A week and a half ago, Zach Sims and Ryan Bubinski started working on a new site they call “Codeacademy.” After posting a note about the site on Hacker News, they suddenly had 1,000 concurrent users within hours.
Codeacademy offers free lessons in learning to program with JavaScript that feel almost like a game, because they award points and trophies that are visible to your friends as you progress through the course. And unlike similar services, Codeacademy doesn’t ask you to register until you’ve completed several lessons, at which point it will save your progress. The duo has plans to monetize the site, but they haven’t worked out the details yet.