> 00:18:59.887
kind of expand this Los Altos idea and

00:18:59.887 --> 00:19:01.474
see how we can really transform what

00:19:01.474 --> 00:19:03.564
happens in the classroom.

00:19:03.564 --> 00:19:05.443
That's kind of an update
on what we're up to.

00:19:05.443 --> 00:19:08.974
I think now we can, I believe
there's just going to be

00:19:08.974 --> 00:19:10.481
a Q and A part of this.

00:19:10.481 --> 00:19:15.729
(audience applause)

00:19:15.729 --> 00:19:18.116
Male voiceover: [unintelligible]

00:19:18.116 --> 00:19:20.586
For those of you living in the Bay Area,

00:19:20.586 --> 00:19:22.689
the person who's going
to have a chat with Sal

00:19:22.689 --> 00:19:24.474
needs no introduction;

00:19:24.474 --> 00:19:28.714
three-time Emmy Award Winning Raj Mathai,

00:19:28.714 --> 00:19:30.313
who just three months ago was named

00:19:30.313 --> 00:19:32.526
News Anchor for NBC Bay Area.

00:19:32.526 --> 00:19:35.194
He was a very well-regarded sportscaster

00:19:35.194 --> 00:19:36.806
for a number of years with that station.

00:19:36.806 --> 00:19:39.772
So let me welcome to
the stage, Raj Mathai.

00:19:39.772 --> 00:19:44.656
(audience applause)

00:19:45.409 --> 00:19:46.983
Raj: Hello everyone.

00:19:46.983 --> 00:19:47.624
Should we sit ...

00:19:47.624 --> 00:19:49.059
Sal: Yeah, yeah, yeah ...

00:19:50.228 --> 00:19:53.895
Raj: First of all, is
he a stand-up comedian

00:19:53.895 --> 00:19:56.309
or an educator? This is phenomenal.

00:19:56.309 --> 00:19:58.724
That was wonderful.

00:19:58.724 --> 00:20:01.979
Sal: By virtue of my name, I
feel the desire to entertain.

00:20:01.979 --> 00:20:05.479
(laughter) But I will keep my shirt on.

00:20:05.479 --> 00:20:11.289
(laughter)

00:20:11.289 --> 00:20:12.633
Raj: I'm glad you brought it up because

00:20:12.633 --> 00:20:14.464
the first thing this morning,
I'm putting on my suit,

00:20:14.464 --> 00:20:15.727
getting ready to come
here and my wife says,

00:20:15.727 --> 00:20:17.006
"What's happening today?"

00:20:17.006 --> 00:20:18.816
I said, "I'm going to the TiEcon event

00:20:18.816 --> 00:20:20.953
and I'm going to spend
part of the afternoon

00:20:20.953 --> 00:20:24.175
with Salman Kahn," and
she dropped to the floor.

00:20:24.175 --> 00:20:25.467
(audience laughter)

00:20:25.467 --> 00:20:28.341
Raced to the closet,
"What am I gonna wear?"

00:20:28.341 --> 00:20:29.388
"You're coming with me?"

00:20:29.388 --> 00:20:31.151
I said, "No, the real Salman Kahn."

00:20:31.151 --> 00:20:33.251
You have more of an impact I think, than

00:20:33.251 --> 00:20:35.146
the other one, right?
(laughs) (audience applause)

00:20:35.146 --> 00:20:41.841
Sal: If you want a really surreal story,

00:20:41.841 --> 00:20:45.587
apparently Bill Gates did
a search for Salman Kahn

00:20:45.587 --> 00:20:48.672
(audience laughter)

00:20:48.672 --> 00:20:51.399
and he forwarded his entire organization

00:20:51.399 --> 00:20:53.187
the other guy saying,

00:20:53.187 --> 00:20:56.647
"Did you know there's
another Salman Kahn?"

00:20:56.647 --> 00:20:58.694
Just the idea of seeing Bill Gates look at

00:20:58.694 --> 00:21:01.508
Salman Kahn without his
shirt on was a very ...

00:21:01.508 --> 00:21:02.947
(audience laughter)

00:21:02.947 --> 00:21:06.848
Diffident ... Anyway, it's not about him.

00:21:06.848 --> 00:21:08.397
Raj: I think like so many people,

00:21:08.397 --> 00:21:09.830
like everyone here in the audience, I too,

00:21:09.830 --> 00:21:12.456
just backstage, just
captivated about your story.

00:21:12.456 --> 00:21:13.797
This isn't the first time that I've heard

00:21:13.797 --> 00:21:15.244
about your story, I've been following you

00:21:15.244 --> 00:21:17.072
for a while now.

00:21:17.072 --> 00:21:19.652
So what happens now?

00:21:19.652 --> 00:21:21.903
Here we are, we have a
lot of entrepreneurs,

00:21:21.903 --> 00:21:23.988
we have a lot of venture capitalists,

00:21:23.988 --> 00:21:25.034
and one of the big questions is,

00:21:25.034 --> 00:21:28.098
"Okay, this is great, it
seems very successful,

00:21:28.098 --> 00:21:30.657
but it's not-for-profit."

00:21:30.657 --> 00:21:31.909
So at what point ...

00:21:31.909 --> 00:21:32.940
Sal: What is is for, then? (laughs)

00:21:32.940 --> 00:21:35.185
Raj: At what point do you turn the corner,

00:21:35.185 --> 00:21:37.557
if that point is even on your radar?

00:21:37.557 --> 00:21:39.025
Sal: No, we're definitely
not going to turn,

00:21:39.025 --> 00:21:40.356
this isn't like a batch and switch,

00:21:40.356 --> 00:21:43.099
we're not going to be
not-for-profit at some point.

00:21:43.099 --> 00:21:44.103
I think I would have to do something

00:21:44.103 --> 00:21:45.640
pretty shady at this point to actually

00:21:45.640 --> 00:21:48.937
turn it into a for-profit.

00:21:48.937 --> 00:21:51.445
This simple answer is we're going to

00:21:51.445 --> 00:21:53.196
stay as not-for-profit.

00:21:53.196 --> 00:21:55.480
The decision early on was, and
I think a lot of you all can,

00:21:55.480 --> 00:21:57.740
I'm not saying there's
anything wrong with for-profit,

00:21:57.740 --> 00:21:59.361
I obviously worked for
in a very for-profit

00:21:59.361 --> 00:22:02.995
industry before this,
it's pretty much about

00:22:02.995 --> 00:22:04.948
that's all it was for
... (audience laughter)

00:22:04.948 --> 00:22:06.680
Raj: That's the next session at 2:00.

00:22:06.680 --> 00:22:10.029
Sal: Yeah, exactly,
(laughter) stock tips ...

00:22:10.029 --> 00:22:13.403
Early on, it was in 2008 actually,

00:22:13.403 --> 00:22:17.323
some VCs had approached
me and it was actually

00:22:17.323 --> 00:22:18.952
pretty exciting; conversation number one,

00:22:18.952 --> 00:22:22.815
because they said, "This is
awesome. We can fund this.

00:22:22.815 --> 00:22:24.431
You'll be able to get a salary.

00:22:24.431 --> 00:22:26.135
You can keep doing these videos full time.

00:22:26.135 --> 00:22:28.319
You don't have to find all
the spare time to do it.

00:22:30.518 --> 00:22:32.857
It'll be a double bottom line business or

00:22:32.857 --> 00:22:35.365
we can, a social venture,
whatever you want to call it,

00:22:35.365 --> 00:22:37.900
and if it works out, you'll be rich."

00:22:37.900 --> 00:22:41.053
That didn't sound bad to me, so

00:22:41.053 --> 00:22:44.070
we scheduled another meeting.

00:22:44.070 --> 00:22:46.535
It was obvious by Meeting Two,

00:22:46.535 --> 00:22:48.153
there was something that just wasn't ...

00:22:48.153 --> 00:22:49.648
I'm not saying there's
anything wrong with this,

00:22:49.648 --> 00:22:51.214
but I was just enjoying this so much.

00:22:51.214 --> 00:22:54.154
It was really why I kind
of woke up in the morning.

00:22:54.154 --> 00:22:55.798
By Meeting Two, the
conversation started to

00:22:55.798 --> 00:22:57.734
become like, "You should
continue doing this,

00:22:57.734 --> 00:22:59.170
but we should focus more on test prep,

00:22:59.170 --> 00:23:00.729
and maybe we could charge for this or

00:23:00.729 --> 00:23:03.179
have a subscription model or a freemium,

00:23:03.179 --> 00:23:05.344
or whatever you want to call it,

00:23:05.344 --> 00:23:08.199
I'm not saying that
they were wrong or bad,

00:23:08.199 --> 00:23:09.984
but I just started, it didn't feel as fun

00:23:09.984 --> 00:23:12.111
all of a sudden, so I was just like,

00:23:12.111 --> 00:23:14.209
"Hold on, maybe we'll just wait on this

00:23:14.209 --> 00:23:15.729
and see where it goes."

00:23:15.729 --> 00:23:16.898
Then you fast forward a little bit more

00:23:16.898 --> 00:23:18.855
all the way to 2009 and
I talked to a few other

00:23:18.855 --> 00:23:21.429
VCs and I just went through kind of an

00:23:21.429 --> 00:23:23.779
introspective process because
like I said in the talk,

00:23:23.779 --> 00:23:25.205
one of the really fun things about this

00:23:25.205 --> 00:23:29.402
was the idea that people
were saying "thank you,"

00:23:29.402 --> 00:23:32.530
that my great grandkids could use this,

00:23:32.530 --> 00:23:34.066
that kids all over the world could this

00:23:34.066 --> 00:23:36.173
really for all time, that
even if I got hit by a bus,

00:23:36.173 --> 00:23:38.540
these things could keep teaching.

00:23:38.540 --> 00:23:40.820
I went through the thought experiment of,

00:23:40.820 --> 00:23:42.488
"What's a home run in either situation?"

00:23:42.488 --> 00:23:43.764
A home run in the for-profit world,

00:23:43.764 --> 00:23:46.231
which isn't a bad thing,
it's by no means certain,

00:23:46.231 --> 00:23:51.204
is you become this major player, IPO,

00:23:51.204 --> 00:23:55.390
or you get acquired and I would feel

00:23:55.390 --> 00:23:56.688
pretty good about that,
I would have created

00:23:56.688 --> 00:23:59.071
a big business that I'm sure would have

00:23:59.071 --> 00:24:01.229
reached many people, I
would become rich which

00:24:01.229 --> 00:24:04.222
wouldn't have been bad, but then when you

00:24:04.222 --> 00:24:06.782
think about the total amount
of the not-for-profit side,

00:24:06.782 --> 00:24:09.032
it was even a little more exciting.

00:24:09.032 --> 00:24:11.127
There's kind of this
opportunity here, maybe ...

00:24:11.127 --> 00:24:13.613
to start an institution,
to start something that

00:24:13.613 --> 00:24:16.016
could last maybe hundreds of years.

00:24:16.016 --> 00:24:17.487
This is what I told my wife,

00:24:17.487 --> 00:24:19.396
"There are no for-profit
entities that last

00:24:19.396 --> 00:24:22.987
more than, very few last
more than a century,

00:24:22.987 --> 00:24:25.103
but there are not-profit
entities that do."

00:24:25.103 --> 00:24:27.979
Not to put Kahn Academy
in the same league as

00:24:27.979 --> 00:24:29.892
these organizations,
but would I rather start

00:24:29.892 --> 00:24:32.519
a GE or would I rather start a Stanford?

00:24:32.519 --> 00:24:33.849
When I thought about it
that way, I was like,

00:24:33.849 --> 00:24:35.262
"It would kind of be more exciting just

00:24:35.262 --> 00:24:38.181
to start the latter," so
that's the not-profit ...

00:24:38.181 --> 00:24:43.419
Raj: It's interesting,
your background (applause).

00:24:43.419 --> 00:24:45.732
It's interesting you bring up Stanford,

00:24:45.732 --> 00:24:49.139
even your own CV, MIT and then to Harvard,

00:24:49.139 --> 00:24:52.930
you are talking about real
traditional institutions here.

00:24:52.930 --> 00:24:56.056
What you're doing, in
many ways can be viewed as

00:24:56.056 --> 00:24:58.432
very untraditional,
higher educated people.

00:24:58.432 --> 00:24:59.942
Is there a negative side of this?

00:24:59.942 --> 00:25:01.636
Have you gotten some pushback whether it's

00:25:01.636 --> 00:25:03.400
from the traditional education community

00:25:03.400 --> 00:25:05.446
or anyone else in the community?

00:25:05.446 --> 00:25:07.414
Sal: Right now, and luckily, I expected

00:25:07.414 --> 00:25:09.387
a lot more pushback,
especially when we go into

00:25:09.387 --> 00:25:12.274
schools and all, but the fun thing is,

00:25:12.274 --> 00:25:13.844
the core thing that we're doing,

00:25:13.844 --> 00:25:15.577
we're going straight to the students,

00:25:15.577 --> 00:25:17.281
or straight to the parents,
so we don't have to

00:25:17.281 --> 00:25:19.384
get buy-in from a lot,
but even in the schools,

00:25:19.384 --> 00:25:21.326
we're dealing with the schools that have

00:25:21.326 --> 00:25:22.560
wanted to do it, we're not forcing anybody

00:25:22.560 --> 00:25:25.390
to do anything, and I
think the only resistance

00:25:25.390 --> 00:25:28.282
we get is sometimes when
people see just kind of

00:25:28.282 --> 00:25:29.866
on the surface, they
say, "Oh wait, lectures

00:25:29.866 --> 00:25:32.236
on video, they're going into classrooms,

00:25:32.236 --> 00:25:33.689
wait ... this is here
to replace teachers."

00:25:33.689 --> 00:25:37.098
or this going to somehow
mechanize the classroom.

00:25:37.098 --> 00:25:39.482
What we're saying is the exact opposite.

00:25:39.482 --> 00:25:41.489
These videos and the software, they're

00:25:41.489 --> 00:25:43.845
actually about to
rehumanize the classroom.

00:25:43.845 --> 00:25:46.237
Instead of having a teacher
up here giving a lecture

00:25:46.237 --> 00:25:49.958
and students down there
passively listening,

00:25:49.958 --> 00:25:51.765
we're offloading all
that with the technology

00:25:51.765 --> 00:25:53.372
and now class time becomes interactive.

00:25:53.372 --> 00:25:55.565
We can tutor each other, the
teacher's going to walk by,

00:25:55.565 --> 00:25:56.902
every moment of their time is going to be

00:25:56.902 --> 00:25:58.315
mentoring each other, there's data,

00:25:58.315 --> 00:25:59.867
there's analytics so that any intervention

00:25:59.867 --> 00:26:02.656
that the teacher does is very productive.

00:26:02.656 --> 00:26:04.296
The teachers who've experienced it,

00:26:04.296 --> 00:26:05.908
they told us this is
why they became teachers

00:26:05.908 --> 00:26:06.654
in the first place.

00:26:06.654 --> 00:26:09.904
I think the only resistance is just the

00:26:09.904 --> 00:26:11.570
knee-jerk reaction, but when they actually

00:26:11.570 --> 00:26:12.487
see what we're doing, we're actually

00:26:12.487 --> 00:26:13.255
all about empowering teachers.

00:26:13.255 --> 00:26:15.866
Raj: Do you think there
will be some resistance,

00:26:15.866 --> 00:26:19.111
even more so, as Kahn
Academy gets more well-known?

00:26:19.111 --> 00:26:20.174
Right now it's well-known,
but it's going to

00:26:20.174 --> 00:26:22.227
get to that next level where people,

00:26:22.227 --> 00:26:24.353
especially now, the economic
climate in this country,

00:26:24.353 --> 00:26:26.156
where there's so many budget cuts,

00:26:26.156 --> 00:26:28.240
there's so much bad blood
going back and forth,

00:26:28.240 --> 00:26:29.948
do you expect some
resistance, because I'm sure

00:26:29.948 --> 00:26:31.777
there will be at some
point around the corner?

00:26:31.777 --> 00:26:34.147
Sal: Yeah, and we have to
be careful there because

00:26:34.147 --> 00:26:36.299
obviously, education's a very
politically charged thing

00:26:36.299 --> 00:26:40.315
and we're trying our best to
stay out of the arguments.

00:26:40.315 --> 00:26:42.604
We think regardless of where
everything else settles,

00:26:42.604 --> 00:26:44.483
we can be relevant.

00:26:44.483 --> 00:26:52.001
Maybe it will develop,
but we haven't seen it

00:26:52.001 --> 00:26:53.001
in a strong way just yet.

00:26:53.001 --> 00:26:55.445
Raj: In terms of the subject matter now.

00:26:55.445 --> 00:26:56.860
You're doing all these videos by yourself?

00:26:56.860 --> 00:27:00.340
I'm a TV guy, I get a sore
throat by talking a lot.

00:27:00.340 --> 00:27:04.591
When you plan on expanding,
are you just going to

00:27:04.591 --> 00:27:07.339
start bringing in other
experts in various subjects?

00:27:07.339 --> 00:27:11.091
Sal: Based on what our
focus is in the short term,

00:27:11.091 --> 00:27:12.749
we don't view that as [gating] factor.

00:27:12.749 --> 00:27:14.423
I keep making videos, this is fun for me

00:27:14.423 --> 00:27:16.082
because there's some stuff I know and

00:27:16.082 --> 00:27:17.371
there's some stuff I get to learn,

00:27:17.371 --> 00:27:19.320
I get to keep teaching
it and all the rest.

00:27:19.320 --> 00:27:23.000
Even just one guy can
do K through Calculus

00:27:23.000 --> 00:27:24.571
plus Chemistry, Biology and Physics

00:27:24.571 --> 00:27:27.423
on a course of about three man years,

00:27:27.423 --> 00:27:29.090
so it is this very scaleable thing.

00:27:29.090 --> 00:27:31.047
With that said, we are
starting to look for

00:27:31.047 --> 00:27:32.798
other potential lecturers.

00:27:32.798 --> 00:27:34.298
I'll even say [unintelligible],

00:27:34.298 --> 00:27:36.050
we're translating into 10 languages;

00:27:36.050 --> 00:27:39.215
Hindi, Bengali, we've already started on,

00:27:39.215 --> 00:27:42.338
and we want to do other languages.

00:27:42.338 --> 00:27:44.303
There's an opportunity;
one, to help redo the videos

00:27:44.303 --> 00:27:46.111
in this language or even
teach in those languages.

00:27:46.111 --> 00:27:47.714
One thing that we're
missing is basic literacy

00:27:47.714 --> 00:27:49.128
videos, but like in the context of the

00:27:49.128 --> 00:27:51.253
developing world, that's super important.

00:27:51.253 --> 00:27:53.868
Yeah, we are looking to bring
other people in the fold.

00:27:53.868 --> 00:27:54.993
One thing we're not looking to do is

00:27:54.993 --> 00:27:56.935
we don't want to be this crowdsourced

00:27:56.935 --> 00:27:58.850
hundreds of thousands of teachers where

00:27:58.850 --> 00:28:01.792
the student watches one
video from one teacher

00:28:01.792 --> 00:28:03.097
and then another video
from another teacher

00:28:03.097 --> 00:28:05.336
and it's different quality, first of all,

00:28:05.336 --> 00:28:06.204
that already exists.

00:28:06.204 --> 00:28:07.599
YouTube has that to some degree,

00:28:07.599 --> 00:28:09.031
there's other sites that do that,

00:28:09.031 --> 00:28:12.580
and we think that our niche is
really a bond with the teacher.

00:28:12.580 --> 00:28:14.369
It's crazy because it's technology, but

00:28:14.369 --> 00:28:16.320
we think we can actually form
a bond with the students.

00:28:16.320 --> 00:28:19.636
People, once they watch 10, 20, 30 videos

00:28:19.636 --> 00:28:21.366
from the same teacher, they're willing to

00:28:21.366 --> 00:28:23.803
invest their time and their
emotional energy into it.

00:28:23.803 --> 00:28:25.935
Raj: You can obviously sell and teach this

00:28:25.935 --> 00:28:28.055
product amazingly because
it's your product,

00:28:28.055 --> 00:28:29.467
you have a dynamic personality,

00:28:29.467 --> 00:28:31.306
obviously very intelligent.

00:28:31.306 --> 00:28:32.551
How do you bring the next person in there

00:28:32.551 --> 00:28:33.767
to do the ...

00:28:33.767 --> 00:28:37.052
Sal: It's an open question,
we're kind of doing,

00:28:37.052 --> 00:28:38.964
there's a guy who ...

00:28:38.964 --> 00:28:40.633
Raj: Like American Idol casting? (laughs)

00:28:40.633 --> 00:28:42.680
Sal: Thinking about
that, like teaching Idol,

00:28:42.680 --> 00:28:44.790
there's a couple of people who've,

00:28:44.790 --> 00:28:47.318
there's some guys who are video bloggers

00:28:47.318 --> 00:28:49.876
who are pretty hilarious
and intellectual and stuff,

00:28:49.876 --> 00:28:51.483
and they want to try it
out, so we'll see how

00:28:51.483 --> 00:28:53.871
they do ... And there's
a guy from MIT who's

00:28:53.871 --> 00:28:56.954
a computer science, he's been
teaching computer science.

00:28:56.954 --> 00:28:58.206
I think he's got a lot of potential,

00:28:58.206 --> 00:28:59.974
but we're not in a rush
to find these teachers

00:28:59.974 --> 00:29:01.105
because we want to take our time and

00:29:01.105 --> 00:29:02.926
find people who really
resonate with students.

00:29:02.926 --> 00:29:05.176
Raj: Your biggest fear moving forward,

00:29:05.176 --> 00:29:06.713
obviously there's been
a lot of success now,

00:29:06.713 --> 00:29:08.343
but is there something
in the back of your mind

00:29:08.343 --> 00:29:10.339
that you're curious
about, that maybe you're

00:29:10.339 --> 00:29:11.848
a little fearful about as
you move forward with this?

00:29:11.848 --> 00:29:17.944
Sal: Yeah, I think any
organization at our stage

00:29:17.944 --> 00:29:20.054
you don't want to be a flash in the pan.

00:29:20.054 --> 00:29:22.420
The ambition is to be something that lasts

00:29:22.420 --> 00:29:25.300
a hundred years, we'll be sad
if we don't last three years.

00:29:25.300 --> 00:29:27.678
Our main thing is, let's
just make sure that

00:29:27.678 --> 00:29:29.880
we are continuing to drive value,

00:29:29.880 --> 00:29:31.384
that we don't get caught
up in these other things,

00:29:31.384 --> 00:29:34.464
The focus of me just going
on TV and talking about

00:29:34.464 --> 00:29:36.474
educational forum and
becoming a policy person

00:29:36.474 --> 00:29:37.801
or something like that.

00:29:37.801 --> 00:29:39.713
I think where we are
right now, we're in this

00:29:39.713 --> 00:29:41.839
kind of inflection where
I think our main goal

00:29:41.839 --> 00:29:43.506
is to always just put the blinders on,

00:29:43.506 --> 00:29:45.843
stay focused on really
what got us to this point,

00:29:45.843 --> 00:29:47.405
which is really the end student,

00:29:47.405 --> 00:29:48.969
and making sure that we
continue to add value

00:29:48.969 --> 00:29:50.780
to that student and then the people who

00:29:50.780 --> 00:29:52.874
want to empower them, their
parents and their teachers.

00:29:52.874 --> 00:29:55.156
Raj: In the Bay Area here,
a lot of us familiar with

00:29:55.156 --> 00:29:57.489
school districts that are as successful,

00:29:57.489 --> 00:29:59.921
whether it's in east
Oakland or east Palo Alto,

00:29:59.921 --> 00:30:02.972
are you trying to target specific types

00:30:02.972 --> 00:30:04.925
of areas, demographically, perhaps?

00:30:04.925 --> 00:30:07.262
Sal: Yeah, we are focused
mainly on the Bay Area.

00:30:07.262 --> 00:30:09.173
We're looking all over the country and

00:30:09.173 --> 00:30:11.024
actually the world, we're going to a few

00:30:11.024 --> 00:30:13.006
international schools, but
what we're looking to do,

00:30:13.006 --> 00:30:15.708
Los Altos is obviously
not a community in need,

00:30:15.708 --> 00:30:20.015
(audience laughter)

00:30:20.015 --> 00:30:21.791
but what was really good about Los Altos,

00:30:21.791 --> 00:30:24.091
two of the 7th grade classes we did were

00:30:24.091 --> 00:30:27.070
actually slower tracked
kids and they've actually

00:30:27.070 --> 00:30:28.838
been doing tremendous, they've shown even

00:30:28.838 --> 00:30:31.758
more profound results,
so even Los Altos isn't

00:30:31.758 --> 00:30:35.178
all uniformly fluent and well-healed.

00:30:35.178 --> 00:30:37.175
What we're looking to
do is, other use cases,

00:30:37.175 --> 00:30:39.473
less well-healed neighborhoods,

00:30:39.473 --> 00:30:41.412
charter schools, private
schools, public schools,

00:30:41.412 --> 00:30:43.676
all of the above, but the
one theme that we do want

00:30:43.676 --> 00:30:46.565
in all these schools
is that there's buy-in,

00:30:46.565 --> 00:30:49.028
that it's not just the
mayor or the superintendent

00:30:49.028 --> 00:30:50.813
who's forcing it down; that the mayor,

00:30:50.813 --> 00:30:52.505
the superintendent, the
principal, the teachers

00:30:52.505 --> 00:30:56.231
and the parents all really,
really, really want this.

00:30:56.231 --> 00:30:59.406
About the flash in the pan,
I think our biggest risk is

00:30:59.406 --> 00:31:02.367
some schools kind of
half-way implements it,

00:31:02.367 --> 00:31:03.587
and then it's a disaster.

00:31:03.587 --> 00:31:06.454
Then everyone points and
says, "Look, it doesn't work."

00:31:06.454 --> 00:31:08.721
I think that would be a
disaster not just for us,

00:31:08.721 --> 00:31:10.393
but I think for the whole
idea behind it which

00:31:10.393 --> 00:31:11.871
I think has a lot of power.

00:31:11.871 --> 00:31:14.473
Our goal over the next
10 to 15 school districts

00:31:14.473 --> 00:31:17.938
is to just make sure
that their unambiguous

00:31:17.938 --> 00:31:19.291
success is like Los Altos.

00:31:19.291 --> 00:31:21.342
Raj: What about you for
the actual content of it?

00:31:21.342 --> 00:31:25.050
I mean, like any teacher,
and you are a teacher,

00:31:25.050 --> 00:31:27.462
you have to stay fresh and current and

00:31:27.462 --> 00:31:29.905
even continue to learn
about your own topics.

00:31:29.905 --> 00:31:31.655
How do you do that? Is
that part of your day?

00:31:31.655 --> 00:31:35.158
Sal: Yeah, there's some stuff that I know

00:31:35.158 --> 00:31:36.936
by virtue of my background,
but there's some stuff

00:31:36.936 --> 00:31:38.666
like Organic Chemistry ... I took it and

00:31:38.666 --> 00:31:40.408
I did all right in the
class, I took it in college,

00:31:40.408 --> 00:31:43.352
but a lot of people are
asking for Organic Chemistry.

00:31:43.352 --> 00:31:44.547
It's like one of these core classes.

00:31:44.547 --> 00:31:46.659
Every pre-Med and a lot of
Science leaders take this.

00:31:46.659 --> 00:31:49.716
There's actually no
Organic Chemistry videos

00:31:49.716 --> 00:31:51.462
on the web, there aren't
even bad ones out there.

00:31:51.462 --> 00:31:55.040
(laughter)

00:31:55.040 --> 00:31:58.133
So I said, "I need to
learn Organic Chemistry."

00:31:58.133 --> 00:31:59.690
But the one thing that I emphasize,

00:31:59.690 --> 00:32:01.041
I don't want to teach something unless

00:32:01.041 --> 00:32:02.294
I'm excited about it.

00:32:02.294 --> 00:32:05.416
We've all experienced
a teacher at the front

00:32:05.416 --> 00:32:06.560
of the classroom who's like,

00:32:06.560 --> 00:32:09.221
"The next step in the process
is ..." and you're like,

00:32:09.221 --> 00:32:10.887
"If he doesn't give a damn, why should I?"

00:32:10.887 --> 00:32:13.351
(audience laughter)

00:32:13.351 --> 00:32:16.880
So I won't do a video
unless I'm excited about it.

00:32:16.880 --> 00:32:18.387
The first day of studying
Organic Chemistry,

00:32:18.387 --> 00:32:20.215
I was not that excited about it.

00:32:20.215 --> 00:32:22.222
Actually once I immersed myself and really

00:32:22.222 --> 00:32:23.552
started thinking about
it and really started

00:32:23.552 --> 00:32:25.563
drawing [unintelligible],
it started to get exciting.

00:32:25.563 --> 00:32:28.702
I kind of immerse myself in
subjects that I don't know,

00:32:28.702 --> 00:32:30.587
I'll call up buddies that I think might be

00:32:30.587 --> 00:32:32.573
able to connect some dots for me and then

00:32:32.573 --> 00:32:34.376
once I feel like I have
a holistic picture,

00:32:34.376 --> 00:32:37.349
then I'll just start recording.

00:32:37.349 --> 00:32:40.518
I force a smile on my face and I do it.

00:32:40.518 --> 00:32:41.743
Hopefully it shows up in the videos.

00:32:41.743 --> 00:32:43.676
Raj: Like so many people
here, we [unintelligible]

00:32:43.676 --> 00:32:48.089
last night and talking
about just taking a risk,

00:32:48.089 --> 00:32:50.533
going against the grain,
going against the analysts

00:32:50.533 --> 00:32:53.542
that tell you one thing, you
obviously are doing that.

00:32:53.542 --> 00:32:56.744
What's the spirit, I don't
know about push back,

00:32:56.744 --> 00:32:58.318
but when you tell your Indian parents,

00:32:58.318 --> 00:33:01.954
"I'm leaving the hedge fund, my MIT and

00:33:01.954 --> 00:33:03.292
the Harvard education and I'm going to do

00:33:03.292 --> 00:33:04.620
this thing on YouTube," [unintelligible],

00:33:04.620 --> 00:33:05.506
"What are you doing?"

00:33:05.506 --> 00:33:10.754
Sal: Oh yeah. It's funny because my wife,

00:33:10.754 --> 00:33:12.973
she's finishing up her
fellowship at Stanford right now,

00:33:12.973 --> 00:33:15.137
but when I first told
people, especially at

00:33:15.137 --> 00:33:17.788
[unintelligible] parties that ...

00:33:17.788 --> 00:33:19.757
"What do you do?"

00:33:19.757 --> 00:33:25.839
"I make videos on YouTube." (laughter)

00:33:25.839 --> 00:33:27.751
I've actually heard this,
when they hear I'm ...

00:33:27.751 --> 00:33:31.560
I've heard them, "Well, at
least his wife is a doctor."

00:33:31.560 --> 00:33:36.590
(laughter)

00:33:36.590 --> 00:33:37.567
Raj: It's interesting, though, right?

00:33:37.567 --> 00:33:40.075
Sal: Yeah, thank God my wife's a doctor,

00:33:40.075 --> 00:33:44.507
but although a resident,
she wasn't making the ...

00:33:44.507 --> 00:33:48.166
but anyway, the day after ...

00:33:48.166 --> 00:33:50.090
My mother's very supportive of it now,

00:33:50.090 --> 00:33:52.175
but the day after I officially quit,

00:33:52.175 --> 00:33:55.451
and I actually did not consult my mother,

00:33:55.451 --> 00:33:57.368
not like a good [unintelligible] son,

00:33:57.368 --> 00:34:00.762
but my mother called my
wife and my mother-in-law,

00:34:00.762 --> 00:34:05.852
"What? How did you let him do this?"

00:34:05.852 --> 00:34:07.256
Everyone's really pumped about it now.

00:34:07.256 --> 00:34:10.066
Raj: As you look around at this room now,

00:34:10.066 --> 00:34:12.026
is there something, a message that you

00:34:12.026 --> 00:34:15.839
would want to give to
people here as you see

00:34:15.839 --> 00:34:18.283
what you're doing in moving forward?

00:34:18.283 --> 00:34:20.823
Sal: Yeah, there's a broader message about

00:34:20.823 --> 00:34:22.892
entrepreneurship and I think that,

00:34:22.892 --> 00:34:24.695
and I have a kind of a singular story,

00:34:24.695 --> 00:34:26.113
I think there's multiple ways obviously to

00:34:26.113 --> 00:34:28.948
kind of start something, but
my story as you could tell,

00:34:28.948 --> 00:34:31.783
was just me trying to reach a need and

00:34:31.783 --> 00:34:33.972
it was exciting for me
when just when a handful of

00:34:33.972 --> 00:34:36.214
my cousins were obviously
benefiting from it.

00:34:36.214 --> 00:34:38.774
That was enough. I was happy
with just that small success.

00:34:38.774 --> 00:34:41.689
It was worth my time to build it then.

00:34:41.689 --> 00:34:45.638
I think the lesson is whatever you do,

00:34:45.638 --> 00:34:47.888
hopefully there's some
small subset of people

00:34:47.888 --> 00:34:50.555
who find it life-changing
for them, maybe ...

00:34:50.555 --> 00:34:53.381
or in some way, very compelling.

00:34:53.381 --> 00:34:55.135
If you have that, then
it makes it worthwhile

00:34:55.135 --> 00:34:56.390
for you to do it.

00:34:56.390 --> 00:34:58.528
Then you kind of don't care how long ...

00:34:58.528 --> 00:35:00.661
There's a possibility
that in 2004 I'm going to

00:35:00.661 --> 00:35:02.720
start this online video platform and I'm

00:35:02.720 --> 00:35:04.505
going to get venture funding and all that,

00:35:04.505 --> 00:35:05.970
and I maybe would have
written a business plan,

00:35:05.970 --> 00:35:07.224
worked at it for six
months and if I didn't get

00:35:07.224 --> 00:35:09.023
[unintelligible] I would give it up.

00:35:09.023 --> 00:35:13.098
Because I had, I was happy
with the small successes,

00:35:13.098 --> 00:35:17.176
I was able to pursue it for 5 years before

00:35:17.176 --> 00:35:19.013
I quit my job and then even I was pumped

00:35:19.013 --> 00:35:20.184
about pursuing it
afterwards, so it was one

00:35:20.184 --> 00:35:22.301
of these things where it was one those

00:35:22.301 --> 00:35:24.600
unkillable ventures.

00:35:24.600 --> 00:35:27.577
I think that's one of those things that

00:35:27.577 --> 00:35:28.505
made venture succeed.

00:35:28.505 --> 00:35:29.860
There's a lot of things, a lot of ideas

00:35:29.875 --> 00:35:31.115
that people have and
the ideas just kind of

00:35:31.115 --> 00:35:33.450
go up and it pitters out and it dies and

00:35:33.450 --> 00:35:36.144
eight years later, it
becomes very successful.

00:35:36.144 --> 00:35:37.579
I think there's something to be said about

00:35:37.579 --> 00:35:40.284
maybe designing something
so it has a staying power.

00:35:40.284 --> 00:35:42.331
Raj: Before the call from Bill Gates,

00:35:42.331 --> 00:35:44.001
before all the cliques when it was just

00:35:44.001 --> 00:35:46.949
with your family, what kept
you motivated by doing this?

00:35:46.949 --> 00:35:48.554
Because yes, you quit a job,

00:35:48.554 --> 00:35:50.224
a good salaried job to do this.

00:35:50.224 --> 00:35:51.860
Sal: That's why I did not quit,

00:35:51.860 --> 00:35:55.074
so I am a practical person there.

00:35:55.074 --> 00:35:56.748
It was worth my time to do it.

00:35:56.748 --> 00:35:59.276
I was still spending
probably 15 hours a week

00:35:59.276 --> 00:36:01.905
with a day job doing
this for my cousins ...

00:36:01.905 --> 00:36:04.074
Raj: What was that leap of faith moment?

00:36:04.074 --> 00:36:06.126
Was there a point when you
finally looked and said,

00:36:06.126 --> 00:36:08.322
"You know what, I can do
this. I want to do this."

00:36:08.322 --> 00:36:09.704
What was that leap of faith moment?

00:36:09.704 --> 00:36:14.017
Sal: That became pretty
clear in 2007, 2008

00:36:14.017 --> 00:36:15.162
when other people were watching it.

00:36:15.162 --> 00:36:18.436
My cousins were, Nadia, not to show off,

00:36:18.436 --> 00:36:19.907
but she ended up taking
Calculus her freshman

00:36:19.907 --> 00:36:23.717
year in high school and we
went from being a slow ...

00:36:23.717 --> 00:36:24.747
When you see that with just one student,

00:36:24.747 --> 00:36:26.682
you're like, "This could
be transformational."

00:36:26.682 --> 00:36:28.160
That by itself made it worthwhile.

00:36:28.160 --> 00:36:29.789
You start getting letters from students.

00:36:29.789 --> 00:36:32.735
Then really, I had to
wait until 2009 because

00:36:32.735 --> 00:36:35.945
the success of the site
bounced off with our own

00:36:35.945 --> 00:36:39.238
financial risk, that was
the point where it just

00:36:39.238 --> 00:36:41.412
became hard for me to
focus on anything else.

00:36:42.228 --> 00:36:44.401
Raj: When you talk
about these cousins now,

00:36:44.401 --> 00:36:45.919
where are they and are they kind of your

00:36:45.919 --> 00:36:47.427
role models here of ...

00:36:47.427 --> 00:36:49.516
Sal: Yeah, I tell Nadia
on a regular basis,

00:36:49.516 --> 00:36:51.383
"You better be successful because ..."

00:36:51.383 --> 00:36:52.954
(audience laughter)

00:36:52.954 --> 00:36:55.487
There's a lot riding on this."

00:36:55.487 --> 00:37:00.412
She's now at Sarah
Lawrence and some of you,

00:37:00.412 --> 00:37:01.958
the [unintelligible] parents might cringe,

00:37:01.958 --> 00:37:06.520
but she's a writing major,
but she's also pre-Med.

00:37:06.520 --> 00:37:08.485
(audience laughter)

00:37:08.485 --> 00:37:10.037
Raj: Really?

00:37:10.037 --> 00:37:12.584
Sal: She's a writing major by choice.

00:37:12.584 --> 00:37:14.764
She's actually a Math rock star.

00:37:14.764 --> 00:37:15.834
Raj: And pre-Med by heritage.

00:37:15.834 --> 00:37:19.870
Sal: And pre-Med by heritage, exactly.

00:37:19.870 --> 00:37:23.490
Raj: As we wrap it up
here, the next phone call

00:37:23.490 --> 00:37:26.194
from Bill Gates or whoever it is,

00:37:26.194 --> 00:37:27.973
when they ask you how you're doing,

00:37:27.973 --> 00:37:29.860
have you gotten better
in these last few years?

00:37:29.860 --> 00:37:32.527
Because I would imagine you
have, with your tutorials.

00:37:32.527 --> 00:37:34.110
Do you look back on those
first tutorials, you're like,

00:37:34.110 --> 00:37:35.960
"Oh Gosh, I'm much better now."

00:37:35.960 --> 00:37:37.860
Sal: Some of the other
ones, like my cousins,

00:37:37.860 --> 00:37:39.239
they're not going to pay me.

00:37:39.239 --> 00:37:40.532
I literally answer a telemarketer call in

00:37:40.532 --> 00:37:42.940
one of those earlier
videos, I don't edit it out.

00:37:42.940 --> 00:37:44.359
I'm just like, "No, I
don't want Dish Network,"

00:37:44.359 --> 00:37:50.159
and I hang up. (audience laughter)

00:37:50.159 --> 00:37:51.715
You can edit that out,
I don't want to get ...

00:37:54.037 --> 00:37:56.990
Now Bill Gates is watching these videos.

00:37:56.990 --> 00:37:58.557
I feel like maybe I
should be a little nicer,

00:37:58.557 --> 00:38:00.162
a little bit more thought out, but

00:38:00.162 --> 00:38:01.858
I think one of the things that's captured

00:38:01.858 --> 00:38:03.639
peoples' imagination early on is that

00:38:03.639 --> 00:38:04.496
it does feel personal.

00:38:04.496 --> 00:38:06.231
It does feel like there's
just this guy recording.

00:38:06.231 --> 00:38:08.620
It doesn't feel like
this publishing company

00:38:08.620 --> 00:38:10.287
is doing these computer graphics and doing

00:38:10.287 --> 00:38:12.649
all these, "The next
step in photosynthesis is

00:38:12.649 --> 00:38:14.794
when the ... " This feels like this very

00:38:14.794 --> 00:38:17.394
organic thing and so I
think we want to make it

00:38:17.394 --> 00:38:19.311
more nicer, easier to
watch, more polished,

00:38:19.311 --> 00:38:22.004
but we don't want to make it too polished.

00:38:22.004 --> 00:38:22.625
Raj: That's a very good point.

00:38:22.625 --> 00:38:24.393
There's that fine line
now of bringing in the

00:38:24.393 --> 00:38:27.466
TV camera, the earpieces,
the makeup, the so forth,

00:38:27.466 --> 00:38:29.612
are you flirting with that line, yet?

00:38:29.612 --> 00:38:31.083
Or is it still you kind
of want to stay ...

00:38:31.083 --> 00:38:33.502
Sal: We always want to be organic,

00:38:33.502 --> 00:38:37.562
a guy at his screen capture board, or gal,

00:38:37.562 --> 00:38:39.835
explaining the concepts in real time,

00:38:39.835 --> 00:38:41.663
not with a script.

00:38:41.663 --> 00:38:43.154
We might experiment with other things on

00:38:43.154 --> 00:38:45.667
the forefront, maybe
History or Literature,

00:38:45.667 --> 00:38:47.825
but for the most part, it's
going to be the same thing.

00:38:47.825 --> 00:38:49.965
Raj: Sal, pleasant to
spend some time with you

00:38:49.965 --> 00:38:52.250
this afternoon, I think I
speak for the entire room.

00:38:52.250 --> 00:38:54.117
Good luck, continued success.

00:38:54.117 --> 00:38:59.839
(audience applause)


Correction calendar notation

WEBVTT
Kind: captions
Language: en

00:00:00.530 --> 00:00:03.720
I told you in the last video
on calendar notation that,

00:00:03.720 --> 00:00:08.670
regardless of whether you're
using BC, AD or BCE and CE,

00:00:08.670 --> 00:00:13.660
that there is no year
0, that we had 1 BC.

00:00:13.660 --> 00:00:16.210
And then we had that
theoretical birth of Jesus,

00:00:16.210 --> 00:00:18.120
and most historians
don't think that he

00:00:18.120 --> 00:00:23.140
was born right exactly
on January 1, 1 AD.

00:00:23.140 --> 00:00:24.680
But there's no year 0.

00:00:24.680 --> 00:00:28.360
Right after that, you
go from December 31, 1

00:00:28.360 --> 00:00:31.920
BC, to January 1, 1 AD.

00:00:31.920 --> 00:00:33.690
There's no year 0.

00:00:33.690 --> 00:00:35.410
And despite the fact
that I emphasized

00:00:35.410 --> 00:00:39.030
that in the last video, I didn't
take that into consideration

00:00:39.030 --> 00:00:41.070
when I calculated
how many years there

00:00:41.070 --> 00:00:46.720
were between Plato's birth
and Columbus discovering

00:00:46.720 --> 00:00:47.730
the new world.

00:00:47.730 --> 00:00:50.380
And the reason why I didn't
take that into consideration

00:00:50.380 --> 00:00:52.700
is that the year
1492, whether you

00:00:52.700 --> 00:00:57.505
want to call it AD
1492, Anno Domini 1492.

00:00:57.505 --> 00:00:58.880
Whether you want
to call it that,

00:00:58.880 --> 00:01:01.780
or whether you want to call
it 1492 in the Common Era.

00:01:01.780 --> 00:01:07.177
It's not 1492 years since the
theoretical birth of Jesus,

00:01:07.177 --> 00:01:08.760
which we know is not
the actual birth.

00:01:08.760 --> 00:01:11.040
He was probably
born before that.

00:01:11.040 --> 00:01:15.890
It is 1,491 years since
the birth of Jesus.

00:01:15.890 --> 00:01:17.950
And to think about
it this way, let's

00:01:17.950 --> 00:01:19.890
just assume-- I'll
keep emphasizing,

00:01:19.890 --> 00:01:21.860
it's a theoretical date
that we're talking--

00:01:21.860 --> 00:01:24.630
or the theoretical event,
this kind of birth of Jesus

00:01:24.630 --> 00:01:27.570
that our calendars
revolve around.

00:01:27.570 --> 00:01:33.250
If we talk about January 1,
let's think about it this way.

00:01:33.250 --> 00:01:42.030
So January 1, 1
in the Common Era.

00:01:42.030 --> 00:01:45.140
How long is that since
the birth of Jesus?

00:01:45.140 --> 00:01:46.203
It's not one year.

00:01:46.203 --> 00:01:47.786
You wouldn't just
look at this and say

00:01:47.786 --> 00:01:50.620
it's been one year, because
this is theoretically

00:01:50.620 --> 00:01:52.450
the day that he was born.

00:01:52.450 --> 00:01:55.080
So this is zero years,
or almost zero years

00:01:55.080 --> 00:01:57.640
since that theoretical
birth of Jesus.

00:01:57.640 --> 00:02:04.920
Another way to think about it
is how long after January 1,

00:02:04.920 --> 00:02:09.700
the year 1 before
the Common Era--

00:02:09.700 --> 00:02:11.200
and I could've
called this AD, and I

00:02:11.200 --> 00:02:13.330
could've called this
BC-- what's the time

00:02:13.330 --> 00:02:15.530
difference between
these two dates?

00:02:15.530 --> 00:02:17.367
So the way I calculated
it before, I said,

00:02:17.367 --> 00:02:19.450
oh, this is one year after
that theoretical birth.

00:02:19.450 --> 00:02:20.130
That's wrong.

00:02:20.130 --> 00:02:22.320
This is during that
theoretical birth.

00:02:22.320 --> 00:02:24.560
But if I did it the way
I did in the last video,

00:02:24.560 --> 00:02:25.850
I would have said, oh,
that's one year after,

00:02:25.850 --> 00:02:26.460
one year before.

00:02:26.460 --> 00:02:28.335
You add them together,
and you would get two.

00:02:28.335 --> 00:02:31.390
But that's wrong because
there is no year 0.

00:02:31.390 --> 00:02:37.000
So January 1, 1 AD, or 1 in the
Common Era is right over here.

00:02:37.000 --> 00:02:42.580
And then January 1, 1 BCE, is
exactly one year before that.

00:02:42.580 --> 00:02:45.907
So there's only one year,
one year difference.

00:02:45.907 --> 00:02:47.490
And the reason why
the math is strange

00:02:47.490 --> 00:02:50.240
is because there is no year 0.

00:02:50.240 --> 00:02:53.335
If there was a year 0, then my
calculation in the last video

00:02:53.335 --> 00:02:54.630
was correct.

00:02:54.630 --> 00:02:57.070
So really, the way that
you would calculate

00:02:57.070 --> 00:03:03.730
the time between Plato's birth
at 428 BC and Columbus sailing

00:03:03.730 --> 00:03:08.510
across the Atlantic in
1492, you would say, OK.

00:03:08.510 --> 00:03:13.400
This is 428 years before that
theoretical birth of Christ.

00:03:13.400 --> 00:03:18.380
But this isn't 1,492 years
after that theoretical birth.

00:03:18.380 --> 00:03:21.240
This is 1492 minus 1.

00:03:21.240 --> 00:03:23.610
So what you would do is you
would add these two numbers.

00:03:23.610 --> 00:03:25.490
This is 428 before.

00:03:25.490 --> 00:03:28.880
This is 1,492 minus
1 years after.

00:03:28.880 --> 00:03:31.120
So you would add them
and then subtract 1.

00:03:31.120 --> 00:03:34.830
So the correct answer-- so
this is the correction part--

00:03:34.830 --> 00:03:40.140
it isn't 1,920 years between
Plato's birth and Columbus.

00:03:40.140 --> 00:03:42.300
We want to subtract 1 from that.

00:03:42.300 --> 00:03:45.270
It is 1,920 minus 1 years.

00:03:45.270 --> 00:03:49.440
So that is 1,919 years.

00:03:49.440 --> 00:03:54.770
The same way that the difference
between 1 AD and 1 BCE,

00:03:54.770 --> 00:03:57.270
you could almost view it as
positive and negative numbers.

00:03:57.270 --> 00:03:59.470
You say, oh, this is
positive 1 minus negative 1.

00:03:59.470 --> 00:04:00.540
That would give me two.

00:04:00.540 --> 00:04:03.420
But there is no 0, so you would
need to subtract another 1.

00:04:03.420 --> 00:04:06.290
So this is exactly
1 year difference.

00:04:06.290 --> 00:04:07.800
So just want to clarify that.

00:04:07.800 --> 00:04:11.470
That's what that no
year 0 does to us.


Khan Academy on Perry's Principles (6/2/2011)

WEBVTT
Kind: captions
Language: en

00:00:00.914 --> 00:00:02.830
STEVE PERRY: In a small
Silicon Valley office,

00:00:02.830 --> 00:00:06.180
Salman Khan is using simple
illustrations and lingo

00:00:06.180 --> 00:00:09.920
to explain math, science,
history, and even business

00:00:09.920 --> 00:00:10.820
concepts.

00:00:10.820 --> 00:00:14.300
SALMAN KHAN: If this
does not blow your mind,

00:00:14.300 --> 00:00:16.270
then you have no emotion.

00:00:16.270 --> 00:00:19.470
STEVE PERRY: The 10 to 20-minute
tutorials on khanacademy.org

00:00:19.470 --> 00:00:21.650
are free to anyone, anywhere.

00:00:21.650 --> 00:00:22.270
Sal.

00:00:22.270 --> 00:00:24.250
You have found the answer, man.

00:00:24.250 --> 00:00:24.510
SALMAN KHAN: Hopefully.

00:00:24.510 --> 00:00:25.730
We've got a lot of work to do.

00:00:25.730 --> 00:00:26.938
STEVE PERRY: No, I'm serious.

00:00:26.938 --> 00:00:29.419
You've opened up the world
of learning to the world.

00:00:29.419 --> 00:00:31.960
SALMAN KHAN: The best way to
get at the core of most issues--

00:00:31.960 --> 00:00:35.970
whether it's poverty,
health care, whatever,

00:00:35.970 --> 00:00:38.150
even democracy-- is making
sure you have an educated

00:00:38.150 --> 00:00:39.310
population.

00:00:39.310 --> 00:00:41.530
And so the technology
is now making it

00:00:41.530 --> 00:00:44.350
so that the delivery
cost of that education

00:00:44.350 --> 00:00:46.517
is going pretty close to 0.

00:00:46.517 --> 00:00:48.850
DEAN BRETTLE: Instead you get
31 instead of negative 31.

00:00:48.850 --> 00:00:50.641
STEVE PERRY: Dean
Brettle uses Khan Academy

00:00:50.641 --> 00:00:52.930
as a tool for homeschooling
his two children.

00:00:52.930 --> 00:00:53.770
DEAN BRETTLE: What
I like about it

00:00:53.770 --> 00:00:55.450
and what I think the
kids like about it

00:00:55.450 --> 00:00:57.210
is that you can work
at your own pace.

00:00:57.210 --> 00:00:59.460
If they don't understand the
video, they can pause it.

00:00:59.460 --> 00:01:00.700
They can rewind it.

00:01:00.700 --> 00:01:02.230
They can watch it
multiple times.

00:01:02.230 --> 00:01:03.665
CHILD: Seven.

00:01:03.665 --> 00:01:05.540
DEAN BRETTLE: And you've
already got the 2's.

00:01:05.540 --> 00:01:06.590
STEVE PERRY: And
with Khan, you have

00:01:06.590 --> 00:01:08.740
to master all the
material before moving on,

00:01:08.740 --> 00:01:10.520
with only hints to help you.

00:01:10.520 --> 00:01:12.561
DEAN BRETTLE: If you're
struggling with something

00:01:12.561 --> 00:01:15.800
in a regular school,
and you don't get it

00:01:15.800 --> 00:01:18.057
but you take the
test, and you get--

00:01:18.057 --> 00:01:18.765
STEVE PERRY: A C.

00:01:18.765 --> 00:01:19.980
DEAN BRETTLE: A C on the test.

00:01:19.980 --> 00:01:21.450
STEVE PERRY: Can't
move on with a C here.

00:01:21.450 --> 00:01:22.195
DEAN BRETTLE: That's right.

00:01:22.195 --> 00:01:23.160
STEVE PERRY: You trying
to kick teachers out?

00:01:23.160 --> 00:01:25.520
Because that's what a lot of
teachers then start to think.

00:01:25.520 --> 00:01:27.010
SALMAN KHAN: No, it's
the complete opposite.

00:01:27.010 --> 00:01:28.400
What it does, at
least in my mind,

00:01:28.400 --> 00:01:30.090
it would make the job of
teaching a lot more fun.

00:01:30.090 --> 00:01:31.714
Because they come in
every day and they

00:01:31.714 --> 00:01:34.572
get to actually be guides and
mentors for these students.

00:01:34.572 --> 00:01:36.780
STEVE PERRY: Like fifth
grade teacher Richard Julian.

00:01:36.780 --> 00:01:40.210
His Los Altos, California
school uses Khan lessons

00:01:40.210 --> 00:01:41.250
in math class.

00:01:41.250 --> 00:01:43.540
The software tracks
each student's progress.

00:01:43.540 --> 00:01:46.560
RICHARD JULIAN: And by doing
that it allows the teacher

00:01:46.560 --> 00:01:48.080
to know their
students very well.

00:01:48.080 --> 00:01:49.705
It allows them to
know their strengths.

00:01:49.705 --> 00:01:51.422
It allows them to
know their weaknesses.

00:01:51.422 --> 00:01:53.130
STEVE PERRY: Khan
Academy is a nonprofit.

00:01:53.130 --> 00:01:56.150
But it's backed by
Bill Gates and Google.

00:01:56.150 --> 00:01:58.040
You could make money
from this, you know.

00:01:58.040 --> 00:01:58.673
[SALMAN LAUGHS]

00:01:58.673 --> 00:02:00.640
You can make a lot of money.

00:02:00.640 --> 00:02:02.890
How many distinct users
do you have per month?

00:02:02.890 --> 00:02:04.640
SALMAN KHAN: It's
pushing two million now.

00:02:04.640 --> 00:02:06.280
STEVE PERRY: You're
the math guy,

00:02:06.280 --> 00:02:11.810
but $1 apiece isn't
that much to charge.

00:02:11.810 --> 00:02:14.610
You're doing this
for free, partner.

00:02:14.610 --> 00:02:16.340
What gives?

00:02:16.340 --> 00:02:18.645
SALMAN KHAN: You know, if
Khan Academy was for profit,

00:02:18.645 --> 00:02:21.850
it would limit the number
of kids who would use it.

00:02:21.850 --> 00:02:23.820
Hopefully when I'm
80, I can say, wow,

00:02:23.820 --> 00:02:25.644
there's a billion
kids that use it,

00:02:25.644 --> 00:02:27.060
and maybe will
continue to use it.

00:02:27.060 --> 00:02:28.520
And maybe even
after I'm gone, this

00:02:28.520 --> 00:02:30.450
can be an institution
that can last

00:02:30.450 --> 00:02:33.500
for 100 years or 200 years.


May 29th, 2011 CNN Piece

WEBVTT
Kind: captions
Language: en

00:00:02.230 --> 00:00:04.070
SPEAKER: When we
first met Sal Khan

00:00:04.070 --> 00:00:07.920
18 months ago he was working
at home in a converted closet

00:00:07.920 --> 00:00:10.110
in the heart of Silicon Valley.

00:00:10.110 --> 00:00:12.450
The former hedge fund
analyst had recently

00:00:12.450 --> 00:00:15.400
quit his job to do
something that, at the time,

00:00:15.400 --> 00:00:16.690
sounded a bit strange.

00:00:16.690 --> 00:00:19.240
SAL KHAN: Right now
I'm cash flow negative.

00:00:19.240 --> 00:00:22.410
SPEAKER: He gave up a
paycheck with a hefty ambition

00:00:22.410 --> 00:00:25.057
to help educate
the world online.

00:00:25.057 --> 00:00:27.140
SAL KHAN: A lot people
thought I as kind of crazy.

00:00:27.140 --> 00:00:30.020
Obviously, when every
waking hour you have

00:00:30.020 --> 00:00:32.020
you would sneak into a
room and make math videos

00:00:32.020 --> 00:00:35.670
and put them on YouTube, people
kind of question, what's up?

00:00:35.670 --> 00:00:37.990
SPEAKER: What originally
started as some math tutoring

00:00:37.990 --> 00:00:41.010
for a cousin turned into
a global phenomenon.

00:00:41.010 --> 00:00:43.850
The idea didn't seem
so crazy anymore.

00:00:43.850 --> 00:00:46.340
Though Khan, a brilliant
MIT and Harvard

00:00:46.340 --> 00:00:49.090
grad with a wife and
two children to support,

00:00:49.090 --> 00:00:52.020
was slowly starting to
run out of his savings.

00:00:52.020 --> 00:00:55.010
That's when he learned that
one comment from the right man

00:00:55.010 --> 00:00:58.260
can change everything-- an
out of the blue endorsement

00:00:58.260 --> 00:00:59.690
from Bill Gates.

00:00:59.690 --> 00:01:01.910
BILL GATES: There's a new
website that I've just been

00:01:01.910 --> 00:01:05.510
using with my kids recently
called Khan Academy, K-H-A-N,

00:01:05.510 --> 00:01:08.970
just one guy doing some
unbelievable 15-minute

00:01:08.970 --> 00:01:10.090
tutorials.

00:01:10.090 --> 00:01:11.334
SAL KHAN: It was surreal.

00:01:11.334 --> 00:01:14.000
I mean, it's one of those things
where it's this person that you

00:01:14.000 --> 00:01:16.730
grew up knowing,
almost a hero most

00:01:16.730 --> 00:01:18.320
of your life, all of your life.

00:01:18.320 --> 00:01:21.400
SPEAKER: Soon Gates kicked in
a million and a half dollars.

00:01:21.400 --> 00:01:23.730
He also won $2
million from Google.

00:01:23.730 --> 00:01:25.760
It had a contest to
see who had the best

00:01:25.760 --> 00:01:27.814
ideas to better the planet.

00:01:27.814 --> 00:01:29.230
SAL KHAN: We did
now have millions

00:01:29.230 --> 00:01:31.752
of dollars to essentially
pursue the dream.

00:01:31.752 --> 00:01:33.210
SPEAKER: A dream
that's enabled him

00:01:33.210 --> 00:01:37.350
to post more than 2,300 videos
on a host of different subjects

00:01:37.350 --> 00:01:40.180
from math, to
history, to economics.

00:01:40.180 --> 00:01:42.780
SAL KHAN: It involves an
expansion of the central bank's

00:01:42.780 --> 00:01:43.660
balance sheet.

00:01:43.660 --> 00:01:45.290
SPEAKER: Khan has
expanded his approach

00:01:45.290 --> 00:01:48.340
to create a software
platform for classrooms.

00:01:48.340 --> 00:01:51.110
And he's working closely with
one local school district.

00:01:51.110 --> 00:01:53.010
TEACHER: Why don't you start
with reviewing some of these

00:01:53.010 --> 00:01:54.010
and getting them out of the way?

00:01:54.010 --> 00:01:55.390
SAL KHAN: It was literally,
it started with me just

00:01:55.390 --> 00:01:57.560
saying, look, my
cousins have a problem.

00:01:57.560 --> 00:01:59.990
I think I have a solution
for my cousin's problem.

00:01:59.990 --> 00:02:00.540
So I did it.

00:02:00.540 --> 00:02:02.440
And it required pretty
much no resources,

00:02:02.440 --> 00:02:03.636
a little bit of my time.

00:02:03.636 --> 00:02:04.510
It was like, oh wait.

00:02:04.510 --> 00:02:05.510
My cousins liked it.

00:02:05.510 --> 00:02:06.610
And other people liked it.

00:02:06.610 --> 00:02:07.610
Let's keep going.

00:02:07.610 --> 00:02:09.787
SPEAKER: With his newfound
fame and resources--

00:02:09.787 --> 00:02:11.620
SAL KHAN: This is the
worldwide headquarters

00:02:11.620 --> 00:02:12.520
of the Khan Academy.

00:02:12.520 --> 00:02:14.603
SPEAKER: --Khan has been
able to ditch the bedroom

00:02:14.603 --> 00:02:16.150
closet for an office.

00:02:16.150 --> 00:02:18.790
And he now has a small
staff to take things

00:02:18.790 --> 00:02:21.490
to an even higher level.


Understanding calendar notation

WEBVTT
Kind: captions
Language: en

00:00:00.660 --> 00:00:04.800
This right here is a fresco by
Raphael of Plato hanging out

00:00:04.800 --> 00:00:07.180
with his best
student, Aristotle.

00:00:07.180 --> 00:00:09.150
And you may or may not
know that these two

00:00:09.150 --> 00:00:11.670
fellows, along with
Plato's teacher,

00:00:11.670 --> 00:00:15.800
Socrates, are considered the
fathers of Western philosophy.

00:00:15.800 --> 00:00:18.060
But that's not what
this video is about.

00:00:18.060 --> 00:00:20.130
This is actually just
a small little video

00:00:20.130 --> 00:00:23.860
about different dates, or maybe
a better way to think about it,

00:00:23.860 --> 00:00:28.790
different ways to specify
dates or dating mechanisms.

00:00:28.790 --> 00:00:33.130
And so, if you were to
look up Plato's birth,

00:00:33.130 --> 00:00:37.730
you might get either 428 or
427, but we'll go with 428.

00:00:37.730 --> 00:00:41.950
If you were to look
up Plato's birth,

00:00:41.950 --> 00:00:46.600
you might see it
written as 428 BC,

00:00:46.600 --> 00:00:52.570
or you might see it
written as 428 BCE.

00:00:52.570 --> 00:00:55.350
And the natural question is,
what's the difference here?

00:00:55.350 --> 00:00:56.940
They both have a
BC, but this one

00:00:56.940 --> 00:00:59.790
has an E. It's the
same year right now.

00:00:59.790 --> 00:01:02.240
And the answer is that
these are referring

00:01:02.240 --> 00:01:04.900
to the exact same
year in history,

00:01:04.900 --> 00:01:08.320
but the acronyms here do
stand for different things.

00:01:08.320 --> 00:01:13.610
BC literally stands
for Before Christ.

00:01:13.610 --> 00:01:17.120
So if the date is
written 428 BC,

00:01:17.120 --> 00:01:20.580
the implication is
that this is 428 years

00:01:20.580 --> 00:01:22.500
before the birth of Christ.

00:01:22.500 --> 00:01:25.380
We'll see in a second that
that's not exactly right,

00:01:25.380 --> 00:01:27.260
but that's what
the implication is.

00:01:27.260 --> 00:01:29.500
If someone writes
BCE, they're saying

00:01:29.500 --> 00:01:30.710
something very different.

00:01:30.710 --> 00:01:32.305
The B still stands for before.

00:01:36.960 --> 00:01:41.600
But the CE, the C in CE does
not stand for Christ anymore.

00:01:41.600 --> 00:01:43.640
It now stands for common.

00:01:43.640 --> 00:01:48.347
And so the CE part
is Common Era.

00:01:53.040 --> 00:01:55.360
Even though it's not
referring to Christ anymore--

00:01:55.360 --> 00:02:00.590
and the intention here is so
that it's less religious than

00:02:00.590 --> 00:02:03.830
the term "Before Christ"-- it's
still putting an importance

00:02:03.830 --> 00:02:07.280
on Christ's birth, because it's
saying that the common era is

00:02:07.280 --> 00:02:09.800
the time period after
the birth of Christ,

00:02:09.800 --> 00:02:12.170
which we'll see in a
second isn't exactly right.

00:02:12.170 --> 00:02:15.530
But there's essentially the
same exact dating scheme.

00:02:15.530 --> 00:02:19.130
One not directly
referring to Christ, one

00:02:19.130 --> 00:02:21.900
that is directly
referring to Christ.

00:02:21.900 --> 00:02:26.340
Similarly, this right
here is a painting

00:02:26.340 --> 00:02:27.800
of Christopher Columbus.

00:02:27.800 --> 00:02:29.950
And if you were to look
up in history books, when

00:02:29.950 --> 00:02:34.270
was his first voyage and when
did he first show up in the New

00:02:34.270 --> 00:02:37.350
World, finding an
island in the Bahamas?

00:02:37.350 --> 00:02:47.086
You would see it written as
either 1492 or AD 1492 or 1492

00:02:47.086 --> 00:02:47.585
CE.

00:02:50.250 --> 00:02:53.540
And once again, these are all
referring to the same year,

00:02:53.540 --> 00:02:55.780
just using different acronyms.

00:02:55.780 --> 00:02:57.820
One of them's a little
bit more religious,

00:02:57.820 --> 00:03:00.610
or more directly
refers to Christ.

00:03:00.610 --> 00:03:02.870
And one is a little
less religious.

00:03:02.870 --> 00:03:07.050
So AD, some people think
it refers to after death.

00:03:07.050 --> 00:03:08.580
It does not refer
to after death,

00:03:08.580 --> 00:03:10.580
because if you think about
it, if you have years

00:03:10.580 --> 00:03:14.150
before the birth of Christ,
and if you started numbering

00:03:14.150 --> 00:03:17.350
after his death, how
would you number the years

00:03:17.350 --> 00:03:18.830
during his life?

00:03:18.830 --> 00:03:21.850
So AD does not stand
for after death.

00:03:21.850 --> 00:03:30.200
It stands for Anno Domini,
which literally means,

00:03:30.200 --> 00:03:33.920
anno means year, and domini
means lord, or the lord's.

00:03:33.920 --> 00:03:37.500
So it's the year of the Lord
or the year of our Lord.

00:03:37.500 --> 00:03:39.140
So it's years since.

00:03:39.140 --> 00:03:44.420
And 1 Anno Domini would be the
year of Jesus Christ's birth.

00:03:44.420 --> 00:03:45.450
So not after death.

00:03:45.450 --> 00:03:48.780
It stands for Anno Domini, but
literally year of our Lord.

00:03:48.780 --> 00:03:55.390
So years since Jesus was
born, with year one implicitly

00:03:55.390 --> 00:03:56.530
starting with his birth.

00:03:56.530 --> 00:03:58.770
And we'll see in a second
that's not exactly right.

00:03:58.770 --> 00:04:01.070
CE stands for Common Era.

00:04:05.160 --> 00:04:08.910
Once again, 1 CE is
the same thing as AD 1.

00:04:08.910 --> 00:04:12.730
Sometimes we now write,
instead of writing AD 1492,

00:04:12.730 --> 00:04:15.990
we'll write 1492
AD, all referring

00:04:15.990 --> 00:04:18.740
to the exact same thing.

00:04:18.740 --> 00:04:23.530
Now, all of these things we
refer to, when we say 428 BC it

00:04:23.530 --> 00:04:28.060
implies 428 years before
the birth of Christ.

00:04:28.060 --> 00:04:31.990
1492 AD, that's in the
year of our Lord 1492,

00:04:31.990 --> 00:04:37.120
it implies 1492 years
since the birth of Christ.

00:04:37.120 --> 00:04:39.110
But the reality
is that we're not

00:04:39.110 --> 00:04:42.700
really quite sure
when Christ was born.

00:04:42.700 --> 00:04:44.830
And so these aren't exactly.

00:04:44.830 --> 00:04:47.960
Columbus didn't sail
across the Atlantic

00:04:47.960 --> 00:04:52.530
exactly 1492 years after
the birth of Christ.

00:04:52.530 --> 00:04:58.520
Most historians put the birth
of Christ at 7 to 2 BC or BCE,

00:04:58.520 --> 00:05:00.340
depending on how
you want to view it.

00:05:00.340 --> 00:05:03.740
Remember BC is Before Christ,
which is a little ironic,

00:05:03.740 --> 00:05:06.140
because we're talking about
the actual birth of Christ.

00:05:06.140 --> 00:05:09.490
BCE is Before the Common Era.

00:05:09.490 --> 00:05:14.580
And they put his death at 30
to 36 AD, which is 30 to 36

00:05:14.580 --> 00:05:17.490
in the year of our
Lord, or-- that's

00:05:17.490 --> 00:05:19.340
what this stands
for, Anno Domini--

00:05:19.340 --> 00:05:22.540
or in the Common Era, CE.

00:05:22.540 --> 00:05:26.120
Now some people, they
obviously don't like BC.

00:05:26.120 --> 00:05:30.300
They don't like the BC,
AD naming mechanism,

00:05:30.300 --> 00:05:31.810
because it's
explicitly referring

00:05:31.810 --> 00:05:33.070
to Christ in every year.

00:05:33.070 --> 00:05:36.342
It makes Christ the central
figure in all of history.

00:05:36.342 --> 00:05:38.425
So they'll say that this
is clearly too Christian.

00:05:41.460 --> 00:05:45.390
And they would
prefer the situation,

00:05:45.390 --> 00:05:48.490
they would prefer the less
Christian naming scheme

00:05:48.490 --> 00:05:54.680
where you use BCE and CE.

00:05:54.680 --> 00:05:57.146
But a lot of people would still
say, hey, look you change.

00:05:57.146 --> 00:05:59.020
Well, you know, first
of all, some Christians

00:05:59.020 --> 00:06:02.300
wouldn't like this that you
removed the direct references

00:06:02.300 --> 00:06:06.110
to the birth of Christ,
or being in the years

00:06:06.110 --> 00:06:07.930
since Christ's birth.

00:06:07.930 --> 00:06:10.922
But even here, and they'll
say, you've removed it.

00:06:10.922 --> 00:06:12.630
But even here, some
people would complain

00:06:12.630 --> 00:06:14.963
that although you've made the
direct reference that this

00:06:14.963 --> 00:06:18.671
is saying Before the Common
Era, and the Common Era,

00:06:18.671 --> 00:06:20.670
even though you've removed
the direct reference,

00:06:20.670 --> 00:06:24.000
it still makes Christ's birth
the central thing in all

00:06:24.000 --> 00:06:25.010
of history.

00:06:25.010 --> 00:06:30.540
But this is the convention
whether people like it or not.

00:06:30.540 --> 00:06:33.500
In order to have the same
reference point and it's

00:06:33.500 --> 00:06:36.440
too logistically difficult
to switch it this time,

00:06:36.440 --> 00:06:38.370
everyone has essentially
settled on this.

00:06:38.370 --> 00:06:41.750
It's really just a
matter of letters

00:06:41.750 --> 00:06:43.906
of which naming scheme you pick.

00:06:43.906 --> 00:06:45.280
But the whole
point of this video

00:06:45.280 --> 00:06:49.230
is that you don't get
confused between BC and BCE.

00:06:49.230 --> 00:06:52.160
You don't think that AD
stands for after death, it

00:06:52.160 --> 00:06:55.570
stands for Anno Domini,
in the year the Lord,

00:06:55.570 --> 00:06:57.590
or the year of our Lord.

00:06:57.590 --> 00:06:59.940
And CE stands for Common Era.

00:06:59.940 --> 00:07:04.930
But this and this are referring
to essentially the same count

00:07:04.930 --> 00:07:07.800
after Christ, after
the birth of Christ,

00:07:07.800 --> 00:07:09.620
or this theoretical
birth of Christ,

00:07:09.620 --> 00:07:11.828
which we don't really know
when it actually happened.

00:07:11.828 --> 00:07:17.830
It probably did not happen at
the beginning of 1 AD or 1 CE.

00:07:17.830 --> 00:07:24.290
And these two things also
refer to the same direction

00:07:24.290 --> 00:07:25.630
in the timeline.

00:07:25.630 --> 00:07:29.870
One last thing I want to point
out is that there is no year 0.

00:07:29.870 --> 00:07:34.740
So if you take either
of these naming schemes,

00:07:34.740 --> 00:07:39.520
you have, so let's go
very close to the year 1.

00:07:39.520 --> 00:07:42.660
So there's just some point, this
theoretical birth of Christ,

00:07:42.660 --> 00:07:44.810
which was probably not the
actual birth of Christ,

00:07:44.810 --> 00:07:50.040
but at that theoretical
point-- so New Year's,

00:07:50.040 --> 00:07:55.830
so you have December 31 of the
previous year, all of a sudden,

00:07:55.830 --> 00:08:03.820
now, you are on January
1 of 1 AD or CE,

00:08:03.820 --> 00:08:05.920
depending on how you
want to refer to it.

00:08:05.920 --> 00:08:17.400
And the year before
that was 1 BC or BCE,

00:08:17.400 --> 00:08:19.360
depending on how you
want to refer to it.

00:08:19.360 --> 00:08:23.400
So there is no year
0 in this scheme.

00:08:23.400 --> 00:08:25.460
And then the last thing
I want to emphasize--

00:08:25.460 --> 00:08:29.540
and it might be obvious to
you-- is the larger a number

00:08:29.540 --> 00:08:33.470
you have here, the further
back you're going in time.

00:08:33.470 --> 00:08:35.070
Because this is
saying how many years

00:08:35.070 --> 00:08:37.750
before this theoretical
birth of Christ,

00:08:37.750 --> 00:08:40.000
and obviously larger
numbers here, you have here,

00:08:40.000 --> 00:08:43.690
this is the further you're
going off into the future.

00:08:43.690 --> 00:08:46.680
And if you wanted to figure
out how many years passed

00:08:46.680 --> 00:08:49.590
between Plato's
birth and Columbus

00:08:49.590 --> 00:08:54.690
sailing across the Atlantic
to find the New World,

00:08:54.690 --> 00:08:57.180
you would say, well,
look, it took 428 years

00:08:57.180 --> 00:09:01.570
to go from Plato's birth to this
theoretical birth of Christ.

00:09:01.570 --> 00:09:04.260
And then you have
another 1492 years

00:09:04.260 --> 00:09:07.170
to wait until Columbus
gets his ship together.

00:09:07.170 --> 00:09:08.830
So the total number
of years would

00:09:08.830 --> 00:09:12.490
be-- I'll do it right
over here-- 428 years

00:09:12.490 --> 00:09:14.630
to get to Christ
from Plato's birth,

00:09:14.630 --> 00:09:19.990
and then you have another 1492
years to wait for Columbus.

00:09:19.990 --> 00:09:22.047
So let's see, 8
plus 2, that is 10.

00:09:22.047 --> 00:09:24.380
As you can see, I just wanted
to add a little arithmetic

00:09:24.380 --> 00:09:25.710
in this video.

00:09:25.710 --> 00:09:29.690
So 1 plus 2 plus 9 is 12.

00:09:29.690 --> 00:09:32.740
And then we have
9, 1 plus 4 plus 4.

00:09:32.740 --> 00:09:37.790
So 1,920 years between
Plato's birth and Columbus

00:09:37.790 --> 00:09:40.340
sailing across the Atlantic.