mfrank

ha. that is pretty fair. So at a high level, the way that we actually assure tutor's Skype reliability is tests around speed and reliability (stuff like speedtest and ping test) with reliability being more important. Then we also do a number of test full length lessons using students from different parts of the U.S. / the world at different times of day.

For us because online tutoring is so dependent on a connection, we also try to make sure there are solid contingencies in place in case something extreme like a power outage happens which is rare but more frequent in certain parts of the developing world than in the U.S..

Yep - everyone has different goals and reasons for learning spanish so having a one-on-one who can create lessons that are customized to your needs has been a real differentiator so far.

Good feedback. Ya, we ended up alpha testing our site with both Spanish and Chinese but ended up launching with just Spanish because its easier to try to initially build up a marketplace with only one subject as you point out (to avoid the ghost town feel).

Maybe gearing towards language tutoring at this point makes sense

Thanks - all good feedback and we'll work on it!

This is great news but I'm pretty sure this it is not a "first of its kind" occurrence as there are a number of vehicles (e.g. New Profit in Boston) that specialize in these types of strategic venture-like philanthropy investments.