Above all else, the past two years have shown John and me that the evolution of the Internet is transforming how people communicate.  As connection speeds continue to improve, every day brings more sophisticated ways to interact and share content.  These opportunities to engage others not only presented us with new and enormous possibilities, but required rethinking of old methods. Traditional mass media tactics, like trying to attract the broadest crowd possible, felt flat and out of touch in a world that offers tailor-made content for every niche. Through many heady discussions and countless iterations, we began to visualize aspects of the attitude and approach necessary for succeeding in this new media world.  What we needed was an approach that specifically targeted our intended audience through the channels of communication that they prefer.  Adapting a term from Buddhism, we identified this demeanor of relevant and fearless intentionality as "skillful means".

Because the Internet now allows us to reach students directly, we decided to make our SAT prep specifically for them.  In this context, skillful means demands a focus on educationally-sticky content.  Whatever reactions that this content elicits from non-students falls outside the scope of our intention.  Though confusing or perhaps angering parents is not our objective, it gives us no cause for alarm.  In fact, if every adult liked what we've created, I'd be concerned about paying too much attention to the wrong crowd.  So a little blowback can be a good thing, but the idea is not to be edgy or outlandish for mere shock value. Such behavior ignores the power that skillful means draw from being relevant. We choose to relentlessly focus on a specific audience and engage them in a meaningful way.  This engagement is fearless because all other attitudes and reactions are respected, but ultimately irrelevant.

- allen