Knowledge of english has become a key differentiator enabling one person to score over another – especially in developing economies. In Bangladesh all schooling and knowledge is imparted in Bangla only and very few people know english well.
Research showed that while mobiles have penetrated to the farthest hinterland in Bangladesh, that has not been the case with internet technologies. Hence BBC World Service Trust has leveraged the ubiquity of mobile phones to disseminate lessons to teach English. They have launched a program called Janala (which means window).
This program has been immensely successful and has about 300,000 people signed up for english lessons. They have been successful because -
a) All mobile operators in Bangladesh offer access to this service
b) All mobile operators offer this service at a steep discount
This program is an amazing idea. It is the coming together of some distinct elements that garuntee success – viz. quality content, universal availability all at an unbelievably low price.
My takeaway from this – whenever I design a service, I will strive to provide access from a mobile phone either as voice or through SMS and provide access to a significantly larger population. What do you think? Please share your feedback.
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