Why I left Skillshare and where are my courses now

I don't want to discourage anyone from trying Skillshare, but for me and my business, it's no longer the best option.
The new course platform is hosted on Teachable classes.weronikazubek.com
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[@Unders]

Crazy ive just had a similar experience because some students were asking a question. So i added a video into the course. to make it better, So they closed the course. And support have said "Please note that once the class is reviewed by our Moderation team and approved it should not be updated later on" How insane is that....

[@WeronikaZubekart]

It's just annoying having to jump through someone else's hoops

[@portersblackboard]

I didn't know adding a Q&A section could be a problem. I figure if you can change the course once it has been published that changing it would not be a problem. Perhaps a reasonable solution would be to re-edit the video and super impose the information in a block of onscreen text. I figure as long as the video length didn't change you could help your students and not upset the people behind the curtain.

[@wanderingcreativity]

Thanks for sharing wishing you well on your path and less dreary things !

[@cantonesezoom2721]

I have similar experience. Skillshare closed my class and deactivated my account without telling me. I will never use them again.

[@LauraLopesG]

Thanks for sharing this information.

[@WeronikaZubekart]

Glad it was helpful!

[@KorysArtCafe]

Thx for making this. I’m just starting to make courses and trying to figure out the best plan. It’s plain stupid what skillshare is doing. I’m so turned off to using them, as a teacher or a student. Thx again!

[@WeronikaSalach]

Oiii sorry to hear about your experience, that’s strange! 😱

[@mandyobrien8452]

I'm so sorry you and other artists have to go through this crap.

[@LaughingInTiny]

Phew, glad I found this before putting myself on there! Thinking I'd rather build a new platform.

[@UYDesigns]

I had a similar experience where they just took down my classes with no warning. Not to mention they don't pay enough. I realised could make more money on my own website.

[@joyneasleystudios]

Wow! I have many classes where i had to break a section of a class up and label them part 1,part 2, and so on. I may need to go back and rename them.

[@EveWilliamsMusic]

Your experience on SkillShare doesn't surprise me at all. I have found them a total nightmare to deal with. They have absolutely no people skills and they are completely discourteous. I also got an email I had 'violated' (very strong word ) their policies. They have me 1 month to edit 8 courses while I was awaiting surgery and moving a house. I got a month's extension, killed my self to meet it then got an email saying they had closed 5 of my classes for missing the deadline, which I had infact met. I eventually got an acknowledgement they had made a mistake but wasn't reimbursed for my loss of earnings while the classes were down.

[@mylifepart2]

I m actually making a class for skillshare and sorry to hear about your experience...I m aware of the strike policy they have so I will be extra careful in my work... Thx you for sharing your experience...good luck god bless...

[@salikw]

How is it going mate

[@mylifepart2]

@@salikw hello

[@salikw]

@@mylifepart2 hello mate! Did you made a skillshare course? How is it going?

[@TheTaff777]

Yep...similar experiences here. Skillshare are insanely petty. I'm there right now as a means to an end but I dont think they'll be a long term option.

[@millemajart]

They are not taking very good care of their business partners (there teachers) and i do not understand this agressive approach. I am considering the same. Good for you.

[@LizAmacher]

I’ll try Teachable again perhaps. I just spent 8 hours yesterday trying to upload two videos for Skillshare and they were 2.14 GB and wouldn’t upload. I didn’t realize it had to be less than 2 GB but yet had to be a high quality video … that means around 8-9 minutes for each segment which is a pain to divide my 30 minute tutorial, but I did anyway and it still didn’t upload (it also had part 1,2, and 3). I wonder if that’s why it didn’t get accepted. I ended up creating a Patreon account until I figure out which platform to use! Thanks for sharing about experience!

[@WeronikaZubekart]

Exactly! They want tiny videos. But sometimes it’s hard to divide up one long demo. Then you divide divide and still size is too large. And it’s just a pain

[@studentlearn7610]

Hi Weronika Zubek, Thanks for this helpful video, would you be interested in doing a video review for our site when it goes live?

[@ManinderDandiwal]

Does teachable also pays according to watch time minutes

[@SubashSL]

Despite watching your video I did go with Skillshare in November 2021, and though I wasn't making much I was happy to be getting students and was planning to start my second course. Also, I did number my videos, 1., 2. and so on but did not receive any strikes. But yesterday a strange thing happened. One of my students who joined in April this year was deleted and along with that about 400 premium minutes (for which you earn royalties) were gone too. When asked Skillshare promptly replied saying "Our Trust & Safety team runs a daily check to remove any disingenuous user accounts from our database, which is why you have seen a change in your Stats". If they ran it daily why did it take from them so long to detect a spurious user who joined way back in April? One other thing I noticed was the changing of names of some users or should I say one user. It kept changing and I was wondering how it could happen. Does Skillshare add users to encourage teachers? And remove users when the course isn't doing well, again to encourage teachers to make more content and courses?

[@carleen4you851]

I am watching your video and I am absolutely disgusted of Skillshare’s behaviour! I had my 2nd strike a few days ago, the 1st one was for my very first video when I was learning how to publish a video on Skillshare! They just send you strike for a “yes” for a “no”, for not a big deal… UNREAL! I don’t really consider creating a new class before 6 months, as apparently they close your account after 3 “violations” as they love to call a mistake. I don’t have the impression they are there to help people, but rather to destroy them, destroy creativity, they work against themselves and they don’t realise it! They are completely unprofessional and incompetent, not to mention the majority of “teachers” on the platform who “teach” you how to draw little circles and stupid flowers that a toddler is able to better. I am now looking into Teachable and maybe Udemy, hopefully the staff is smarter on these platforms. The thing is you put so much effort into creating a profile, learn how a platform works, adapt your videos to that platform, which is so time consuming, and they just smash with a stupid “violation” email? Well, good luck to Skillshare for promoting the losers with 1 student for their class!!!

[@SubashSL]

Udemy is no better. They'll sell your courses dirt cheap (they constantly run a $20 or even less than that campaign). Uploading on Udemy is another pain. It was a blessing in disguise that one of my perfect videos was constantly being rejected by them for not meeting their requirements. Sick and tired of perfecting the video, I finally pulled out and I am happy I did that. I then went with Skillshare in Nov.2021 but just yesterday I encountered my first problem where they have deleted a student of my class who joined in April this year and some 300+ premium minutes (for which you earn royalties) have also been deleted. I did use Teachable in the past but on Teachable you will have to do the marketing unlike Udemy or Skillshare.

[@carleen4you851]

@@SubashSL It's good to know, thank you for your advice 🙂

[@portersblackboard]

I know you posted this a while ago but it makes no sense that putting numbers in your videos would warrant a strike. Seems like they could have put human eyes on it to see if it really was a problem, then given you a week or so to fix the problem without giving you a strike. Their strikes are quite insulting the way they do it and often for insignificant things. I hope all is going well on Teachable!

[@WiresNStuffs]

I just had all my classes closed too without any email or reason given though screw them the same as you it covers my gas, I'm making thousands a month from other publishers and skillshare are a drop in the pond making about 100 dollars a month its a small loss and a small amount of money to tolerate the disrespect.

[@GhostLeadGaming]

here me out i repeat "DO NOT USE SKILL SHARE ANYTHING IS BETTER THAN SKILL SHARE LIKE UDEMY OR OTHERS" the people teaching there are either non professional (youtubers who r not pro and dont really know the difference between teaching and just making a video) anybody can make videos? meaning all type of videos can be made by any amatuer, meaning takes time to filter good teacher. happened to me so no way am i ever let anyone fall for skillshare neva!!! eva!!! evaaaaaaaa!

[@ryanholden9977]

I feel better about canceling now. Huge ethical dilemma. Screw Skillshare. A bunch of the classes are way too long anyhow!

[@reavanante2160]

This sounds very unethical. Terms of service should be known, not something made up in a few seconds. People can't live like that. I've noticed they are advertising very much via television.

[@ThandieDowery]

I’m sorry that this happened to you. It sounds EXTREMELY frustrating. But at the end of the day, you didn’t follow their guidelines. I think some accountability is needed here. You could have simply called part 2 ‘Title Continued’ or something. Get creative with your lesson titles or flag your concerns with customer care regarding this part of the guidelines beforehand. I under it could have easily been an oversight on your part, but dragging them for your not following the platforms rules isn’t cool. Anyway, wish you luck on your Teachable journey. I will be uploading my courses on a few platforms to mitigate any potential transgressions/bans on my part, as accidents do happen.

[@bluedenim5979]

I don't think it's a violation to number your classes. I don't remember seeing that on the list. What Weronika isn't saying is that Skill-share is very quick to claim that teachers have violated something, some actually are not doing so and the matter is not looked into, I think that is why she was so angry because they treated her poorly, just reading between the lines. The communication from the platform is really poor. Teachers are threatened with low-res copied and pasted e-mails that are not a case by case thing, it's just a blanket e-mail and then they have their accounts closed without proper communication or transparency, and/or classes taken down. The e-mail lists incidents without further explanation that may or may not be relevant: some examples are: "the content is not your own and you are in violation of Skill-share's policy and your account will be closed" (not verbatim) Their claim: "uploading content you did not create" "Your account has been flagged for fraudulent activity, your account will be closed and your course removed" (fraud includes using more than one e-mail address, they will claim you are trying to game the algorithm as well), they accuse everyone of this one "misleading referral or class review activity", teachers are accused of this but usually under false pretenses and their classes are immediately removed without warning They will also claim: "Using your profile or any community space primarily as a proxy to other websites, services, or competitors is not tolerated." so you are only allowed to use their platform?? This one is sent to a lot of teachers and they are falsely accused: "Manipulating metrics surrounding engagement (manipulating or faking referrals or minutes watched)" And sadly, this one: I feel this one is not realistic: If the goal of your content or community participation is to gain engagement outside of Skillshare, it is likely not aligned with the spirit of the platform" There isn't a perfect way to judge this and if you use other methods to self promote they might see it negatively. Skillshare claims that you can make a lot of money with their platform but in reality you don't make enough to sustain yourself and you will need other means to pay your bills. They should really understand this and in the art community, online promotion is how people show their portfolios and get work. I see one of their star teachers who taught at FIT has self promotion on his page, he refers to not one but several different businesses he himself has founded and promotes it shamelessly. At the end of the day it is about money, and if you aren't a chosen star they may eliminate you because you might not make them money...it may not be about anything you did. They also have to make deals with investors and whatnot and probably have to satisfy them in order to get money. The platform has really narrow constraints and it inhibits artists which is why it really isn't something I would recommend using at this point.

[@xxwoman]

From a customer perspective, Skillshare has scammed me twice! I will never ever use them again. I hope teachers get off that platform. Good luck to you!

[@claire4212]

what happened?

[@Arabian_Epileptic]

Skill share is scammy

[@youknowkbbaby]

Most of the skillshare courses are terrible.