I'm happy for John, and this is great news for the Khan Academy. But I have to admit my reaction was mixed about his initial plans to focus on the iPad. On one hand, this is tantamount to saying you want to ensure that rich kids have better access to educational materials. Relative to the rest of society, children of parents who can afford an iPad are probably the least needy re educational tools. On the other hand, they're probably the ones who will make the most use of the tools.
It is awesome that Khan Academy has attracted so much top talent. Has the potential to make a real difference in world education and thus in human potential. Goes to show how much effect a relatively small investment can make when joined with amazing, driven, talented people.
> I should note that I’ve made a personal decision to scale back some other aspects of my professional life. I’m no longer accepting any new speaking engagements...<p>It is very hard to leave/scale-back unfinished business or commitments but it is a very important step before starting something new and big. I know many creative people who have tons of projects and commitments that they can't bring themselves to leave and as a result, they never have enough time to concentrate fully on their next big things. I highly commend John for making the tough decision of leaving Mozilla and lots of personal projects so that he could do something big.
Bill Gates calls this the future of education. I think he is correct. I am doing a project involving corporate training and this method has vast implications for my work. I also have three school age children, and they will be "attending" Khan tonight. This is the very first post I've read on HN and I'm overwhelmed by its significance. Thanks!
I spoke to John Resig the other day after he fixed /r/f7u12's stylesheet (he really earned his mod place!), and now I hate him with all my heart for being more successful and more of a nice guy than I am. I bet he's also more handsome.<p>EDIT: <i>And</i> he's a year younger! Damn you, jeresig!
This is perfect. The alignment of terrifically smart, talented and passionate people to come together for a worthy cause. Congrats and wish you the best.<p>With the recent startup boom, its sad to see some great talent spend time building little features or apps; just wish they could use their amazing talents to solve some really large problems..
I wish the Khan Academy and everybody who is working for this awesome idea and good cause all the best. It is these people that make me feel so proud of mankind.<p>Getting the chance to work on such a project makes money and career fade far into the background. All the Good this project is doing for the world makes it worth it. And all without the need to charge for the service or display ads.<p>Congrats John on this excellent choice for a chance to make a change.
If I'm not mistaken Khan Academy is still hiring: <a href="http://www.khanacademy.org/jobs/dev" rel="nofollow">http://www.khanacademy.org/jobs/dev</a> and <a href="http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2412000" rel="nofollow">http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2412000</a><p>I'm sure there are many great minds in here who would love to join John and the rest of the KA team
Wow! We're thrilled that this happened. Today is another great day for education. The greatest day was probably when Salman Khan quit his job and went home to upload his videos full time. We use Khan academy almost every day, for our children and ourselves.
Congratulations to the Kahn Academy, and congratulations to John.<p>I am really looking forward to you building software full time. It is going to be great for jQuery!
Congratulations John and Khan Academy! Khan Academy, as I've said before, I think is one of the most important pieces of technology I've seen. I think maybe one day on par, in terms of impact, with the web itself. Great news.
I discovered Khan Academy about 1 year ago and since then the website has not changed that much, except for some polishing on the site.
Here is a snapshot of the site in June 2010 <a href="http://replay.web.archive.org/20100601053141/http://www.khanacademy.org/" rel="nofollow">http://replay.web.archive.org/20100601053141/http://www.khan...</a><p>The site is currently quite hard to navigate around or search. Now that even talents like John have started to join the academy, I'm pretty sure, the site will definitely provide a better experience. Good for Khan, the academy and the education system