The secret to the 2020s education revolution can be found in 1920s Hollywood.

The towering film industry seems inevitable today. A 100-year cultural behemoth. The heart of 20th century entertainment culture. It feels pre-destined to exist, like it was decreed on the stone tablets of Moses.

But that’s not what happened. Hollywood started in the 1920s, with a bunch of guys in suits sitting in a room.

I have proof.

Look up founding of early movie studios. Paramount, Warner Brothers, MGM. All started by guys in suits, sitting in a room, kicking around an idea.

These men noticed a key insight earlier than anyone else. A new technology had arrived. At the time, live theater was king. Early film was shaky, soundless, and colorless. At this early stage, it probably seemed like a cheap inferior. But a small group of enterprising individuals were able to zoom out and see its massive future potential. Film carried a stunning advantage:

Film could be replicated, at almost no cost, and distributed anywhere, to be played at anytime.

This feels obvious today. But at the time, it was revolutionary. Early film moguls began as humble risk-takers. They were future-forward visionaries willing to gamble on a new competitor with short-term limitations but infinite long-term upside. The resulting Hollywood film boom created entertainment options unrecognizable to a pre-film world.

In hindsight, the success of these Hollywood titans feels like destiny. But each time the golden “WB” or the MGM lion appear before opening credits, you’re seeing evidence of radical self-belief. Imagine the excitement the film founders felt in the earliest days, when the world had yet to appreciate their transcendent vision?

I can imagine. Because I believe we’ve stumbled onto a similar insight for education this century. A breakthrough that will transform the future of learning and connection. Here’s our advantage:

In the past, learning was top-down and expert-driven. More students = worse experience

Now, learning = bottom-up, peer-driven. More students = exponentially better experience

What a flip! Like entertainment, learning used to be constrained by physical space. This is no longer true. Live learning can now happen simultaneously, around the world. Act Two co-founder Dan Sleeman and I have the track record to prove it: between Write of Passage and Building a Second Brain, we served 7,000+ live students in 75+ countries over the past five years, to rave reviews and remarkable outcomes.

Learning is no longer limited by space. And just like with film, this new affordance opens us up to educational options unrecognizable to a pre-Internet world. We call it Education 3.0: rather than top-down knowledge transmission, 21st century education will be collaborative, bottom-up, action oriented learning. That's what we're building with Act Two.

Picture the pageantry of the Oscars. The stage, the dresses, the awards, the afterparties. A worldwide media extravaganza. And yet, it all began with one man: Louis B. Mayer, head of MGM studios. The Oscars went from a flash of insight flitting across his mind, to an idea to discuss, to humble set of next steps. Decades later, it’s the world’s biggest awards ceremony – a defining cultural touchstone of old media.

But the Oscars are dying. They’re the old game, a declining relic of last century.

I care about the new game: What media or education institutions will define the new century?

The answer will unfold day by day. But I promise you this: they already exist. They started as an idea. Now they’re being executed upon, a set of humble next steps. New visions made possible by new technological affordances and daring risk-takers. In time they’ll make their ascension.

100 years from now, the winners will feel inevitable, obvious with hindsight. Like Disney, Fox, or Warner Brothers, you won’t be able to imagine a world without them. But like the black-and-white photos of early Hollywood, these century-defining institutions will all trace their roots back to their humble early days. To the 2020s. To a few earnest people honing their grand vision in a Zoom grid.