Speaker Profile: Robert Zimmerman

Robert Zimmerman is a coder, web innovator, illustrator and game designer, and the creator of ClassJump.com, a provider of free websites to teachers world-wide. He is also the founder of Drawger.com, a social networking site and blog spot  for professional illustrators, illoz.com, which is a portfolio site for illustrators, sites available by invitation only, and Edgeofit.com – which provides free websites to visual art schools, and a personal mentoring program for students who wish to be trained by working professionals (work still in progress).

Zimmerman was once a personal assistant to children’s author Mercer Mayer, and drew a bunch of his books for him while he smoked his pipe.

TEDxAsheville Topic

How do you improve the lives of 100,000 or more people, with no real plan and no money? In my case, it was just a matter of realizing I wanted something myself that didn’t exist already. What I wanted was a place where I could quickly check online if my children had homework. When I realized that no such place really existed, I figured there must be a lot of people like myself who would like to have the same thing, so I decided to make it myself.

The idea was simple, make something good for a good reason. I want to encourage others to do exactly the same thing. You do not need a staff (ClassJump has none), you do not need a support line (ClassJump has no phone number), you do not need a board (ClassJump has no board), you do not need promotional dollars or even a marketing plan. All you need is a single idea and a willingness to act on that idea. What I’ve discovered is that if you build it, they actually will come.

TEDxAsheville: What’s up with the photo?

RZ: Ah yes, people always ask for [a photo].  And [this] is what they get. What it means: It’s not about me and I’m not at all interested in credit.

Video

Soni Pitts, a TEDxAsheville Organizer

This event is not being organized by the TED conferences — this is an independently organized TED event.