Mail tfurrows [at] sdf.org
Ok, the title might be an exaggeration. It should probably read "carrying a useful bit of the internet with you." What I'm talking about is a project called "Rachel Offline" which you can find at racheloffline.org
The premise is simple: the world is full of billions of people, and only a small percentage of them have reliable internet, or any internet at all. All humans could benefit from the educational aspects of the internet, and many of those educational aspects are freely licensed. The only issue is bringing the internet to the people.
While we all wait for that infrastructure to be built, those without internet don't have to wallow in the dark ages. Several projects, including Rachel Offline, have sprung up to fill the gap. Rachel basically compiles a huge collection of free and open educational resources into a server that can be used locally, by anyone.
Let me spell that out more clearly. Imagine you live in a remote village. You're no so backward that you don't have technology; you have computers and even semi-reliable power. What you don't have are expensive copper lines connecting you to a telco, and satellite equipment is expensive. What do you do?
Enter Rachel. Rachel is a small server (a raspberry pi, or other) that is pre-configured, so you don't have to know much to manage it. You set it up in your village, and it creates a WIFI hotspot. You connect to it, and open your browser. You're presented with a small copy of portions of the internet, all available right from your own server. No connection to anything outside your village is required, yet you get to benefit from a huge collection of the world's knowledge, books, video lessons, wikipedia, and a myriad of other resources.
Imagine the possibilities! Remote users don't have to be cut off from the world. Just because you can't be online all the time, doesn't mean you can't benefit from what the internet has to offer.
Are there other ways to do this? Sure. Outernet is another one that shows a lot of promise. But Rachel is the one I'm working on now.
Currently, my family is planning an educational roadtrip. Internet access has been a big question for us, because we use the internet for almost every subject we educate our kids in. We plan to have the internet as often as possible, but what do we do if we can't get reliable service?
Just like a group of school-aged kids in a remote village, we will be able to benefit from Rachel on our trip. I am setting up a customized server for our kids, with modules hand-selected to meet our kids needs. If we find ourselves without internet while we're out, we'll still have what we need.
Now I just need to find a way to support this amazing project!
