I spend a lot of time in the Open Content world. COSL is all about opening up content and making it available to the world. Given that fact why would I write about selling content? The Internet is full of great content and if all I need to do is run a quick Google search to get my answer why would I pay?
For anyone that has done any Ruby on Rails programming you have hopefully discovered Peep Code. It’s like porn for programmers. Peep code picks a very specific topic related to an area of programming in Rails that is meaningful to a lot of people. They have videos on REST, ActiveMerchant, using Textmate, etc. Many of these topics are covered on sites around the web, but customers are willing to pay to get it here.
Why?
For one the handy packaging makes it simple to find what you need. They have done a great job marketing the site. Most people in the community know the site. They have experts give the training so you know you are getting high quality material. For example, Cody Fauser, one of the ActiverMerchant developers put together the presentation on ActiveMerchant. The fact that the micro-training is cheap – $9 – doesn’t hurt either.