We're about to release support for foreign domains, which allow you to map foreign domains (like www.myschool.edu) onto EDU 2.0 domains (like myschool.edu20.org). Subdomains can also be mapped , so edu20.myschool.edu can be mapped onto myschool.edu20.org.
Users will only ever seen the foreign domains, and EDU 2.0 performs all the mapping behind the scenes.
As I've mentioned a few times, support for foreign domains is going to be one of the "premium" features that we will charge a small monthly fee for. So now is a good time for me to present our philosophy about "premium" features.
Here's our philosophy:
1. We will never charge for any feature that started as free.
2. We will only charge for non-essentials that could be considered "luxury" features.
3. We will only charge a small monthly fee for these luxury features.
4. Users can turn off the "luxury" features whenever they like and cancel the monthly fee.
5. All our features, including the "luxury" ones, will be free for schools with less than 20 students.
We are releasing new features at a fast clip, including some really nice new options like SCORM, proficiencies, curricula tracking, the iPhone interface, etc., and all of these features are free. This is going to be the overall trend, with most of the new features being free. The only thing in the future we're *definitely* going to charge for is rich analytics, because this uses up quite a bit of storage and processing power to do properly.
In addition, our upcoming e-commerce feature will allow schools to charge students for their classes and take orders using credit cards or paypal. This feature will be free but we take a small flat surcharge ($1-2) per student when they sign up using the feature.
Here's a table that presents an approximate pricing strategy. "Gold" is the regular system, and will include most of the new features we release. "Platinum" will include support for foreign domains. "Diamond" will include rich analytics. The "Small", "Medium", 'Large" and "X-Large" refers to the number of students registered with the school - teachers, parents and administrators do not count in these numbers. The pricing is not finalized, but it's in the basic ballpark.
|
Small |
Medium |
Large (100-499) |
X-Large |
|
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Gold | ==FREE== | ==FREE== | ==FREE== | ==FREE== |
| Platinum | ==FREE== | $9/month | $19/month | $39/month |
| Diamond | ==FREE== | $19/month | $39/month | $69/month |
We've always strived to be transparent with our community, and the revenue that we'll make from these luxury features will allow us to accelerate the development of new features, most of which will be free and benefit the entire EDU 2.0 community.
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