UPDATE 1 July 2020: Bluprint classes have been acquired by TN Marketing, which is an online platform for video classes. The announcement indicates that students will retain access to their classes, and I believe that instructors will continue to be compensated for their work. Details are forthcoming. For now, the key news is that though the Bluprint platform will be closing this summer, classes will be moved to a new platform and students will retain access. You are, of course, still more than welcome (indeed, encouraged!) to join me in my self-hosted crochet class, using the discount code, below. This code will remain until the end of July, 2020.
An email to instructors today, 1 July, from TN Marketing said: “For existing subscribers to Bluprint, and past buyers of individual classes from Bluprint/Craftsy, those customers will continue to have access to their content on the Bluprint site, at www.mybluprint.com. As noted above, this Bluprint site is expected to be open and accessible for past customers through August 2020. After that, the new TN Marketing site will migrate that customer access to our platform. Any classes they purchased, and their subscriber benefits, will be available into the future, through their online accounts.”
Last week, Bluprint announced that its parent company, NBCUniversal, will be closing down the crafty/foodie online learning platform beginning in late July. It’s very difficult news for the nearly 140 people who will be losing their jobs, and for the many hundreds of instructors who created outstanding classes and were paid royalties for every class sold or minute streamed.
I have four crochet classes on the platform, and each one of them was a joy to create and film with folks who really knew their stuff and put students at the heart of every production. I’m proud of these classes, which I created with the company starting in 2014, when it was called Craftsy, before NBCUniversal acquired it.
I will not be given these classes when the platform folds, and that is fair. It’s business. I own my own teaching approach, projects and skill, but I never owned the production of these classes. I’m disappointed to lose these incredible resources for students, but I am still able to teach and connect and help, and that is exactly what I’m doing.
Several weeks ago, I started to teach a crochet class on my own platform, in response to our collective experience and stress of spending far more time at home in these pandemic times. In answer to my own stress, I found I wanted to work on a project that is comforting, engaging and meaningful, and teaching crochet is all three. Making crochet is many of those things to crocheters, too.
Crochet for Challenging Times is starting out bare bones as far as class content goes, but over time it will grow into a compendium of all of my crochet knowledge. Every week or two I’m filming new lessons to add to the class. My home-based production isn’t as slick as when I filmed my Craftsy/Bluprint classes in a dedicated studio with professional hair and makeup, production, videographers and editors, but crochet needn’t be schmancy. I bring the same heart and approach to teaching when I film on my dining room table in fits and spurts around my son’s remote schooling as I do when I’m in a big studio.
Students who enroll in my class are invited to join a private class forum, where I answer questions and they can get to know each other and show off their creations. And in coming weeks I will begin to hold occasional live office hours by video chat, so I can offer help in a way I never could for my Craftsy or Bluprint students.
I would love to welcome all of my Craftsy/Bluprint students to join me in Crochet for Challenging Times, at a discounted one-time registration fee that includes everything I mentioned above, including all the new lessons I’ll be adding over time. Use the code STUDENTLOVE40 for 40% off when you sign up.
Yup, this is on the honour system; I have no good way to check that students using the code are also students of mine on Bluprint, and that’s okay. If folks who haven’t taken my classes before sign up with the discount, I’ll be just as happy to teach them and get to know them, so please do feel free to share this offer with friends and family, or on your own blog or social media.
Tech platforms come and go, but craft is forever. I hope to continue making things with you long into the future.