About MASSOLIT

Why was MASSOLIT established?

MASSOLIT was created in order to give more people access to the knowledge and insight of the world's best academics.

Who is behind MASSOLIT?

MASSOLIT was founded by Chris Tudor in September 2013. Prior to founding MASSOLIT, he taught at Oxford University (2010-11) and worked as a strategy consultant specialising in education (2012-13).

Since then, the team has grown to twelve people, including eight content developers, a head of sales, a digital marketing assistant, an account manager and a finance manager.

Where does the name MASSOLIT come from?

In Mikhail Bulgakov's The Master and Margarita, a book written in the Soviet Union between 1928-40 but not published until 1967, MASSOLIT is the place where all the writers meet up and hang out.

How long is an average lecture?

Most lectures are between 8-12 minutes in length.

Are lectures coded to the curriculum?

To a large extent, yes. In some cases, subjects may be more wide-ranging than a single specification option and/or designed for extension and enrichment.

How many lectures are there for each subject?

MASSOLIT currently features 7179 lectures across 1148 courses. These are split across twelve subject areas as follows:

• 150 lectures across 31 in Biology
• 144 lectures across 27 in Chemistry
• 830 lectures across 134 in Classics & Ancient History
• 184 lectures across 32 in Economics
• 193 lectures across 33 in English Language
• 1751 lectures across 201 in English Literature
• 114 lectures across 22 in Geography
• 503 lectures across 83 in Government & Politics
• 1429 lectures across 241 in History
• 399 lectures across 69 in Mathematics
• 535 lectures across 91 in Philosophy & Religious Studies
• 152 lectures across 27 in Physics
• 626 lectures across 118 in Psychology
• 285 lectures across 55 in Sociology

Click here to download a full list of our courses and lectures [.xls, 572 KB]

How are topics for lectures chosen?

In some cases, schools get in touch to ask us to cover certain subjects, which we are more than happy to do.

In most cases, however, it's a combination of looking at the specification to see what needs to be covered, speaking to the contributor to get their opinion on what would be the most useful topics to cover, and thinking about what would work best in the video format.

How many lectures are added each year?

We are planning to add 300-400 courses in the next year, which equates to about 2,000 lectures.

Where can I find a list of recently-added lectures?

The course list is arranged in terms of which courses have been added most recently.

Can I see any sample lectures?

Yes. We have a regularly-updated YouTube channel where you can check out some of our videos.

Why do you charge for lectures?

We need money to cover our costs (e.g. server and hosting costs, camera equipment, post-production software, travel up and down the country, etc.). Charging a small annual subscription fee seems like the fairest way to do it.

Access and Outreach is extremely important to us, and we welcome discussions with Outreach & Access officers (or equivalent) at both Schools and Universities as to how we best do the right thing with this, so please get in touch.

Can staff and students watch lectures at home?

Yes. Once your school has signed up, all staff members and students will have their own username and password, which means they can watch lectures whenever and wherever they like.

If my school subscribes, do we automatically get access to new lectures?

Yes. If you subscribed today, you'd not only get access to the 1148 courses that are on the site right now, but everything else that is added over the next 12 months.

Can teachers check whether students have watched lectures set for them as homework?

Yes. We have powerful analytics tools whereby teachers can see who has watched what, and when. We can even tell you how much of each video has been watched!

Is there a limit on the number of students and teachers who can log in to watch a lecture at the same time?

There is no limit. Everyone in the school could watch the same lecture at the same time if they liked.

Are there any lectures freely available online?

Yes. We have a regularly-updated YouTube channel where you can check out some of our videos.

Alternatively, we provide free access to one lecture from each our lecturers, so you can see what they're like. You can start having a look at some of these via our contributor list.

Can lectures be downloaded for offline viewing?

No, although this is something that we are thinking about doing in the future.

Can we choose to subscribe to lectures in individual subjects?

Each subject collection is available as a separate 12-month subscription, but you can save up to 40% per subject with a multi-subject subscription.

What personal data does MASSOLIT have on file?

Our database contains all the information you provided to us when you registered for an account: your full name, your email address, your school, and an encrypted version of your password. In addition to this, we store the date (and time) your account was created, the date (and time) of your last sign-in, and your IP address at your last sign-in.

Can I request to see my personal data?

Yes. If you would like to see the personal data that MASSOLIT has in its database, simply get in touch and we will send your full user record.

Do you share personal data with third parties?

Yes. Some of the things you do on the MASSOLIT website are shared with Google Analytics. We share data when you visit any page on the site, as well as whenever you play a video.

We also share data with Wistia, the company that hosts all our videos and whose video player we use. Data is shared with Wistia whenever you visit a page with a video on it and (again) whenever you play a video.

It is important to note that all this data is anonymised before it reaches third parties. We don't send any personally-identifiable information like your name or email address. With Google, we also anonymise your IP address.

Can I request my personal data to be deleted?

Yes. If you would like us to delete the data we have on file, simply get in touch and we will permanently delete your user record.

Are you compliant with the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR)?

Yes. If you have any queries, complaints or suggestions with regards to how we handle personal data, please don't hesitate to get in touch.

Why do you share this data? What is it used for?

Google Analytics and Wistia collate data from individual user sessions to provide an overview of how much the site is being used. We might use Google Analytics to check how many times videos on the site were watched in the last thirty days, for example, or to see how many times students from a particular school have watched videos since the beginning of term.