21–30 of 39 posts
I'm not able to gather a business model for this - who are their customers, how do they get paid?
For anyone who has been following the furor over Twitter's moves to control it's network and infrastructure at the expense of the developers who gave it value (and it's logo!), Clever and LearnSprout should be concerning. The idea is that School's can integrate their SIS system with Clever's network once, and then have "seamless" integrations with whatever tools operate on that network. This is "free of charge" to th…
The cost savings for developers is also very real. Instead of having to hire full-time integrators to manage each account with variants for each SIS, developers can plug into an API that works with all SISs once and be done.
Finally, we should remember that having access to an API that is not regulated by SIS companies allows for the development of a new generation of edtech that until now, was not possible due to the fact that much of the data is purposely locked away in the SIS. Would Pearson really want parents using something like Edmodo in lieu of their own portal? In the attention economy, it's not in Pearson's interest to enable these types of solutions.
For anyone who has been following the furor over Twitter's moves to control it's network and infrastructure at the expense of the developers who gave it value (and it's logo!), Clever and LearnSprout should be concerning. The idea is that School's can integrate their SIS system with Clever's network once, and then have "seamless" integrations with whatever tools operate on that network. This is "free of charge" to th…
You make a good point numbsafari, though I disagree with your suggestion that schools will end up paying in the long run. Fundamentally, this is true, but I would add that schools will be paying much less than what they are paying now. Integration with 3rd party apps is time consuming and expensive. If a "once and done" option is available, schools will benefit. The cost savings for developers is also very real. Inst…
You don't necessarily have to submit them to a standards body like ECMA or IMS. You can just publish them under an open license that is free to use by everyone involved.
You'd still be able to provide your service and charge for it accordingly.
Pearson already offers an open-standards based integration solutions. Yes, it's convoluted and difficult to implement. But it's out there and it's used by almost all of the real SIS providers. The idea that FTP and CSV are the only options available to schools is false. See http://sifinfo.org for an example.
All you are doing is changing which fox is in the hen house. It's a good game, business-wise, but is it really the right move for the K-12 providers and their customers?
Wait a minute, is this taking private information about minors and, without guardian consent, using a proprietary API to give the information to private industry for-profit corporations?
They must have a pretty good vision to attract the capital
They must have a pretty good vision to attract the capital
Wait a minute, is this taking private information about minors and, without guardian consent, using a proprietary API to give the information to private industry for-profit corporations?
Of course, many existing SIS integration tools provide such capabilities, it's just that they are overly cumbersome to implement and use and so very often aren't.
Schools and enterprise businesses have a lot more in common than you'd think...
Wait a minute, is this taking private information about minors and, without guardian consent, using a proprietary API to give the information to private industry for-profit corporations?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
You make a good point numbsafari, though I disagree with your suggestion that schools will end up paying in the long run. Fundamentally, this is true, but I would add that schools will be paying much less than what they are paying now. Integration with 3rd party apps is time consuming and expensive. If a "once and done" option is available, schools will benefit. The cost savings for developers is also very real. Inst…
Then why not publish your API specs and data formats under an open copyright license? You don't necessarily have to submit them to a standards body like ECMA or IMS. You can just publish them under an open license that is free to use by everyone involved. You'd still be able to provide your service and charge for it accordingly. Pearson already offers an open-standards based integration solutions. Yes, it's convolute…
From the perspective of a software company, something like SIF adds needless additional costs. Want to plug into SIF? Get certified: http://www.sifinfo.org/us/sif-certification.asp. API docs? Support? Good luck finding that.
The reality is that most of the standards you're talking about are free money for high-priced consultants.