[AretNCarlsen]

In the vein of "nobody ever got fired for buying IBM", no teacher ever got fired for storing all of their students' data locally, whether on a personal PC or a physical gradebook. I have worked with businesses that do not want to store data in the cloud (Amazon, Salesforce, etc) if the data is at all confidential. They have a point: the risks of local data storage are serious but intuitive, whereas the average person has only your word regarding the safety of the cloud. And teachers, like doctors and bankers, have auditors that they would have to persuade to accept the new technology.

I would not be surprised if the post mortem reveals that some teachers brought this app up with their administrators, who responded, "That app would be handy for you, but if there is theft or corruption of your students' data, how would we defend ourselves in the ensuing lawsuits? 'The developer seemed reliable?'"

[jcampbell1]

I make my living selling software to teachers, and the privacy issue comes up about 1 in 20 sales. It is an issue, but not a deal breaker. If a teacher has an online grade book they can share with parents, and it gets results, then teachers will buy the software.

Irrational lawsuit paranoia is a real problem, but it is not the reason this product failed.