Please forgive me if I get this wrong and post it incorrectly.
I would like fellow hackers to give me some constructive feedback on my MVP please. Ideas and suggestions as how I can improve my version 1.0 and how I can get the word out so I can help many students as possible.
Thanks alot! Azaan
My initial reaction was that this is really well done. Excellent work. It's clear and concise. I was wondering where you were from when I noticed that the tutor search was in so many different languages.
This makes it easy for me to end up with a result with no data, if you don't have a tutor with the language I need and the skills.
What I'd recommend is that the search operate as a filter. First they select the class, then you show what levels you have teachers registered for, then you filter that data to tutors you have the language for. If you don't have a tutor for the language, you can then request the user to sign-up to be notified, and you can start to build up the marketplace and understand where the supply and demand side limits are.
Or, alternatively, just focus on a smaller geographic area or language, and then expand as you grow.
Really excellent work. Dare I say, better than much of the other Show HN posts. :)
Also, see if you can update the Show HN label to include a bit more about your project or put "I'm 11 years old and built this tutor search", you may bet more interest that way.
The only suggestions I have, aside from what others said here, are marketing/design related. The "for parents" section on the homepage has red check marks and this initially made me think this product does NOT offer those things. Red is usually reserved for bad/warning/errors and personally for any checklist I'd stick with the same color for all check marks. Additionally cutting down some of the text on the pages could be helpful. Marketing should be straight, simple, and to the point. For example instead of "Work flexible hours to suit your schedule" maybe replace it with "set your own schedule". If you want some help in this area, feel free to reach out and I can give some more suggestions.
> I would like fellow hackers to give me some constructive feedback
I also like how you see yourself as a hacker. Hacking is probably the most important thing as a programmer to get good at. It's not following best practices or reading the manuals that everyone else is reading. It's about finding creative solutions to mundane problems, this is what programming is to me.
"Upcoming classes" section was empty for me when I joined as a tutor. So maybe if that section is empty have some placeholder or some sort of instruction to let the user know what's happening.
Asking for banking details is also something that probably be handed off to a provider like Stripe for security/compliance reasons. And also to make your users more comfortable sharing that information with you.
Otherwise, great job and I can only imagine what your skills will look like in 10 years.
"Upcoming classes" placeholder page is a great idea.
"banking details" this for the tutors only so can pay them in different countries that Stripe may not support yet.
Stripe is being used for taking payments from students.
To give you some business advice, I think you have a useful story to tell about being 11 and starting a business. You need exposure to get people on your platform. I’d try reaching out to people with a lot of visibility and the right contacts, tell them your story and ask for help. People working w education & people who just have a lot of followers.
Regardless of how it goes you’re right now getting invaluable experience of a kind that many people only start getting a decade later than you (at least) which means you’re setting yourself up for big success later on.
It really looks great for a MVP.
I suggest you had the ability to book multiple classes with a tutor and grow the tutors for more subjects
On the about page (and maybe others) there are multiple ’ and – characters eg: child’s. It looks like these should be apostrophes and dashes. The often happens if you copy and paste from a word doc which uses the curly (high ascii) versions of apostrophes and mdashes. You can use "e; and — to replace these.
This is brilliantly done. You have a bright future ahead.
A few suggestions:
1. You could add anonymous(but verified) tutor ratings. This will enable children to find better tutors while tutors are encouraged to perform better to increase their ratings.
2. I think it's more user-friendly if you open internal pages within the same tab (e.g. the open section opened a new tab).
3. Also, I could think of many revenue models. Example: Commission on tuition fees (better to do once you're established), Premium accounts for tutors to host learning materials, On-Demand tuition classes, private sessions, etc.
Again, really well done. I wish you all the best!
Cheers!
I am really amazed and thankful for the helpful advice and response of fellow hackers.
I am not sure who the competition is exactly although I am sure there are plenty of companies offering tuition. I benefited immensely from remote affordable tutors during the Covid-19 pandemic lock down and realised there are many highly educated teachers out there who can teach online at around 1/3 of the local price. Hence the idea was born.
Screening and evaluating tutors, I have found an experienced teacher to help me interview and vet the tutors to make sure they are child-friendly, qualified and competent.
Here is the short version of the interview: https://soundcloud.com/azaan-maqbool/azaan-bbc-interview?si=...
I've only grown more irresponsible and rowdy as I aged ;)
On a related note, I think many children are ready to drive cars much earlier than the current age limit.
https://aaafoundation.org/rates-motor-vehicle-crashes-injuri...
Just a heads up: you have encoding issues in your "How it works" page
(I removed "great", because it's too optimistic for the dry stile here.)
> or do I have to to start a new one?
No, don't worry. It's better to use a descriptive title, but it's not a big deal. The mods may change it later.
My best guess is that it was done in a heavy collaboration with a professional developer(s) with the kid being used as a figure head to create an unique PR and marketing angle.
If you look up the company registration data, it shows up as being established back in the 90s by someone with the same last name and listing their position as a "system analyst".
If you look through the Twitter stream, it does not read like something written by a child, even a very mature one. Ditto for the copy on the website, including the About page and what not.
Basically, this looks too good to be true as described. Realistically speaking.
The big-pizzazz "I'm $age and I did $thing" story has forever included the dimension of implicit parental help. It was true at science fairs when I was Azaan's age and it's been true as long as HN has been around. Who cares? It's no reason to take your resentment out on the kid.
What sort of a community are we trying to be here? Not this sort, that's for sure.
I am 34 years old and I have a hard time finding a use for that word as it is, I can't really imagine 11 years old me grasping the concept of "empowerment". I was already writing (some) C at that age, I felt like a cool kid because I managed to paint the screen red in Turbo C++, but not so much to have the maturity and foresight of opening a whole business, create an MVP, market it, and ask Paul Graham for advice.
But what do I know.
Aged 10, I passed my GCSE Mathematics exam with the highest possible grade, an A Star (Grade 9).
I am one of the youngest boys in the 33+ year history of the exam to have achieved this.
We are all born with different abilities and talent. I suck at sports but excel in Mathematics and Sciences etc
https://educational-life.org/ten-year-old-maths-whizz-gets-h...
... and if one needs an explicit confirmation that it was someone older than 11-year old posting all this, here it is. Phrasing, voc and the tone - none of it correlates with what a kid would say, leave alone to an adult stranger.
I am all for encouraging anyone to get better at things they are genuinely interested in, but being warm and receptive to blatant mis-representation of one's work is not the right thing to do. It sends the exact opposite of the right signal.
Even if you're right on the facts, punishing the child for it is exactly the opposite of what you should be doing.
https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
Note this one: "Have curious conversation; don't cross-examine." And above all, this one: "Be kind".
As for cross-examining an 11-year-old - what kind of community do you guys think this is supposed to be? Please re-read the guidelines repeatedly.
Ah, there it is.
ML course by a 15 year old!
Under 13s usually end up with their accounts forcibly deleted because of laws about collecting data [making it disproportionately inconvenient to facilitate young children].
I feel safe now that I know someone good is around to protect against the nasty baddies (envious and jealous bullies).
"It's fair to say that most 6 year olds are probably more interested in playing with toys and computer games than taking a programming class, but not Kautilya Katariya. Now 7, Kautilya has been recognized as the world's youngest computer programmer after completing four professional certifications from IBM for Python and artificial intelligence."
https://www.techrepublic.com/article/a-6-year-old-became-the...