Why $75 computers are priceless

Building upon one of this week's articles - The Prophet of Cheap - I would like to discuss how education is getting transformed not just by cheap devices, but also by cheap or free content. After all, what would the underprivileged kids in underprivileged regions do with cheap hardware if it weren't for the resources they can access using that hardware? With free content available on $75 computers, the value such products create surpasses every yardstick to measure social value. 

Among the foremost education content providers today is Khan Academy, which with its radical idea of video tutoring, has come to "provide a high quality education to anyone anywhere" - exactly as in its mission statement. The entire collection of 3300 lectures is available for free, making education - a basic human need - accessible. Has school education ever been better than this?

Over the previous decade, most elite universities have also embraced this idea of "education to anyone anywhere." The MIT OpenCourseWare was one of the first of its kind, which has since given rise to edX. While it may appear small in the western world where there is no scarcity of quality education across most fields, it is not the case in much of the eastern hemisphere. College education, which is expensive to both offer and receive, is not a pressing concern for governments in developing countries. For instance, India only has about 10 technical schools and 2 business schools comparable to global standards for a population of over 1 billion. Initiatives such as the OCW and edX are really beneficial for those who cannot otherwise afford world class content. 

Acknowledging this steeply growing need for educational content, numerous providers and initiatives have blossomed in the recent past. However, I believe that visionary institutions like Khan Academy and MIT are the ones who set out to actually spread education and thereby created a path for social good. 

Back to our topic question again: Is the $75 computer really worth just that?