Over a year ago, we started working with ADL to figure out where SCORM should go next. There were many roads that ADL could have gone down, and they’ve chosen ours — Project Tin Can. We’ve been building and refining the Tin Can spec and our prototypes for a while now, and it’s time for you to see what we’ve been doing. It’s also time for you to share your thoughts on Project Tin Can with ADL and find out how you can contribute. You’re all invited to join ADL on Thursday, April 5 at 2:30pm ET for the Project Tin Can kick off meeting. You can join right from your computer. Sign up here. You can count on hearing our voices there, too. ADL will be sharing details about Tin Can, the schedule for release, and many other things as well. If you want to get started before then (or just want to talk shop,) email us at tincan@scorm.com. We’re happy to help you become an early adopter of Project Tin Can.

When it comes to getting something for free, I’ll do just about anything. Last summer, we had a new ice cream store open in East Nashville. The night before they "officially" opened, they were offering free ice cream. I stood in line for close to 2 hours in 90 plus degree weather in June for two scoops of ice cream. It was by far the most delectable ice cream I had ever eaten, but ice cream none the less. You may think that’s a bit extreme but I like to think of it as getting a good deal. Helps me sleep at night, anyways. We really like you, so we’ve decided to give you something pretty awesome for FREE and you don’t have to stand in line or do anything crazy for it. All you have to do is agree not to make money from it. Deal? We’ve recently released SCORM Driver, free for non-commercial use. You heard right! You can now convert your courses to SCORM and AICC for free. That means there will be more really conformant SCORM and AICC content packages in the world, which makes us really happy. Put simply, SCORM Driver wraps your content in SCORM (or AICC) and allows it to work in practically any LMS. The only thing that we ask of you in return is that you only use the free version of SCORM Driver for non-commercial purposes. Wondering what we mean by non-commercial? Check this out. To get started, check out the Quickstart Guide, and download SCORM Driver from the Add Content page in SCORM Cloud. Then you are on your way making some awesome SCORM conformant courses. If you have questions along the way, let us know. We’ll do our best to answer them. Want to use your courses commercially? No problem, we’ll just need to talk about licensing.

A few months ago, we asked our support staff (which is made up of project managers, and developers, and others) to focus on one word: delight. Ultimately, we feel like making customers happy is the most important thing we can do as a company. So we reminded the crew that delight was important, and encouraged them to find a way to watch that. Through our help desk software, we’re able to ask our customers how we’re doing as we close out tickets. This was an interruption that we didn’t want to impose on our customers, but it’s pretty light, and it’s pretty important, so we went ahead with it. The data from this feedback shows up on our big board in our gathering room constantly. In a competitive office (OK, I’m competitive), scoreboards help us know how we’re doing. Of late, I’ve heard a few of the folks who work on support walking around muttering about "getting one more happy face". Why the muttering? This is our scoreboard. Every time someone answers the question, "How did we do?" it adds a new face to the top of the queue, and pushes one off the bottom. And now you, too, can see why the obsession is cranked up right now. The team is on the verge of pushing their approval rating from 98% to 99%.  Speaking generally, SCORM professionals are probably as beloved as say, tax professionals. People don’t usually get happy about SCORM. But our support crew (which includes most of the people who work here in one way or another) is killing it.  So, thanks to Joe, and Jena, and Troy, and the Thomases, and all of the other folks who work with tickets for being obsessed enough to push from 98% to 99%, even though 98% would be good enough. Thanks for being delightful. Oh, and thanks to the 100 people who have rated our support since my last ticket was rated. The blame for keeping us at 97% for a while was crushing me.  

These are busy times at Rustici Software.  Between all of the activity around Tin Can, some new employees, and a bunch of new Engine customers, we have a lot going on.  As part of a recent contract negotiation, I was asked to justify the integration cost or to do it on an hourly basis.  I said, "No," to the hourly option and here’s why: We’re always going to take a full service approach to implementations, and believe strongly that hourly setups aren’t good for anyone.  They incent us to move slowly, and encourage you to count the minutes.  So, we set a fixed fee, and take the implementation personally.

For years, every single sales call at Rustici Software was handled by yours truly. We’re selling a very technical solution to a difficult problem (SCORM), and my experience as a developer really helped me in those conversations. We’ve grown over the years, though, and having all of the sales conversations go through one person had become too much, so we’ve brought on some SCORM Cloud experts, and we’ve asked Chris to start helping out with SCORM Engine and SCORM Driver sales. We still aren’t the kind of company that does pushy sales; Chris is just here to help you find the right product and answer your questions, but even that requires expertise. On May 1st, Chris happened to come to work dressed like me, and he happened to close a SCORM Engine sale that day. He joked that, "If all I have to do to close sales is to dress like Tim, I’ll do it!" Well, the people of Rustici Software called him on his hairstyle, and in typical Chris fashion, he took the bait. "Sure, I’d shave my head if that’s all it takes." Negotiations were complete, and the bet was set. If we could close 6 new SCORM Engine deals over the course of May, Chris would shave his head to look ever more beautiful. Note: This is where you learn that Chris is not good at betting. First of all, he’s doing something we all want him to do. Second, there’s no "winning" side of the bet for Chris. Regardless… Friday, May 25th arrived, and so did the 6th new SCORM Engine contract. That, my friends, is a big month (that’s only gotten bigger since, we’re on 7 now). We’re pretty fired up about the Engine implementations and what we’ve got going on with Tin Can these days too. These are exciting times. And as for Chris? He’s a mensch.

Thirteen years ago, a collection of like-minded folks gathered to find a better way for eLearning systems to work well together. Philip Dodds, Claude Ostyn, and many others gave their time to solve problems like resuability and interoperability. They looked at the best technology and standards of the day, they imagined how people would use eLearning content over the coming years, and they created SCORM. Over those thirteen years, SCORM has been a massive success. Thousands upon thousands of courses have been exchanged between systems that didn’t play well together prior to SCORM’s creation. Thousands upon thousands of dollars have been saved by companies that bought a piece of content once and used it in many contexts. And many, many business have been created. So I’ll just say it. Thanks to those of you who imagined, built, and nurtured SCORM.

One learner launching a course in a browser from within an LMS that can’t talk to other LMSs. SCORM’s done a lot a great stuff, but it does come with baggage, doesn’t it? Today’s learning world requires something more, doesn’t it? Project Tin Can gave us the opportunity to throw off SCORM’s shackles, and we took it. Tin Can provides the plumbing that will free us, as an eLearning industry and beyond, from these limitations. ADL is sprinting toward a wide release of Tin Can API, and it’s going to change that opening statement dramatically. One learner or many launching a course or any other activity from wherever they like on any device and communicating that experience to an LMS or any other system, all of which can talk to each other. We’ve all wanted SCORM to get out of our way at some point, the Tin Can API is happening. So, now what? What experiences will you design? What tools will you build? We’re excited to announce TinCanAPI.com to focus on all things Tin Can.Take a look and let us know what you think.

Introducing TinCanAPI.com. My name is Andy and I’ll be your tour guide today.  Let’s go!  First stop: What is Tin Can?  Here you’ll learn what the Tin Can API is, how it works, and why it matters. This is also where we’ll showing you who the current adopters are and how they’re using the Tin Can API. You want to be a part of this group. If you’re working with the Tin Can API and want to be added to the Current Adopters page, let us know. Next stop: Developers Are you a developer interested in building a Learning Record Store or an application that sends Tin Can statements to an LRS? Are you interested in making a contribution to the Tin Can API Spec? Then you’ll want to stop by the Developers section of the site.  Here you’ll find a number of valuable resources as well as opportunities to ask us questions and ways to join in Tin Can discussions. Stop #3: Our Solutions Ready to get started working with the Tin Can API, but don’t want to go at it alone? Here’s where we’ll walk you through a few options for how we can help. Option 1:  Get a locally installed LRS with SCORM Engine + Tin Can API Are you an LMS solution and you want to support the Tin Can API? This is the place for you. Option 2:  Get a hosted LRS with SCORM Cloud + Tin Can API Do you want to get up and running fast with an LRS and you don’t want to deal with the pains of maintaining it yourself? This is the place for you. Option 3:  Create Tin Can Activities with SCORM Driver + Tin Can API Are you an e-learning content provider and you want to track and report on your content in a Learning Record Store using the Tin Can API? This is the place for you. Last stop: Tin Can Chatter There is much going on in the world of Tin Can and we want this site to be a destination for you to stay in the loop. We’ll be sharing our thoughts via the TinCanAPI.com blog, curating Tin Can news and talk via the Community Chatter page, providing quick links to past TinCanAPI.com newsletters, and sharing #TinCanAPI tweets via the Twitter page. The Tin Can Chatter section will be updated frequently, so check back often. We’ve already crammed a lot into this site, but there is much more to come.  If you ever have trouble finding what you’re looking for, let us know.  We want to help you!  If you have suggestions for things to add, let us know. Thanks for visiting and enjoy!   The post Welcome to TinCanAPI.com appeared first on SCORM.

How cool would it be if we could look inside our brains and see what we’re learning and how we’re learning it? But we can’t do it. We can’t manage learning. So what the heck are we doing with ourselves? Why are we building learning management systems and specifications that help them work better? It comes down to this: learning is so important that we have to try. We have to do everything in our power to put our students, kids, learners, employees, and volunteers in the environment that gives them the best chance to succeed. Success, in all its varied definitions, is a goal that we can all get behind. Try this exercise: If you had to guess whether or not someone was going to succeed in the task they are about to attempt, if your life depended on it, what would you want to know more than anything else? The task could be anything. Will Michael Jordan make the game winning shot? Will Sally make her sales quota? Will Chuck crash his forklift into the wall? What would you want to know? I’d want to know that Michael’s made that shot time and time again. I’d also like to know just how many times he’s practiced that shot in that situation. I’d want to know if Sally has ever had a sales quota before. I’d want to know how many books she’s read about sales techniques. I’d want to know how much research Sally has done to learn about the product she’s going to sell. I’d want to know if Chuck has crashed his forklift before. I’d want to know if he’s crashed his car. I’d want to know if he’s completed the required forklift driving training course. I’d want to know if Chuck has ever has a conversation with a mentor, perhaps one who’s had a forklift accident before. I’d want to have a deep understand of their respective experience. Is there any better predictor of future success than prior experience? We may never be able to look inside our brains and see what we’re learning, but if we can increase our understanding of experiences and their connection to success, then we’ll have accomplished something. If we can collectively build "success management systems", I think we’ll really have accomplished something. The post Inside Your Brain appeared first on SCORM - .

No, we’re not going to get into politics, there’s waaay too much of that coming to the blogosphere this year already. This post is about four more reasons I love working at Rustici Software. The Next Four Welcome to Rustici Software Andy Whitaker, Megan Bowe, Jaffer Ibrahim and Brian Miller (who as the second of his name will hereafter be referred to as "Bobby", ask Tim or I for that backstory sometime). Andy and Megan come to us to keep the snowballing momentum behind the Tin Can API moving forward. They’ve been at it for a little while already. If you haven’t already heard from them, you probably will soon. They will be active over at tincanapi.com. Jaffer and Brian bring more serious development horsepower into the mix. They’ll be coding away behind the scenes as we roll out new products that fully realize the potential of the Tin Can API. Well, come to think of it, maybe we should talk politics for a bit. We haven’t introduced "The Thomases" to you all yet. The Thomases TJ Seabrooks (the "T" is for Thomas) and Freddie O’Connell (real name "Thomas", see "Bobby" above, but he did this on his own) have been with us since the start of the year. The Thomas’s spend their days bringing #delight to our SCORM Engine implementations. As for the politics, you see TJ’s a bit of a conservative and Freddie’s a bit of a liberal. We decided to hire them both and put them in the same office just to see what would happen. It should make for a fun election season. I’m pretty fired up about the talent that’s cranking out great stuff at Rustici Software. This is really an amazing crew of people producing some phenomenal work. It just seems to get better with each batch of hires. The post Four More… appeared first on SCORM - .