Apple download link:

https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/syllabeye/id929083083?mt=8

Android Download Link:

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.syllabeye


Overcoming Hurdles

I think I'm gonna keep writing these. They help me. So, we had two major obstacles in December. The most glaring was with getting the app approved via Apple. Unlike Google, which is like, 'shit works? ok. you good', Apple requires more hoops jumped through to get onto their market. They found two bugs (combination of device + OS level issues). I had the developers turn that around in 1 day, but the difference from being In Review status on 12/15 versus getting it back into that status after the initial rejection on 12/19 meant that they did not review it before the whole developer submission process was shut down for the year on 12/22. THEN everything was still hanging well after Christmas, and we had to escalate. But they reviewed and approved Syl labEye on 1/6 so we are now official on both the android and iOS markets. Major milestone.

This was a huge hurdle because we really couldn't go full tilt with the marketing and promotion for the spring semester without the iPhone/iPad version of the app available. We'd have been wasting marketing efforts. Dry runs that Cam did on campus back in December (training some reps to do live demonstrations in high traffic areas) indicated that quite a few of the students had Apple devices. So they were impressed and interested, but we couldn't convert that enthusiasm to action.

Second obstacle was of the people/institutional variety. Cameron had been working with some high ups in the administration of his school to get some backing behind the project. He was told that the Business School and College of Engineering would be the ones who would form the official pilot. On the phone w/ folks from the b school everything was mad enthusiastic. Idea sounded great and all that. He showed up in person, and everyone in the lobby was still very optimistic and down for the idea. He went into the dean's office and dude's whole demeanor was best described as dismissive. No eye contact. Dude seemed suddenly disinterested (compared with his enthusiasm over the phone). Non-committal.

My son was heated after the meeting because he felt disrespected. Although they'd had a verbal agreement over the phone to put him in touch w/ a liason, the dean tried to renege on that. I'll let you do the math on what we assumed the problem could be if ish was cool over the phone, and suddenly cold in person, upon first meeting. Tall, well dressed young black man with neatly groomed dreads and facial hair. *sigh*.

He calls me after the meeting. He was calm during the meeting but he is brimming with frustration as I talk to him. I'm on my way to coach his younger sister in a basketball game. They had to cut their meeting short, so he shoe horns in another quick discussion with the dean later.

I tell him that it likely is what it seems, but that that's nothing new. He's encountered this before, especially out in Eastern NC. He's done his homework and feels like the objections he was presented with were b.s. I ask him to explain them to me. The main one is that dude is wary about risking his credibility on this app. But the pre-agreed plan was that the b school's IT department would approve the pilot after conducting a test.

I tell cam that I've had to deal with these types of situations at work. Ultimately, you don't know what anyone's *real* objections are, regardless of your suppositions. A spade is prolly a spade, but dude could be having a bad day, or he could be pissed at the admin (all of the sudduden) and power tripping by objecting to the pilot. I give him the strategy that I use in corporate America for dealing with situations where I need someone to do something.

1) Pre-empt all of their objections by having solutions to them
2) Explain the whole thing, logically, in such a way that an objective observer would think that they were stupid if they didn't do it, but without ever dotting the lines. Let THEM come to that conclusion based upon your framing of the facts, risks, and mitigations

I coached him through shooting down the dean's stated risk, which was the potential for damage to his credibility (despite the fact that they had previously put departmental weight behind another student who wrote a dating app). This is a PILOT. By definition, it connotes something that is in its early stages and NOT a fully working product. Emphasizing the 'pilot' part in the communications indemnifies you if its not ready for prime time. There is no risk. It either works or it doesn't. However, your IT department is going to test and we're recommending that the professors in the pilot rollout use a specific syllabus template which we know works with the current version of the app. So you are mitigating or eliminating the risk of the thing not working.

THEN, inform him of risks he has *not* considered. The risk to your school, which has a stated objective (b/c we been doing homework) to be a top 50 b school in 3 yrs, for having a major business launch on your campus, but for the principals' origin story to include that they had to go ELSEWHERE for support is huge. We have contacts at nc state and several other schools who are interested. If our pilot ends up happening there or at another institution, that is going to look very bad for your school. Not a threat at all (well, at least not explicitly). Just keeping it 100.

On the other hand, if you provide us with some resources and support (you've seen the potential, everyone universally reconizes the need and the market), you have the ability to benefit from a tremendous upside. Basically no money expended on your part (think of all the free publicity if this blows up), and a huge marketing differentiator for your university and your program. And if it doesn't work, the spin is STILL positive: you are fostering an environment of innovation and entrepreneurship giving students the tools to succeed in a new economy. win/win/win.

After that we prayed in advance of the conversation, that God would prepare the dean to hear what cameron had to say, and remove any impediments and obstacles that may have prevented him from taking him seriously. And that cam would be able to articulate everything clearly, with passion, but not emotion, and make his case objectively.

I'll continue this in a reply since this has gotten long....



peace & blessings,

x.

www.twitter.com/poetx

=========================================
I'm an advocate for working smarter, not harder. If you just
focus on working hard you end up making someone else rich and
not having much to show for it. (c) mad

https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/syllabeye/id929083083?mt=8

Android Download Link:

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.syllabeye

The website is s yllabeye.com (remove the space). as stated in the other poast, I'm not posting direct links to the website b/c i don't want to mess w/ the brand and put them in a position where my posting or okp content is an issue.

Here is part 1 of this story:

http://board.okayplayer.com/okp.php?az=show_topic&forum=4&topic_id=12672376&mesg_id=12672376&listing_type=search

and the prologue:



http://board.okayplayer.com/okp.php?az=show_topic&forum=4&topic_id=12666288&mesg_id=12666288&listing_type=search

http://board.okayplayer.com/okp.php?az=show_topic&forum=4&topic_id=12578794&mesg_id=12578794&listing_type=search




peace & blessings,

x.

www.twitter.com/poetx

=========================================
I'm an advocate for working smarter, not harder. If you just
focus on working hard you end up making someone else rich and
not having much to show for it. (c) mad

the second time around. scheduling a follow-up prior to everyone leaving for winter break was a bit tricky, but eventually they had the mtg and the dean was there, his director of IT, the entrpreneurship / small business professor, and a designated liason to the b school for the syl labeye project.

cam did the demo for them with some test syllabi, and it worked perfectly. they were very impressed with the functioning of the app as well as the implications for them (increased productivity for professors due to less time dealing with student excuses for late / missed assignments or problems w/ deadlines).

the best part of the whole thing is that in the beginning the dean presented to the other people from the b school and HE ran off the talking points, almost verbatim. in particular, he said that he was taking a kind of, 'ok, we'll get to it ' attitude, and was going to put off the meeting until january, but that's before cameron explained to him that the half-life of an app based business is much shorter than traditional businesses, and that in this case, first mover advantage (our catchphrase to explain why we needed to move urgently) was of utmost importance in allowing them to gain a foothold, and grab marketshare in advance of any future competition.

that could not have gone better if we'd scripted it.

cam walked out of the meeting with a prof who committed to pilot it to his class of over 500 students (and who would redo his syllabus to match our template). another person would start work on a study (to capture various metrics to measure the efficacy of syll abeye : number of missed assignments, number of zeros, grade average, etc) so that we would end up with some hard data to give the university. and another would serve as the liason to the b school for any issues. AND, if the rollout in january to the 500 students (which would include a 3 min presentation by cam in their big lecture hall on use of the app) went well, they'd roll it out to the whole b school in February.

so now cam and mikal are going to the other schools on campus (engineering, nursing, urban planning, etc), to get more folks on board.


in the meantime, we got to kick the marketing and everything into full gear. meaning getting press releases out, blasting social media, and setting up our street team approach for campus peer marketing. on that one, we don't have a big budget, so its gonna take some faith on the part of other students to give this thing an initial push until it gains enough momentum that we can prime the pump with revenues.


peace & blessings,

x.

www.twitter.com/poetx

=========================================
I'm an advocate for working smarter, not harder. If you just
focus on working hard you end up making someone else rich and
not having much to show for it. (c) mad

*Jews you*

"this is okp tho, reading is completely optional" (c) desus

Proceed with caution. I am overtly racist.

<-- In Pigpen we trust

inbox on the latter. we haven't made a decision yet on that, but are compiling a list.


peace & blessings,

x.

www.twitter.com/poetx

=========================================
I'm an advocate for working smarter, not harder. If you just
focus on working hard you end up making someone else rich and
not having much to show for it. (c) mad

~~~~
When you are born, you cry, and the world rejoices. Live so that when you die, you rejoice, and the world cries.
~~~~
You cannot hate people for their own good.

wish i'd had this when I was in college.

ANCHOR THIS POST!

about that logo though......
polish that.
edit: what I mean is...the "eyebrows" take away from the logo on the homescreen IMO...

sorry if you weren't really looking for constructive criticism here.... not trying to take away from anything...because honestly ALL my comments are focused mainly on the aesthetic presentation of the app....
but ...
the screen shots of the program in action on the Google Play Store could be polished up a bit....

For instance:
-The battery life is LOW on every screen shot. That's not a good look. Because someone might jump to the conclusion that the app drains your battery. It's just a good idea to do screen shots showing off your app when the battery level is pretty high.
-The screen shot on the phone screen shows you have a lot of apps open. That's just kinda sloppy looking. Take a screen shot with your status bar hidden, or just clear out all those notifications. If the app has an active icon, take your screen shot with just that icon in view. You want to showcase YOUR app...not any others.
-The screen shot on the tablet screen also has some erroneous running apps on it...looks like you were in USB debugging mode and on a rooted device...is debugging and root necessary to run the app? NO?, then clear that out...do a cleaner screen shot... Also, you had no wifi signal apparently...fix that. lol...
-Pick a better font for the Photo Capture screen maybe. Something about that font just seems out of place.
-Battery life again....when following the screen shots, it looks like you lost 5% of battery between initiating the app, and Selecting an Assignment to add to Calendar. Def, need to hide the batter status or take more screen shots with the battery full.


Put the best foot forward!! THIS APP IS GREATNESS!

>wish i'd had this when I was in college.

me too. but it would have altered my timeline. real talk, my son needs this. his partner needs this. my other son needs this. even the first iteration should be really beneficial for students.

i didn't even realize it until later but in talking through with my middle son about how his first semester went -- my wife is ultimately the source of this idea.

i got 6 kids. the youngest 5 are homeschooled. (my oldest graduated from nc state's design school in may). for the ones that are homeschooled, my wife does all the curricula, lesson plans, etc. and she puts together a consolidated planner for each of them that has everything that they need to do on a given day (down to chores, bball or football practice, church, clubs, what have you )... so they just look at that or look ahead and know what they need to get done.

we were tryna *not* helicopter, but they didn't really know how to do that for themselves. to a large extent, this is somewhat creating that. and eventually, as we grow the functionality, it will expand to be able to do more advanced calendar/task management and even analysis of schedules. God willing, that will be some next ish that will be beneficial well beyond just school, although school will continue to be a huge market.


>
>ANCHOR THIS POST!
>
>about that logo though......
>polish that.
>edit: what I mean is...the "eyebrows" take away from the logo
>on the homescreen IMO...

lol @ 'eyebrows'. thanks for the feedback.

the logo (including eyebrows) has kind of grown on me. that actually came from the development team. we haven't revisited it, yet and, at least the multicolored iris part has become part of our visual brand. but that's all still fluid.

i'm open to suggestion, though, and have wondered about the eyebrows (although i think they are supposed to be lids). our design consultants (my daughter and another state grad) are both working full time in their fields now, although they hit us off w/ some stuff. it is going to be a busy, busy time these next 2 months, in particular.


peace & blessings,

x.

www.twitter.com/poetx

=========================================
I'm an advocate for working smarter, not harder. If you just
focus on working hard you end up making someone else rich and
not having much to show for it. (c) mad

still....
I like just the multicolored iris by itself. It's PERFECT..
The eye lids are distracting me like crazy for some reason lol....

peace & blessings,

x.

www.twitter.com/poetx

=========================================
I'm an advocate for working smarter, not harder. If you just
focus on working hard you end up making someone else rich and
not having much to show for it. (c) mad

The past is my foundation, not my preoccupation.

http://www.typeillypress.com
http://www.twitter.com/mtorez

peace & blessings,

x.

www.twitter.com/poetx

=========================================
I'm an advocate for working smarter, not harder. If you just
focus on working hard you end up making someone else rich and
not having much to show for it. (c) mad

..i edited your OP to include the download links (you should always lead with these whenever possible, you know how most people hate long reads on okp LOL)

thanks for the updates.


*skatin' the rings of saturn*


..and miles to go before i sleep...

*STU*

greatly appreciate the support.


peace & blessings,

x.

www.twitter.com/poetx

=========================================
I'm an advocate for working smarter, not harder. If you just
focus on working hard you end up making someone else rich and
not having much to show for it. (c) mad

Furious Styles: https://blacknative.bandcamp.com/album/furious-styles

Black Confederate on iTunes:
https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/black-confederate-single/id940282326

Video to Black Confederate: http://youtu.be/jbpAQ4qzkqY

PSN: WakandanKing
Follow

what we have now is the MVP (minimum viable product). lots of stuff we want it to do that it does not do yet. and this started with my son and his partner signing a contract with a company in eastern europe to do the development (but not having the money!!!) so, from my involvement since around apr or may last year, everything has been, how can we get the bare basics up and functional enough to get enough users to fund building out the rest of it.

there are LOTS of things we want and need to do, functionally. aesthetically there's lots of stuff, too, but given the nature of how we're going to market, we've spent far less time and attention on that.

none of that is to be defensive, its just me laying out how we got where we are and what we got so far.

i have a background in enterprise business systems (performance, management, monitoring, software delivery, tools development, availability, etc).

i got major gaps, esp in the areas of UX/UI and i am very new to the app game and mobile. likewise, i've taken over development of our webpage (lol) and have not done that since, like, the early 2000s.

long story short, i need all the help i can get. and the guys have got about one more week of being full time sy llabeye employees before they got to get down to being full time students. so thanks in advance for any guidance, pointers or constructive criticism.


peace & blessings,

x.

www.twitter.com/poetx

=========================================
I'm an advocate for working smarter, not harder. If you just
focus on working hard you end up making someone else rich and
not having much to show for it. (c) mad

I will offer my thoughts tonight. Congratulations on putting so much hard work into this project.

i'm actually using this poast to hash through things that are strewn around various places, but i like doing stuff like this on okp b/c of the dynamism and the feedback.

COSTS YOU NOTHING CATEGORY:

1. Pray for us. This is (at least to our beliefs) simultaneously the least and the most you can do. This is a huge opportunity (as well as a fair sized risk) for the core of this business, which is two young black men who are college students. General odds are fairly stacked against them in US society. Both of them are very conscientious and have a desire to do things the right way and to help people way beyond themselves. If successful, they can be a powerful example, and they fully intend to create a ladder that will allow many others to follow behind them.

Also, the investors. I really want them to reap benefits for the faith that they've demonstrated in creating an alternate path to opportunity. My family are not no rockefellers. But the other kid involved really has a tough financial background. If this is even a tenth as successful as it could be it will have a transformative impact on his immediate family.


2. The least you can tangibly do for us is to download the app. It is free. Get it from teh googlez, get it from teh applez -- get it from both if you got an android phone and an ipad. Getting good download numbers quickly will help a lot in terms of general visibility on the market. Even if you ain't a student and have no intention of using it.

3. Like it, retweet it, instragram it, +1 it, at least once. (i need to fix the website so you can access all that from there). it is @sylla beye (no spaces) on twitter and project syl labeye on FB.


COSTS A LITTLE:

4. can i get a dollar? the app is 99 cents on both platforms. that typically would cover a one semester license for unlimited scans of syllabi, however, until we get to around 100k or so downloads, it will be extended to cover a full year's license. that means that anyone buying now could conceivably use this for spring 2015, summmer 2015 and Fall 2015 for a dollar (or, less than the cost of a soda as we say in our ad copy). this is good for aunties and uncles and cousins and such. and friends. if you cop this for a dollar, even if you have no need for or intention of using it, it is helping grow it and provide the capital for us to make it what it needs to be (so a bigger company doesn't come in and swoop )

5. can i get a lead?

- do you know any students? please forward a link to them
- do you know any parents of students? please forward a link to them
- do you know any professors/educators/school admins? please forward a link to them and, if you don't mind, shoot me their email or contact info. there are significant benefits for professors and instructors in knowing that their entire class can potentially have all of their assignments and due dates on their phones and electronically nagging them. let us show you how to make that happen.
- do you know any media? please forward a link to them and/or hit me with their contact info

-- technology story
-- positive story on youth
-- positive story on af-am males
-- positive story on homeschooling
-- positive story on technology aiding education
-- positive story on entrepreneurship

any of the above angles would stand out in a media environment that is saturated with negativity.

COSTS MORE:

6. potential partners - i won't elaborate on this too much in the daylight, but there is huge potential here. 17.9m smartphone using students in the US. whole thing is predicated on the technical solution as well as the ability to hit the ground running. we don't have a huge marketing budget so its going to take a lot of hustle, good will and synergy to make it pop. however, this can end up as a really significant opportunity. when we're making in the thousands, we'll be able to hit off street teamers (folks who do demos on their campus and spread the word to their peers via social media, etc) with a little bit of change.

when we are making in the hundreds of thousands, we'll be able to hit off campus reps in the hundreds (better than the book buyback hustle, and less time and less annoying). and if we're blessed to hit the millions, than that is thousands for ppl who were down from day one, as well as potential marketing and technical positions available.

inbox w/ inquiries of a specific nature, but we can discuss stuff in general here.

thanks all of you for everything you've done already.

and bear in mind, once $$$ starts coming in, one idea we have is to create kind of a micro vc where other ppl who may not have access to traditional funding, but who have great ideas may have a source of potential funding and also expertise in launching a business.



peace & blessings,

x.

www.twitter.com/poetx

=========================================
I'm an advocate for working smarter, not harder. If you just
focus on working hard you end up making someone else rich and
not having much to show for it. (c) mad

yeah inbox me on info on investing please

*Jews you*

"this is okp tho, reading is completely optional" (c) desus

Proceed with caution. I am overtly racist.

<-- In Pigpen we trust

wheres the link that we can blast email out to whomever?

this is a fucking gold mine. @ that price point im struggling to see how you wont make a good bit of bread off this if not fully blow up. extremely excited for your company


does it really matter?

for all my fans who keep my name in their mouth: http://i.imgur.com/v2xNOpS.jpg

>wheres the link that we can blast email out to whomever?
>
>this is a fucking gold mine. @ that price point im struggling
>to see how you wont make a good bit of bread off this if not
>fully blow up. extremely excited for your company

i'ma have a gang of cousins if this blow up like it can. thanks so much for the support, enthusiasm and encouragement.
if this do blow like it can, there's gonna be plenty of opportunities to go around.

here's the main info on the social media:


Twitter: @SyllabEye
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Project.Syllabeye
Instagram: http://instagram.com/syllabeye/



peace & blessings,

x.

www.twitter.com/poetx

=========================================
I'm an advocate for working smarter, not harder. If you just
focus on working hard you end up making someone else rich and
not having much to show for it. (c) mad

~~~~~~~~
A bad Samaritan averaging above average men (c) DOOM

I downloaded the app
sent a news tip to Mashable
I also sent a link to the downloads and website to a friend of mine who both teaches and works for the NCAA national office (she has the connections to disseminate the app as a tool for student-athletes)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The Green Mile is a movie where the magical black man wrongly dies and the white man who let it happen lives forever.

for us). i was hoping we'd have already had a mtg w/ ECU's athletic dept, b/c the next place we were going (parlay off previous mtgs) is UNC (b/c they need all the help they can get).

another okp has a connect to someone who does athletic dept stuff for d3 or naia (sposed to be getting back up w/ them in jan).

and cameron and mikal share an office in their small biz incubator spot in greenville w/ a company that does academic support services for college athletics.

but for real, this is a potential game changer for us and schools.

b/c i was a d1 athlete and remember the whole support staff and all that. them folks getting paid regardless. but they got folks who could put both the syllabus ish into the tool AS WELL AS the athletic schedule (training table, treatment, practice, meetings, games, tutoring) so all that ish is right there. and you got your accountability electronically.

plus they get measured on retention and all that, so the things that we're talking about in terms of improvement to schools' bottom lines if we can move the retention needle (based off some research cam did) becomes even MORE critical for athletic depts because if they numbers are bad enough, that can lead to an early exit, or at least dampen recruiting. so this is yet another win/win. its one that was on our radar, but if you got a connect, we most definitely could use it. i was on a phone call for work work, but i'll read through the inbox now. thank you very much!




peace & blessings,

x.

www.twitter.com/poetx

=========================================
I'm an advocate for working smarter, not harder. If you just
focus on working hard you end up making someone else rich and
not having much to show for it. (c) mad

part as a time management tool for athletes and part as a way to boost student attendance at college sporting event (it's really been lagging).

But, I agree with you - you get into the athletic departments and you can really change the game on multiple fronts.

There's a big national conference for athletic directors that I can steer you towards. It would be worth it to try to get a break out session or be a vendor.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The Green Mile is a movie where the magical black man wrongly dies and the white man who let it happen lives forever.

discuss in plain sight. that's part of the long strategy, which really dwarfs the primary market.

i'll shoot you an email.

for the push notifications, that's one of our updates that is prioritized for when we get some more monies. the main purpose there is for information and inspiration. we have to tread somewhat carefully on the appearance of advertising in a paid app. what i was alluding to was the mechanism for that, tho. but you're right, that is an incredible oppty. one sets up the other, tho.

it may (or may not be) early for the ncaa conf. i was thinking before december came and went that if we'd gotten enough traction, BEYA (black engineer of the year awards) would have been a great conference / marketing /networking oppty for the guys. but that's in mid feb. prolly going to have to pass on stuff like that until next year.

i need to get in touch w/ some AD staff, however, re working out something this year. if they are gung ho on it (and really, they have no reason not to be), it may be something that drastically alters the timeline.

the technical underpinnings are a bit murky, as well. apple does institutional licenses w/ discounts for education. i don't know how that would work cross-platform though. it's on my list of ish to check on quickly.


peace & blessings,

x.

www.twitter.com/poetx

=========================================
I'm an advocate for working smarter, not harder. If you just
focus on working hard you end up making someone else rich and
not having much to show for it. (c) mad

stuff i got to do this afternoon:

- publish the marketing / pr playbook to our whole team
- send out the press releases to about a half dozen outlets on my priority list
- ghostwrite some tweets and fb updates
- write up the ppt deck for athletic depts
- reply to mad inboxes and emails

- write up (for work work) a proposal for a 10m euro potential cloud performance deal
- start on an IT specialist certification package review
- start on my sr cert revalidation package
- review a whitepaper on cloud systems mgmt

- come up w/ practice plan for jv girls bball practice tonight
- send note to parents re: upcoming tournaments


YEAH. its finna be a long day. but its a good thing.




peace & blessings,

x.

www.twitter.com/poetx

=========================================
I'm an advocate for working smarter, not harder. If you just
focus on working hard you end up making someone else rich and
not having much to show for it. (c) mad

www.royallegacy.org

For Real (Official Video):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hBRoCPO8esE

I tumbled it

http://supercali-live.tumblr.com/post/107524042656/there-is-an-app-where-you-can-take-a-picture-of

______________________________________
up on the mic repeating one song, over and over again were these dudes I'd never noticed before. I lost myself in the articulated manner in which they rapped
(c) Krispee

@calilive

peace & blessings,

x.

www.twitter.com/poetx

=========================================
I'm an advocate for working smarter, not harder. If you just
focus on working hard you end up making someone else rich and
not having much to show for it. (c) mad

My tumblr is connected to my Twitter so that'll kill two birds
~~~~
When you are born, you cry, and the world rejoices. Live so that when you die, you rejoice, and the world cries.
~~~~
You cannot hate people for their own good.

this don't link directly to the site so its all good.

some known issues (self-scouting)

website -- i took it over in progress, but i'm kinda stuck w/ the architecture. i'm having to dust off my skills (and they were mad dusty) and have at least been trying to keep it up to date. the templates that were used for the initial had the benefit of working for both the web and mobile, so i've been trying to just edit and alter what's there.

functionality -- i need to push out and promote a fix on the android version causing the screen to blackout on the s4 and s5 (!!!). that's fixed, and i just have to update it. will do that shortly. i have nothing to do with the code directly. the guys hired a contract development firm (one with a very good track record and client list). i've worked a lot with them to resolve issues as well as to architect the future solution. there are quite a bit of features that are presently on deck. we have a prioritized list of 'future features' to implement, and have gotten a preliminary sizing on cost and effort for implementation of them, as well as dependency mapping, etc.

plan was to get this 'good enough' to drop an ep (i hope this is more of an ep than a mixtape). full album is contingent upon us doing decent numbers.

we've tried to mitigate some of the limitations by using the template approach, ie, identifying a couple simple formats for syllabi that we know will work with the present version of the app, and getting some professors to cut and paste their syllabi into this format to assure adoption. very little work for them and they get the benefit of their students using the app. ONE major thing that we know we have to get done fairly quickly is the ability to consume pdfs and convert electronically without the medium of taking the picture. that will drastically improve accuracy. just takes a bit more time and $$ to implement.

design / aesthetics -- as mentioned above we have some more that we can do here. we worked on that also until we felt we were in 'good enough' status, with the knowledge that we'd go back and make additional changes. (the ability to 'skin' the app for a particular school's color and logo, for example).

we know we still need to get more music for the video. it was quick and free, tho, and its better than it was.

any feedback y'all can provide would be very helpful. better to hear it here (or via inbox or email) than to have it on our ratings screen.

a big part of the price point is that if it saves enough time and is cheap enough and students dig the idea that this is being done by students, hopefully we'll get enough leeway and trust to allow us to keep enhancing it and bring out those next level features that are on deck.



peace & blessings,

x.

www.twitter.com/poetx

=========================================
I'm an advocate for working smarter, not harder. If you just
focus on working hard you end up making someone else rich and
not having much to show for it. (c) mad

---
"though time has passed, im still the future" (c) black thought

But tell your story might be good for a podcast. It reminded me of this one: http://gimletmedia.com/show/startup/

---
"though time has passed, im still the future" (c) black thought

i need either you or his FB profile so i can claim yall in real life like oh these cats? known em forever

same shit i do w/ anyone who actually does something worthwhile from here ie desus, koku, babz, etc


does it really matter?

for all my fans who keep my name in their mouth: http://i.imgur.com/v2xNOpS.jpg

your mistakes (because you'll make a lot). and being open to learn from others.

thanks for the compliment and i hope i am (and can remain ) a 'good' parent. its a day to day thing. i could eff it all up tomorrow.

in one of the classic calvin & hobbes cartoons, calvin tells his dad that his poll numbers are slipping.


peace & blessings,

x.

www.twitter.com/poetx

=========================================
I'm an advocate for working smarter, not harder. If you just
focus on working hard you end up making someone else rich and
not having much to show for it. (c) mad

google docs:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1w_zO2OIEc_r5ds9-ZQZJajbt7iIzkQEyUmhiFkvLJvU/edit

This is our playbook for different levels of involvement from people in our respective circles. Please cascade to friends, family and your social networks.

Any questions or leads, please send them to me.

If you want to send out a press release to a particular paper or website or blog, you can use this general one, which I updated yesterday to reflect that we're now officially live:

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1BXbk_faaf-Dx4ZAAE9NCyo5_C0auBDYjlqfv5zejIPY&authuser=0


peace & blessings,

x.

www.twitter.com/poetx

=========================================
I'm an advocate for working smarter, not harder. If you just
focus on working hard you end up making someone else rich and
not having much to show for it. (c) mad

I know some professors and a friend who ran an tutorial program at several colleges for a decade I passed this on to
*fingers crossed*


Are there limits on the app?
As in would it work in Canada
As in where's Chike?
Chike!
~~~~
When you are born, you cry, and the world rejoices. Live so that when you die, you rejoice, and the world cries.
~~~~
You cannot hate people for their own good.

>I know some professors and a friend who ran an tutorial
>program at several colleges for a decade I passed this on to
>*fingers crossed*
>
>
>Are there limits on the app?

not geographic. it'll read english. i haven't tried it with another language yet. we eventually plan to go international. it'll be US -> english speaking countries -> other major languages / markets, with as much overlap as $$$ allows.

tryna make it do what it do before it gets knocked off. ppl been hitting the web page from all over, though. thanks to okp, our first paid user is from NZ (good looks again, ted gee!!!).

>As in would it work in Canada

prolly everywhere but quebec. at some point we'll need to address differences in how dates are notated. that might be a potential issue between 'murrican english and british / aybody else english now that i realise. (see what i bloo'y did there?)


>As in where's Chike?
>Chike!
>~~~~

yeah. we been talking via email. hoping he can pilot it at his school.

then we will officially have our first Professor of Africanomics (c) sev down w/ syllab eye.



peace & blessings,

x.

www.twitter.com/poetx

=========================================
I'm an advocate for working smarter, not harder. If you just
focus on working hard you end up making someone else rich and
not having much to show for it. (c) mad

>then we will officially have our first Professor of
>Africanomics (c) sev down w/ syllab eye.


hit up fwmj if yall are cool like that
his girlfriend is pretty awesome


~~~~
When you are born, you cry, and the world rejoices. Live so that when you die, you rejoice, and the world cries.
~~~~
You cannot hate people for their own good.

thanks!

i got to run to go coach a bball game. just sent out some press releases to the TABJ (triangle association of black journalists, to which I used to belong).

still behind on inbox responses. working through them.


peace & blessings,

x.

www.twitter.com/poetx

=========================================
I'm an advocate for working smarter, not harder. If you just
focus on working hard you end up making someone else rich and
not having much to show for it. (c) mad

may not be the best way to show off the ocr used in the app
there's 1s picking up as ]s and other random stuff

realistically, it can do perfect scans, with a good device camera and good device lighting and good print quality.

in reality, there may be a few characters here and there that get mangled. we'll work toward 100%, but i don't ever know if we'll get there from taking pictures. once we can consume pdfs, it'll be much cleaner.

i'm stuck between whether we are keeping it 100 w/ showing that its not yet perfect, or whether we should have it completely pristine and then ppl will be bugging out if a character is off.

we don't want to misrepresent that it is a work in progress and the hope is that what it does is so much better than not using it at all that people will forgive those imperfections initially while we take the time to hash them out.


peace & blessings,

x.

www.twitter.com/poetx

=========================================
I'm an advocate for working smarter, not harder. If you just
focus on working hard you end up making someone else rich and
not having much to show for it. (c) mad

it's going to get real crazy once the guys are back in school next week and i have to pick up the slack during this ramp up.

fitbit already remind me i'm not sleeping much and i ain't hit crunch time yet.

but hey, few years ago i put in over 300 hrs in 3 weeks for my job (in china) and didn't get paid a single extra cent for that shit. i can suck it up for a few weeks here to hopefully make something happen for my family.

my main concern is to buffer my son because he don't have time to be CEO once classes resume. so i'll be, in essence, acting CEO, CTO, VP of Marketing and PR.

its all good, tho.


peace & blessings,

x.

www.twitter.com/poetx

=========================================
I'm an advocate for working smarter, not harder. If you just
focus on working hard you end up making someone else rich and
not having much to show for it. (c) mad