- The fact that there is thousands, you know, hundreds of thousands, millions of people that watch that video, I think that's really powerful. So how do you think the idea of putting lectures online, what really MIT OpenCourseWare has innovated? - That was a wonderful idea. You know, I think the story that I've heard is the committee was appointed by the president, President Vest at that time, a wonderful guy.

And the idea of the committee was to figure out how MIT could be like other universities, market the work we were doing. And then they didn't see a way, and after a weekend, and they had an inspiration, came back to President Vest and said, "What if we just gave it away?" And he decided that was okay, good idea.

So-- - You know, that's a crazy idea. If we think of a university as a thing that creates a product, isn't knowledge, the kind of educational knowledge, isn't the product and giving that away, are you surprised that it went through? - The result that he did it, well, knowing a little bit President Vest, it was like him, I think.

And it was really the right idea. You know, MIT is a kind of, it's known for being high-level technical things, and this is the best way we can say, tell, we can show what MIT really is like. 'Cause in my case, those 1806 videos are just teaching the class.

They were there in 26-100. They're kind of fun to look at. People write to me and say, "Oh, you've got a sense of humor," but I don't know where that comes through. Somehow, I've been friendly with the class, I like students, and linear algebra, we gotta give the subject most of the credit.

It really has come forward in importance in these years. (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music)