Imagine you're in an elevator with an important potential investor in your new business. You only have around fifteen seconds before the door opens and you part company. You need a quick pitch to describe your big idea. Here's ours, just incase you're in a rush yourself:
"TinyTutor’s an educational application for mobile devices like phones.
Users can download the software and various training modules from
TinyTutor.co.uk and try them for free.
They can then purchase licence keys from the website and unlock entire
courses.
The whole system’s automated and works 24/7."
Now you know the basics, but if you have more time please read on...
Back in the autumn of 2008 I sat in the local Chinese restaurant waiting for my takeaway order. As we often do when we have a free moment with nothing else to do I reached for my mobile phone in the hope it would provide me with some entertainment.
I soon noticed that there was no phone signal and this wasn't a WiFi hot spot. My last option was to see what software it had to offer. Being a brand new smartphone my hopes were high.
Besides two game demos which I wasn't interested in I was amazed to find that this state of the art smartphone couldn't offer anything to entertain me even for the five minutes until my food order arrived.
I continued to sit there, doing nothing. My food order did arrive and I left the restaurant, happy with the food, dissapointed in my new, not so smart phone.
As a software engineer myself this had me thinking. These phones need some software which users can use to fill those spare moments of time, like in my restaurant situation.
I ran though a few ideas, games - been done before, music/video - not always enough time for that, business application - boring. But how about learning... how about using spare time constructively to learn about something your interested in... presented in an interactive and entertaining way?
This is how it all began. I don't believe in paralysis by analysis, thinking about doing things but never actually getting around to them. I started the business plan right away, then the software design, the coding, testing, website, etc, and here we are... the idea becomes reality.
TinyTutor is a small company with clear, simple goals. We're dedicated to providing flexible mobile learning solutions to as wide an audience as possible, simply, quickly and cost effectively.
The TinyTutor strapline is "up a mountain... on the beach... learn anywhere". This isn't just marketing stuff, this is something we truly believe in. You can literally use TinyTutor for interactive learning anywhere, even without an internet connection or phone network signal.
We believe that mobile learning (or m-learning as it's sometimes known) is a natural progression from computer based learning. As more and more mobile devices become available with the capability to run 3rd party applications, mobile learning will become more popular.
Mobile learning is more location independent, more flexible, more informal, and more cost effective than traditional learning methods. For thos reasons, we want to be there at the beginning so that we can help shape the mobile learning landscape.
While our overall company goals and values are unlikely to change, this is the section that we'll update as we develop, increasing our reach to more customers on more platforms, with more course subjects.
Currently we're trialing the first release of the software and the first course, in a subject which I myself am passionate about, golf. The great thing about this niche is that I am my own customer so I know what content to provide and how best to present it.
Short term goals are to make the TinyTutor software and golf learning module available to as many golfers as possible. Having created the best software and course content we can, what remains is a huge marketing excercise. Word of mouth is our best friend now, maybe you can help us there.
Having achieved this the next step is to record exactly how we achieved it and do exactly the same again, but in a different subject area. By repeating this process we will create more learning modules in more subject areas.
The software will continually improve and evolve. It's currently available for devices running S60 3rd edition (more than 70 popular models of mobile phones at the time of writing), but it will also be ported to different platforms making it available to even more people. The website too will evolve as more software versions and more course content becomes available.
As for long term goals, I think from what we've said so far you'll already be aware of those. However, watch this space for updates on where we are.
Thanks for taking an interest in us and what we do. Feel free to try the software and course(s) for free and don't forget to tell all your friends. Happy learning...