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<\/a>Martin Dougiamas - MOODLE Founder and Lead Developer<\/p><\/div>\n
Martin Dougiamas 43, \u00a0is the founder and lead developer of Moodle<\/a> (Modular<\/a> Object-Oriented<\/a> Dynamic<\/a> Learning Environment<\/a>), open-source software project that is a free course management system. \u00a0The company is based in Perth, Australia and not only manages the Moodle software but also manages Moodle Headquarters, the Moodle Community and the Moodle Partner Network.<\/p>\n Moodle Headquarters<\/a> develops and maintains the core Moodle software and all the official community web sites at moodle.org<\/a>. The Moodle Community<\/a> is a network international educators and developers who share ideas, information, support and code. The Moodle Partner Network<\/a> is the money making side of Moodle providing funding to Moodle Pty Ltd through royalties.<\/p>\n Basically, Moodle\u2019s value propostion is to provide free and powerful learning tools to help teachers teach and students learn.<\/p>\n Martin Dougiama grew up in a remote area of Australia and was educated by correspondence. \u00a0While employed at Curtin University<\/a>, the idea for Moodle as open source software came from the frustrations of working with WebCT and the inability to personally customize the software due to intellectual property right restrictions. \u00a0Dougiamas\u2019s credentials include postgraduate degrees in Computer Science and Education as well as a PhD entitled \u201cOpen Source software to support a social constructionist epistemology of teaching and learning within Internet-based communities of reflective inquiry.\u201d<\/p>\n Dougiamas appears to be incredibly driven and is recognized by his peers as being highly dedicated to improving the quality of education around the world. \u00a0He also surrounds himself with an international team<\/a> of like-minded individuals (with credentials that are not made public).<\/p>\n Looking back at earlier blog posts<\/a>, it is clear that Dougiamas has worked incredibly hard to realize his idea and make it the tremendous success that it currently is with 65,000 registered sites in \u00a0216 countries. \u00a0Moodle has 57,713,770 users, 1,269,451 of whom are teachers. \u00a0The enterprise software company, Blackboard, on the other hand, only had 8.5 million users as of 2011. Dougiamas and others like him are successful both as innovators AND CEOs as a result of extreme passion and belief in what they are developing. \u00a0If we find something that engenders similar passion and the will to realize the dream (as well as the market for the idea!), failure is an unlikely option.<\/p>\n References<\/strong><\/p>\n moodle.org<\/a><\/p>\n http:\/\/moodle.udec.ntu-kpi.kiev.ua\/martin_dougiamas.html<\/a><\/p>\n http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Martin_Dougiamas<\/a><\/p>\n