MOOCs

Preston Silverman explains how he founded RaiseMe to make college scholarships available to students earlier, as they progress through high school. He describes testing the idea, choosing colleges and universities as funding partners, and building marketplace density by focusing on particular regions. RaiseMe’s growth came through student sign-ups, partnerships, grants, and later fundraising, while Silverman’s work shifted from customer research and selling to setting direction, recruiting, and fundraising. He closes with advice to stay patient, learn from mistakes, and help students with guidance and career decisions as well as financial aid.

Chris Dixon argues that valuable startup ideas often look bad because they challenge conventional wisdom, seem like toys, or solve only one part of a larger system. Founders can spot these opportunities through direct experience with technology, a problem, or a community. He illustrates this with Google, Airbnb, eBay, Dropbox, Kickstarter, and examples from security, telephony, newspapers, education, and software development. His advice is to build ideas from firsthand experience and look for where it differs from conventional wisdom.