We were getting together tonight to talk about some strategic stuff. I put down my thoughts in case anyone wanted to comment.
Mission
* Generate substantial profits with an environment where users discover their "area of genius" and develop a network to unleash it.
Vision
* To unleash untapped potential by creating an intuitive learning environment - a video wiki - that facilitates a socially annotated "help file" for all human knowledge.
Values
* Infinitely scalable education solution with fixed costs.
* The future was supposed to be about technology; it is about content and people.
* Focused on industry verticals where our software creates the greatest impact and relieves the most pain. Ex: Green, Medical, Human rights, Technical and Professional Services.
* Our development path clearly leads to creating the most functionality for the most people in the most intuitive way possible. Invent as few new wheels as possible.
* Leverage existing technology with established educational infrastructures.
That's about it, working on this has been mind-numbingly cool. I'm amazed by super amazing people I've met these last 4 months. I love all of you!
Wednesday, March 11, 2009
Thursday, March 5, 2009
Why the Synchronous?
Blog = forum for lunatics to share their views of the world. I started mine yesterday and am terrified that people read it. In it, I talked about the future of Nibipedia and our vision for synchronous/asynchronous media applications.
Guy Kawasaki says a company needs a: 3 word mantra. Let it guide everything you do. Ours = Together We Learn
Synchronous learning (Adobe Connect/Facebook?) combined with free database and network services (Wikipedia, Amazon, Youtube, Facebook, Linked In, Twitter) will make a learning environment that allows you to come to a "class" real time, interact with the instructor and other students and then come back later and all of the info will still be there and interact later. Ex: http://tinyurl.com/cnzzo3
Nibipedia's going to be kinda' like a hockey rink.
There's no manual or textbooks at the hockey rink, there are no full time faculty at the hockey rink but yet kids still learn to play hockey. (this may be less true of Silicon Valley hockey rinks, any one care to comment?) Kids learn to play hockey from each other.
Terry Schubring won the Adobe Educational Applications Award in 2006 for developing a synchronous environment for Adobe Connect. http://tinyurl.com/ar55wj The hockey rink story is his.
Chi Migwetch for reading nij!
Guy Kawasaki says a company needs a: 3 word mantra. Let it guide everything you do. Ours = Together We Learn
Synchronous learning (Adobe Connect/Facebook?) combined with free database and network services (Wikipedia, Amazon, Youtube, Facebook, Linked In, Twitter) will make a learning environment that allows you to come to a "class" real time, interact with the instructor and other students and then come back later and all of the info will still be there and interact later. Ex: http://tinyurl.com/cnzzo3
Nibipedia's going to be kinda' like a hockey rink.
There's no manual or textbooks at the hockey rink, there are no full time faculty at the hockey rink but yet kids still learn to play hockey. (this may be less true of Silicon Valley hockey rinks, any one care to comment?) Kids learn to play hockey from each other.
Terry Schubring won the Adobe Educational Applications Award in 2006 for developing a synchronous environment for Adobe Connect. http://tinyurl.com/ar55wj The hockey rink story is his.
Chi Migwetch for reading nij!
Wednesday, March 4, 2009
First Day With The New Blog?
Okay, so I'm late. Yes, I should have been blogging 2 years ago, it's not that I didn't have anything to say, it's just that no one was listening. I am amazed and honored by the worldwide interest in Nibipedia. I'm the face, Schubring's the brains. That said, I guess technically, I had the idea and the story but I got it from talking to him.....
Nibipedia was born after 3 years of reading self development, psychology, business, marketing books and cutting out all other media. Then a summer watching TED talks everyday before triathlon training and daily meditation. All of this coupled with a year of talking with Terry Schubring about Web 2.0. Then, after 3 years of non-fiction, I read Dune.
With 80 pages left, I had an idea, "Companies who support the memes succeed." then I sent out an email to a group of people. "What can we do to make the memes happy?". Two weeks later while listening to Bill Bryson's Brief History of Nearly Everything which is really about the history of science and scientists I thought, "I want to see Wikipedia articles associated with this." I called Schub and in two days we had the first demo.
I owe Guy Kawasaki a great debt for Art of the Start and his blog which is the only blog I read religiously.
Note for Snarky Developers:
The idea for Nibipedia came Oct 9th, we launched Nov 1st. Three weeks from conception to launch. Within 3 months of launch we had over 10K visitors. Now, we're expecting 10K per month. The growth is staggering, the budget non existent. This didn't happen because we had it perfect, it's because we had it launched. Users don't have to think about what our software does so they can focus on what it means. Another thing to keep in mind, we haven't raised a cent from investors. Terry builds it, I promote it. It may not be pretty, it may not be scalable but people are using it and just as important they are talking about it.
So What Does It Mean?
Well, what we're really trying to do is hook up all of the social networks (Facebook, Myspace, Linked In, Ning, Moodle etc.) into a synchronous/asynchronous platform neutral video annotation environment.
English Please.
Okay, so imagine a free hospital. Best doctors in the world. You go there, sign a form, your care is free but your procedures are filmed and medical students from around the world can watch and participate via Facebook, when the procedure is done a button is pushed and voila' it's saved. Essentially what you'd be building is a giant video help file for caring for the human body that can be shared everywhere. Testing etc., educational content management is trivial technology and is available for free.
Please don't get hung up on the nuances of how the AMA/HPPA is never going to let that happen. It's not the point, the point is with what we're proposing we can infinitely scale learning with fixed costs using free tools. Whether it's medical, scientific, technical, professional services or algebra it doesn't matter. What matters is infinite educational scalability at fixed costs.
Nibipedia is a small idea right now but we've come a long way in 4 months. We have made a lot of friends who have seen our potential and the next 4 months will be even more dramatic.
This blog is not meant to be a corporate blog, it's mine, so I may post on my thoughts about marketing, education, closing the digital divide, Einstein's Real Law of Attraction, dirigible transport, the space elevator, nano tech or any other subject that tickle my fancy. In this first one I felt that I had to pay homage to the only reason anyone is listening to me in the first place. Nibipedia.
Chi Migwetch for reading, nij.
Troy
Nibipedia was born after 3 years of reading self development, psychology, business, marketing books and cutting out all other media. Then a summer watching TED talks everyday before triathlon training and daily meditation. All of this coupled with a year of talking with Terry Schubring about Web 2.0. Then, after 3 years of non-fiction, I read Dune.
With 80 pages left, I had an idea, "Companies who support the memes succeed." then I sent out an email to a group of people. "What can we do to make the memes happy?". Two weeks later while listening to Bill Bryson's Brief History of Nearly Everything which is really about the history of science and scientists I thought, "I want to see Wikipedia articles associated with this." I called Schub and in two days we had the first demo.
I owe Guy Kawasaki a great debt for Art of the Start and his blog which is the only blog I read religiously.
Note for Snarky Developers:
The idea for Nibipedia came Oct 9th, we launched Nov 1st. Three weeks from conception to launch. Within 3 months of launch we had over 10K visitors. Now, we're expecting 10K per month. The growth is staggering, the budget non existent. This didn't happen because we had it perfect, it's because we had it launched. Users don't have to think about what our software does so they can focus on what it means. Another thing to keep in mind, we haven't raised a cent from investors. Terry builds it, I promote it. It may not be pretty, it may not be scalable but people are using it and just as important they are talking about it.
So What Does It Mean?
Well, what we're really trying to do is hook up all of the social networks (Facebook, Myspace, Linked In, Ning, Moodle etc.) into a synchronous/asynchronous platform neutral video annotation environment.
English Please.
Okay, so imagine a free hospital. Best doctors in the world. You go there, sign a form, your care is free but your procedures are filmed and medical students from around the world can watch and participate via Facebook, when the procedure is done a button is pushed and voila' it's saved. Essentially what you'd be building is a giant video help file for caring for the human body that can be shared everywhere. Testing etc., educational content management is trivial technology and is available for free.
Please don't get hung up on the nuances of how the AMA/HPPA is never going to let that happen. It's not the point, the point is with what we're proposing we can infinitely scale learning with fixed costs using free tools. Whether it's medical, scientific, technical, professional services or algebra it doesn't matter. What matters is infinite educational scalability at fixed costs.
Nibipedia is a small idea right now but we've come a long way in 4 months. We have made a lot of friends who have seen our potential and the next 4 months will be even more dramatic.
This blog is not meant to be a corporate blog, it's mine, so I may post on my thoughts about marketing, education, closing the digital divide, Einstein's Real Law of Attraction, dirigible transport, the space elevator, nano tech or any other subject that tickle my fancy. In this first one I felt that I had to pay homage to the only reason anyone is listening to me in the first place. Nibipedia.
Chi Migwetch for reading, nij.
Troy
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