Assignment 3 – Symposium Social Reading App

Hi Bryan, Great elevator/venture pitch. I think they were both clear and concise. I would have liked to see some of the charts/graphics in the venture pitch full screen. I do think that you identified a pain point, I always hated reading 20+ page journal articles in university. They often were boring and sometimes impossible to understand. I think creating a software that actively engages learners with the readings could be very successful. It would also be helpful for instructors to known where the struggles are prior to class. I also like that it has the option for peer interaction. With that said I am not sure student will want to use the software. It has a bit of a big brother effect and if I didn't complete my readings or just did them before class I wouldn't want my instructor to know. I also think it might be challenging to get teachers off of platform the institution already subscribes to. I would consider investing in this product but would wait for proof of concept first.

Hi Bryan, thanks for your pitch! I like your enthusiasm in your venture pitch. I really like the idea of this program but am not sure it is entirely practical or that many prof's would implement this. I think moving to a blended format where students complete the readings and are offered opportunity for discussion before coming to class might work best. I am not entirely writing off the idea yet as I do think it is unique and would like to use it first. If this worked well with current LMS platforms then I would consider investing. A sort of "add on" to already existing courses. Thanks for sharing the idea! Would love to see it live.

Feedback: Interesting idea. But I wouldn't invest in this venture at the moment because I think this venture sounds more like something that can be used AFTER completing the readings instead of using it DURING or BEFORE as a reading platform substitute to engage reading. I can see instructors try this for a while, but then ultimately find it to be not that useful as this would require more input from the instructors and peers for each reading that can't be easily controlled. Suggestions: If Symposium allows instructors to open and close a required reading session, then I suppose the idea could work because then students and instructors won't have to wait constantly for an update or discussion to start without a clear date. So adding a timeframe feature might be useful, but then be sure to have it as read-only after so that students can continue to view the content, though comments can't be added. Just a thought. Great pitch though.

Hi Bryan, I think both of your pitches are great: well-prepared, organized and presented! I enjoyed watching them very much: you are a very engaging, confident presenter and a wonderful storyteller! You also ask questions and use facial expressions effectively. You clearly identified a problem and presented a solution. I like that Symposium allows independent reading and reading with the classmates, thus students can choose the mode they prefer. Your elevator pitch communicates well your "value proposition". I think your Symposium is an original idea, and I like your vision on how you will be developing/expanding it through different phases. However, I would not invest in it, as I do not feel I would be able to contribute to its success. Good luck with bringing it to life!

Hi Bryan, your pitches were well-prepared and it was good that you focused on a problem you personally found, which means that other teachers are probably also experiencing the same. It is an interesting idea and I agree with your thoughts and research about collaborative reading, however, I wouldn't invest it in due to the legal issues of needing to link or upload articles into your program to share. In order to verify the article, you will need to work with each institutions library system and have access to their SSO. It might be better to market this tool to the software companies, like ProQuest, who service the Journals and libraries as a way they could enhance their product rather than to teachers or institutions. I do know that eTextbook distributors, like Vital Source, are looking to add this feature to their product. They already have note-taking and highlighting (both public and private) included in their platform. I really like the idea of the conversation happening directly in the article without a separate discussion board, I'm just not sure about the feasibility of the product.

REVIEW

I would not invest in the product at this time, however I do find the idea intriguing. The idea of a peer-driven, collaborative discussion tool for encouraging academic reading in higher education is fantastic. Allowing professors to highlight specific sections and embed questions, comments or discussion parameters within the text is also a great idea. Suggestion: you might also allow professors to embed video or audio to turn that article into a blended delivery lesson, using shorter video clips to address specific sections within a larger article.

There are a few specific concerns and questions that I have for the product at this time, and I don’t feel you have answered those issues enough for me to invest at this time.

First of all, I would like more explanation on how the analytics work. How will this be collected, what kind of information, and how can it be used to target learning objectives?

Secondly, I do not think your ask of $500,000 is enough to carry your business through to profitability. You have a large staff (it appears to be about 20) and you will need to float the business for 18-24 months. I am not sure that you will have the legs to get there on a $500, 000 investment.

Next, I am quite concerned that you have not clearly addressed the issue of getting access rights to the journal articles. There are many platforms that deliver/manage/control and profit from the control of information from academic journals. How will you fit content from vendor-curators like Wiley Online Library and JSTOR, for example, into your platform? Won’t your customers (schools and professors) have to pay an additional content license to use these materials in your product? There may be restrictions in use from these vendors, as you are essentially republishing (or presenting) their content in a for-profit 3rd party application. Many of these vendors make it difficult to students download or use their PDFs, even for institutions that have licenses with them to do so. I suspect that this will be a substantial hurdle to overcome. In addition, it seems as if there is little coordination between content curators at this time (there seems to be no standardization of presentation, delivery, or even archival and searching) and this might mean negotiations will need to be conducted with each vendor of content.

Finally, the big weakness: your revenue model. I have many issues with the idea of a new classroom tool that forces students to bear the cost of implementation. It might be the quickest way to reach a large market, but it means that students will be forced to buy a product that also requires a computer and Internet access. I know that most students these days do own connected devices, but I am not sure that it can be made a mandatory part of education (but then, it is a long time since I have been a student at a Canadian university). I suspect that there will be resistance from students. In addition, I suspect that you will meet with resistance from administrators or even faculty at the idea of making this a mandatory purchase for students.

If it isn’t mandatory, then I wonder at the longevity of the product. If students do not NEED it, then many will not BUY it. If this trend continues, how long will it be used by professors? Students often take the path of least resistance, and not buying a tool that makes them do more work seems like a “path of least resistance” to me.

It might be better to examine a revenue model where this is integrated into the suite of products used by a school for their students. You might do better to target professors or institutions to implement your product. Institutions of higher education have budgets available for products such as this. It takes longer for you to expand into your market, but it seems like a more reliable revenue model in the end.

Finally, there is a legal consideration. As soon as your product starts hosting comments by students, you have to deal with security of their identities. This is why I wonder if this might not be better to develop this as a plugin for some of the more popular LMS products on the market. Access to your plugin would sit behind the universities login and would shield you from some of the legal issues that might make this problematic for larger scale deployment. I do not have experience in 3rd party for-profit plugins, however, but I suggest that it might be worth considering.

Hi Bryan, your pitch is well thought out and put together. However,as an EVA, I would not invest in this pitch. I have always highly valued the experience of in-class discussion and this product takes away from it by discussing topics beforehand. There's something to be said about the spontaneity of in-class discussions, of considering an opposing opinion and thinking on your feet to defend your position or to change your mind as the class discussion evolves. If Symposium already has discussions embedded in the text, it may render the classroom discussions redundant which may decrease the learning experience in the classroom. However, I do think that Symposium can be a very valuable product for strictly online courses where discussions are not as prevalent and can be used to discuss text in detail. I very much like the private mode idea of being able to annotate besides the article, but I am curious on the responsive layout of this. Given the minimal space on a mobile screen, how would Symposium accommodate both the text and the comments on the same screen? If not on the same screen, how would this impact the experience?

No. I would not invest in Symposium. As a teacher, I love the idea. The desire to increase student engagement is always in the forefront of my mind. After 12 years in the classroom, I know it is a complex interplay of the culture/relationships created in each class and the systems put in place by the teacher. I think Symposium is a wonderful platform, but the cynical side of me thinks it would turn into another version of the online discussion boards we see in online classes, where most of the content is generated by students that feel obliged to post something, rather than the insights of engaged students posting of their own interest. One of the strongest aspects of this venture is the marketing plan. The model where professors - who have strong influence over a large number of students - get free use and the cost is borne by the student is very intriguing...it is a new way to leverage teacher influence, which historically has been centered around textbooks, with publishers lobbying profs to choose their content. As online content becomes more prevalent and the old paradigm decays, there is an opportunity for new ventures to step into that space.