Brought to you by SCORM.com, the e-learning standards experts.When looking through the eLearning Atlas, I wondered if the versions of SCORM that companies claim to support are closely matched to what we see being used in reality, via SCORM Cloud. Let’s check it out: Versions of Claimed SCORM Support in the eLearning Atlas vs. Use in SCORM Cloud: When I last reviewed our SCORM Cloud stats, I noticed just how closely the actual use of different standards mapped to the claimed support. Obviously SCORM 1.2 is the most popular and has nearly identical use in our SCORM Cloud. However, many may claim to support SCORM 2004 4th edition, but few actually generate courses using it. I realize SCORM 2004 isn’t always easy and it can create some confusion, could this be the reason for the difference? Maybe the 3rd edition was widely implemented and some became weary of another upgrade. It’s also possible that some of the 4th edition experts out there have no need to test content on SCORM Cloud. I’ll continue to pick at this, but the exact answer is unknown to me. Whatever the reason for 4th’s variance, it’s comforting to know that the standards we mapped in the eLearning Atlas closely match the real-world behavior in the SCORM Cloud. As we continue to develop both tools, what other correlations or discrepancies do you expect to find? Brought to you by SCORM.com, the e-learning standards experts.

Brought to you by SCORM.com, the e-learning standards experts.Most people think buzzwords are annoying, trendy and overused words that pop up everywhere. Buzzwords serve one purpose: to drum up excitement around an idea, product, or event. That’s why people use them. While Chris and I worked through the Atlas, we kept an eye on words that came up to see if we could find any trends in the industry. I’m not one for graphs and charts, that’s more Chris’s speed. What I’m into are trends and patterns. (If you were wondering, I have an affinity for plaid, houndstooth and ikat patterns).   After months of observation, one of the trends we saw was a move in the industry towards social learning. Everyone has different meanings for what "social learning" is and what it does. For some, it means collaborating with others while creating or viewing content. For others, social learning means simply the integration of social media, like blogs, wikis, Twitter or Facebook into traditional eLearning. For me, social learning is both of these things. A few months ago, I added Cookie Intern to my resume here at Rustici Software. A match made in heaven, as I love to bake and the Rusticians love to eat. All of the sudden, every batch of cookies started tasting like soap. I couldn’t figure it out. I changed pans, mixing bowls, spatulas, everything. I took my questions to Facebook and Twitter, begging my friends to provide suggestions, hints, anything that would vanquish this soapy situation. They posted helpful links and speculations, and finally I got my answer. Baking soda. Old, old baking soda that began its journey with me as a high school senior, watched me matriculate at Alabama, witnessed the glory of our 2009 National Championship (Roll Tide), smiled at my graduation, and travelled with me to my new home in Nashville. Who knew that old baking soda made cookies taste like soap, right? Anyways, my point is that I could have Googled the answer myself but I used my community, where my friends and family could brainstorm with me and the group came to the final conclusion, together. This is what social learning is all about: making connections to people and what they know. Chris and I have been fortunate enough, through working with the Atlas, to discover companies who are integrating different forms of social learning into their solutions. Take a look at all of the different companies in the eLearning Atlas that are making the move towards social learning. So keep your eyes open, eLearning world. We’ve only scratched the surface of what social learning is capable of. Brought to you by SCORM.com, the e-learning standards experts.

Brought to you by SCORM.com, the e-learning standards experts.I’m that kid. When you talk about the new kid around the office, the one with a phone practically glued to her hand, constantly texting (I sent over 1,650 last month alone!), the aptly named "digital native", you are talking about me. When it comes to mobile technology, when you aren’t talking about kids like me, you’re talking about mobile learning. But the weird thing is, you all mean different things when you talk about mobile. Mobile means different things to different people. Instead of spouting out my thoughts about what mobile is and what it does, I will stay neutral and point you to the eLearning Atlas instead. We’ve uncovered a lot of really great companies making waves with mobile learning, so take a look and see what they mean when they say mobile. If you are looking for a mobile solution, this is definitely the place to start. We’ve got over 100 platform providers, authoring tools and content creators working with mobile learning in a variety of ways. Whether you are creating stellar mobile content or new ways to access it, if you aren’t a part of the Atlas, pretty please let me know. I’m running low on text messages for the month, so get in touch via smoke signal or email me at jena.lawing@scorm.com this time around. Thanks! Brought to you by SCORM.com, the e-learning standards experts.

Brought to you by SCORM.com, the e-learning standards experts.It’s the start of a new year and almost impossible to escape the idea of resolving to do something different (travel more!), better (exercise everyday!), or not at all (no more pizza!). Given our love of cookies and ice cream, chances are slim that diets are high on anyone’s list around here. So rather than focus on deleting things from our daily lives, we’ll take the ‘do something better’ angle. First up in 2012 is adding some new features to SCORM Cloud. SCORM Cloud does many things, but at its core, it delivers training. Until now, you could import courses, share them with learners and track the results. SCORM Cloud even lets you send your content to another LMS (but that’s another story). We thought it would be kind of cool to include a couple of tools that let you add SCORM content within SCORM Cloud. Check out what we came up with: ScoTube- -Want to use video in your training? ScoTube automagically wraps your video with all of the SCORMy stuff needed. You can use a video from YouTube, or upload your own video file. Either way, one click delivers a SCORM course that’s ready to play in SCORM Cloud. We’ll even let you export it to use outside of SCORM Cloud, if you really want to. Quizzage- Need an easy-to-use tool that creates simple quizzes and surveys? Quizzage is just that. Create your questions (there are 5 types to pick from), set your scoring and learner feedback options, and you’re ready to go. You can deliver your quizzes right from SCORM Cloud. Or even export them from SCORM Cloud if you must. So far, I have created quite a training curriculum for my friends and family- "How to Wash a Cat", "Cha Cha Slide 101", "Playing the Ukelele" and "Mastering Flip Turns". Feel free to check them- just click on any of the titles, to go right to the training. I also thought it might be fun to build a quiz to test your knowledge on some of the cool things SCORM Cloud can do. Try it here and see what you know. Want to give it a try? Just go over to SCORM Cloud. In less than 5 minutes you can build your courses and even share them with your learners. And since it’s through SCORM Cloud, you can even build your own and try it out for free. Brought to you by SCORM.com, the e-learning standards experts.

When SCORM Cloud outages happen, we drop everything until service is restored. A few of us go into "let the world know that we’re working on it" mode, and the SCORM Cloud developers glue their eyes to their screens and wrists to their desks until the outage is resolved. That’s what happened yesterday. SCORM Cloud relies on a few third-party systems to do what it does. Yesterday, a problem was exposed by an outage of one of these systems and SCORM Cloud services were unreliable for about an hour. Typically if a server is unavailable, it will send a "server unavailable" message that we handle appropriately and with no SCORM Cloud outages. Yesterday, the server wasn’t sending anything to SCORM Cloud, not even a "server unavailable" message. We didn’t have anything in place to handle this particular instance, so SCORM Cloud kept trying to connect to the server, opening too many connections and causing failures. We now have code in place so that if the server ever stops responding again, SCORM Cloud will handle it as a "server unavailable" situation — one that we can handle with no problems at all. Our developers don’t have any direct control over how others handle their servers and systems so we can’t directly prevent errors. What we can do (and what we’ve done) is make it so that SCORM Cloud is able to handle a wider range of errors. This translates to more SCORM Cloud up time. If you ever need to see the status of SCORM Cloud (including up time data,) check out our Cloud Status page. You can also follow @SCORMCloud on Twitter for SCORM Cloud news and updates.

  A few days ago, a Pyrex dish filled with orange-chocolate chip cookies arrived in our office. In our world, a Pyrex dish means one thing: we’ve been graced with treats from Tim’s wife. As we sampled the offerings, Tim told us about his wife’s new endeavor. She was turning their kitchen into a test kitchen and would repeat a recipe until she had made it better and simplified the process. Her treats don’t last long in the office, so unfortunately we can’t share with you. Luckily, we have a test kitchen of our own. We’re always testing new features in SCORM Cloud to create a better user experience. Our latest concoction makes it easier for you to upload your courses into your Apps using SCORM Cloud. Enjoy! As you might have seen, we’ve integrated SCORM Cloud in a few places, including WordPress and Google Apps. The way we see it, SCORM Cloud is much like a switchboard. Content comes in from all over the place and SCORM Cloud sends it out to different locations, including other Apps. While you still have the option to upload your courses directly to your App, you can also upload to your App using SCORM Cloud.   Uploading your content directly into Cloud gives you a few benefits. You can test your content using your Test Track Sandbox to see how your users will experience it. You can also launch your courses directly from Cloud. Have you created a Quizzage or ScoTube course you want to share? No problem, you can push those directly to your App too! To upload to your Apps using SCORM Cloud, just follow these easy steps and you’re done before you know it. If you need to share your content outside the API, check out dispatch. We’re always looking for ways to make SCORM Cloud better, so send us your ideas. I’m sure that you can come up with things we’ve never even considered.

We’re hiring a Juggler. No, we don’t need circus skills, but we do need somebody who can keep a lot of balls in the air. Project Tin Can is generating an enormous amount of opportunity and we need somebody to help us keep moving it forward. The job involves bits of product management, project management, sales, marketing and entrepreneurship. We’re also looking for one or two more developers. Start here if you’re interested.

Birthdays are fun around Rustici Software. We all get ice cream- and not just a scoop from a big bucket of vanilla or chocolate. Each person gets to order their very own combination from Cold Stone Creamery (shameless product placement for free ice cream). Given the choice, we each end up with a cup custom made just for each of us. Whether it’s Mike’s Cookie Doughn’t You Want Some™ with Cake Batter ice cream, or Jena’s choice (which usually entails her picking out some of the toppings she ordered), it’s a personalized cup that has the flavors and toppings for each taste. We like to offer the same choices to our customers too. We understand that one platform does not suit everyone. That’s why we built many SCORM Cloud integrations- to meet different tastes and needs. Some flavors we offer include WordPress, Google Apps, Moodle, and now Drupal. The newest addition to the line up, the SCORM Cloud Drupal integration, is one that we are particularly excited about. The module is the result of a collaborative effort between a driven client, a knowledgeable developer within the Drupal community, and our own SCORM Cloud experts. Much like Cold Stone, Drupal offers endless customization options with over 2,000 modules to pick from, letting you build a site that meets all of your needs. You have probably seen Drupal in action as it runs millions of sites, including my favorite, The Onion. Looking for a way to sell access to your courses hosted on SCORM Cloud? The Ubercart module in Drupal offers shopping cart capabilities that now make this a reality. Want to customize the SCORM Cloud player? You can apply your own style sheet through the Content Creation Kit (CCK). Don’t see what you’re looking for? Reach out to the active Drupal community to develop even more functionality. Since we can’t share our ice cream tradition with you (as much as we’d love to), we can offer more flavors of SCORM Cloud. Don’t see your flavor listed here? Just ask us- the combinations are endless.

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 - .

There are so many super cool EdTech startups right now. The list goes on and on, and nearly every one of them is making a tragic mistake, a mistake that corporate LMSs and content vendors made about 15 years ago. Nearly every EdTech company seems to believe that they can live in isolation. EdTech companies must find a way to share data and experiences and content and workflows. APIs are great, and most of this new breed do have an API, but it’s completely impractical to expect that these companies will build to suit each and every distinct API for sharing experiences and data, etc. When Aspen goes from 5th grade to 6th grade, will her experiences in elementary school follow her? When Amelia dominates Princess Math on Saturday morning, will her teacher know that she’s mastered single digit addition on Monday morning? Will the state of California be able to take their students’ history and granular experiences with them when they’re forced to buy a less expensive student management system? It’s time for EdTech to embrace a shared language for communicating these experiences, and you better believe I have the right answer for them. The post EdTech’s Big Mistake appeared first on SCORM - .

It’s official. We’re three for three in the Nashville Business Journal’s annual Best Places to Work contest. We’re proud to be the place people want to come work. It certainly makes it easier to bring on more great people and I love the fact that nobody seems to want to leave. Great people are the foundation of a great company and we have some of the best. I can’t want to see what they do next. The post Three For Three appeared first on SCORM - .

The past week or so Nashville has experienced some pretty intense heat. This wasn’t the normal kind of heat where the temperature and humidity levels are roughly the same. This was a  new kind of heat. Suffocating, debilitating, triple digit heat. The kind of heat that does this to frogs….. Now, I know you’re asking yourself  "why do you care about this frog". The answer is simple. This frog was on a mission. Chris found this frog stuck to the middle of the sidewalk outside our office. Our office is comfortably situated at the end of a long building. We have a sidewalk that completely surrounds 3 sides of our office. The long stretch of sidewalk on the end has a small creek. This creek is usually filled with fast food trash (we pick it up!) courtesy of the hoodlums that hang out on our deck. That creek was where the frog was headed. This frog was killed mid-stride as he tried to approach the watery goodness of the creek. All he wanted was to spend an hour or two in the cool water, maybe cover himself with mud (do frogs do that?) and cool off. To get away from the heat that literally sucked him dry. Poor guy.   The post It’s hot outside. appeared first on SCORM - .

I love SCORM. I’ve built a career and a business around SCORM. When I first read the SCORM spec, I admired its elegance and foresight. SCORM has revolutionized the elearning industry and allowed a market to flourish. SCORM certainly has some warts and even a few character flaws, but I love it all the same. I love SCORM so much it’s even written all over my bicycle. But, SCORM is showing its age. It has carried us as far as it can take us. It’s time for something new, something fresh, something innovative. Something that can propel this stagnant industry forward and become its workhorse for the next decade. Fortunately that something is here. The Tin Can API is the future. From now on, we will be a "Tin Can First" company. We announced our "Tin Can First" strategy at our company-wide planning meeting last week; we have pivoted. Tin Can is happening. Tin Can is real. Tin Can is going to revolutionize the industry, and we’re going to lead the way. You should come along. We are going to ensure Tin Can’s success. We are going to help our customers embrace its capabilities. We are going to help foster a community of adoption and provide adopters with the resources they need to succeed. We are going to develop new and innovative products around the Tin Can API. We will dedicate our energy, thoughts and innovation to projects empowered by the Tin Can API. Tin Can will be our growth engine. We aren’t abandoning SCORM, there’s just not much new that can be done with it. We will still maintain our products and help people implement SCORM. You will still get the same great support you have come to expect. We still love you Grandma SCORM, but we’re going to spend a lot of time with the Tin Can Toddler we have running around. We started a new website dedicated to the evolution of the Tin Can API. Check out tincanapi.com and sign up to receive updates from that site if you haven’t already. The post Tin Can First appeared first on SCORM - .

Bathroom etiquette is a semi-frequent discussion topic around the office. It’s becoming a running joke that Tim and I care way too much about people remembering to replace an empty toilet paper roll. On the surface it’s lighthearted, but you know what, I really care. Actually, I care a whole helluva lot. It’s not about the toilet paper (we’re all smart enough to look before we sit), it’s about an attitude that cuts straight to the core of who we are and where I want to work. Changing the roll is just one of those things that needs to get done. It’s not anybody’s responsibility. It’s not in anyone’s job description, but its just gotta happen. Somebody’s gotta do it. The person who replaces the TP is the person who is going to answer a customer’s question about something well beyond the scope of what we do, just to help them out. The person who takes out the overflowing trash can is the person who is going to make a quick bug fix, even if that code technically belongs to another team. The person who puts a stray glass in the dishwasher is the person who will take 20 minutes to help a struggling peer, despite an overflowing to-do list of his own. A company filled with people who change the toilet paper is a company that delights its customers. It’s a company that respects its employees. It’s a company that can avoid a lot of structure, process, management and unnecessary BS because amazing people are filling in the cracks. A company that changes the TP, doesn’t have to fill out TPS Reports. The post Want a Great Place to Work? Change the Toilet Paper appeared first on SCORM - .

As my bio would suggest, I’m the office talker. I talk faster, louder and more frequently than everyone here in the office. This fact also explains why I get teased about my Southern accent, but that’s neither here nor there. If this was a "loudest laugh" contest, it would be a tie between Freddie and TJ. When it comes to talking, I take the cake. So instead of bothering the people around here with my chatter, I’ve decided to make my talkative nature more productive. I’m taking my talking to the Cloud. You can now chat with me LIVE about all things SCORM Cloud Monday - Friday. I’m usually around my desk from about 9am- 5pm Central time. I wish I could be available all the time, but hey, a girl’s gotta sleep sometime, right? That should give us enough time each day to talk about all the awesome things SCORM Cloud can do and hopefully, I’ll be able to help answer some questions along the way. Each chat will generate a support ticket with us, so if you need to follow up or have other questions, our support staff is there to help you out. You can find me hanging out in the Help button on the SCORM Cloud support page. It looks like this…. So pop on over and chat me, maybe? It’s awfully lonely in there without you. The post Chat me, maybe? appeared first on SCORM - .