In reading the Harvard alumni magazine online this evening, I came upon this interesting article which discusses some of the benefits of spaced learning, a learning technique that “can increase knowledge by up to 50 percent, and strengthen retention for up to two years.” The article links to the website of SpacedEd, a startup that implements spaced repetition in the form of Q&A-style courses that are delivered to paying subscribers daily by email, text message, or RSS feed.
While investigating SpacedEd’s site, I learned that they are seeking new courses. In fact, they offer of a $100 royalty advance and 60-80% royalties for courses added to their site. Conveniently, they also posted a list of the courses requested most often by subscribers.
I do not feel particularly interested in preparing such courses, but I am interested in hiring someone to write them for me. So I threw together a quick job offer and posted it here on Craigslist Manila. My hope is that in the next few days someone will respond with course proposals. I will turn around and submit them to SpacedEd. If SpacedEd accepts them, I will pay the proposer to complete the course, which I will then turn over to SpaceEd. In the short run, I will net $75 per course, since I am offering $25 to the course writer. In the long run, each course should become a small source of residual income that requires little effort to maintain. I will continue to publish updates on this experiment as it progresses.
Initial investment:
Time: 1 hour
Money: $0
Current return:
$0
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Tagged: entrepreneurship, experiments, outsourcing, residual income
