The Internet has fundamentally democratized education. Now if you want to, say, become fluent in a new programming language or brush up on a new machine learning algorithm, you’re just as likely to head to YouTube or Coursera than step foot in a classroom.
There are an insane amount of lectures and talks online ripe for the downloading, many of which are free. The problem is that they’re spread across literally hundreds of disparate platforms, like university websites, YouTube, Vimeo, Coursera, and so on.
FindLectures is an effort to centralize the vast quantities of free online lectures and talks into one searchable repository of knowledge. It pulls from a number of reputable sources, including Oxford University, TalksAtGoogle, TED, the Library of Congress, and more. At the time of writing, it boasts a catalog of over 25,968 lectures.
What makes FindLectures special is that it’s curated for quality, so talks that are misleading, or are simply not all that good are excluded. Most of the content on the site is shorter than 60 minutes, so you can hypothetically fit one into your lunch break.
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To find what you’re looking for, the site lets you refine your search with a number of filters, including by age, speaker, and category. Handily, it also lets you drill down into its catalog to find videos with closed captioning, which will undoubtedly be welcomed by those who are deaf or hard of hearing.
It’s a commendable effort. In the coming months, it plans to expand its catalog with even more talks and lectures. If you’re looking for something productive to do on a lazy Sunday, you could do worse than check out FindLectures.
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