PUBLISH.ME BY MORGAN SMITH

PUBLISH.ME BY MORGAN SMITH

Each quarter, students across all five bachelor's degree programs at Neumont College of Computer Science present their Capstone Project. This penultimate project demonstrates each student's ability to conceive, plan, develop, and present a technology-focused project in only 10 weeks. 

Over the next few weeks, we'll be highlighting some outstanding projects from seniors currently enrolled in the Bachelor of Science in Business Operations and Technology Management degree. This program focuses on teaching grads how to connect developers and business leaders.

Morgan Smith developed a project called "Publish.ME." This web platform aims to remove the bottleneck publishers face when looking for new authors while providing an open platform for writers to gain exposure for their work. 

"Primarily, Publish.ME is solving the greatest barrier to entry for new authors to gain traction in the industry," said Morgan. "It's empowering the writers of the world and eliminating luck from the publishing equation via technology."

Morgan Smith presents his startup, Publish.ME, to his peers and faculty for his Capstone Project presentation.

Previously, Morgan's tech startup won $1,000 in seed money through Get Seeded. He started work on the project in his Project Management in Practice course. Over the next year, he continued to develop the idea in his free time and as part of coursework for other classes. 

Morgan found inspiration from his own love of writing to create a platform where more writers could be published. "As far back as I have memories of anything, I remember creating some sort of art. Eventually I decided that writing would be my primary focus as an artist," said Morgan as he explains his passion for the project. "But at one point, I had a professional writer look me in the eyes and say, 'It's literally a game of chance. I got lucky.' Something snapped in my brain, and I decided I would change the billion-dollar industry that somehow ran on luck."

Once Morgan recognized the bottleneck created by the "slush pile," which is an over saturation of content from aspiring writers, he knew he could use technology to innovate the publishing process. 

He is currently continuing  production on the project and plans to launch the initial software in July 2018.