In September 2002, MIT placed all of its course materials online with the ideal of sharing them publicly all around the world. Chu was profoundly impressed with this effort, and decided to take up the task of translating these materials into Chinese. Volunteers for intellectual sharing In the beginning, the project had only two participants, Chu and a friend of his.
原來 2002 年 9 月，美國麻省理工學院在開放與分享的理念下，將其所有的課程資源陸續放上網路，供全球各界自由取用；朱學恆深受感召，決心投入中文版的翻譯工程。