Nittany Notes is beginning to amplify its business ventures and has targeted the Internet with its plans of expansion, allowing class notes to be purchased and downloaded online.
Nittany Notes owner Tom Matis said it began in the spring with a trial run of about 50 classes posted online. He was happy with the turnout and decided to continue his venture this summer with notes for 19 classes.
"Everything worked really good," he said. "So we will be going full board on it as the semesters go back, and we'll be adding more and more to it."
Even without any advertising, Matis said the word of mouth about the online notes is attracting customers.
"We had several people happy since we have them available 24 hours," he said. "We just recently put up a survey for people, and it's been very positive so far."
Some students see this as being a beneficial service but think there could be a downside as well.
Lauren Tom, a former employee of Nittany Notes, 234 E. College Ave, said the service will be convenient, but it may not appeal to everyone. Tom (senior-management) said the paper notes would still be more convenient because they can be carried from place to place.
"Students are on the go and they like to study in different places," she said. "Unless someone is able to download their notes onto their phone or something, the only way to study is by staring at a computer screen."
Eric Yoder, a manager at Nittany Notes, said the note package is created by special software that disables printing of the notes.
Lisa Albany (senior-human development and family studies) agreed the online notes will be useful because they would not need to be picked up from the store, but said people would like having the notes in hand.
And because the notes are now available to download, they might face problems that have plagued other kinds of downloadable files, Tom said.
"I think if students really depend on Nittany Notes, then they definitely will try to steal them, but if students only use notes for one or two classes, then there won't be a problem," she said.
Yoder said he was not concerned about piracy.
"I'm not worried about loopholes because the software is fairly failsafe," he said. "We'd go crazy if we worried about that all time."
The online Nittany Notes are available for seven days after their purchase. When the time expires, the software will no longer allow the notes to be opened.
"Once the exam passes, it's really not a benefit," Matis said.
