How We're Pricing Spooniversity — and Why
Most online education is priced for people who don't have chronic illness. We built something different. Here's how Three Doors works, why we made these choices, and what it means for you.
📓 Archive note (2026-05): This post describes the "Three Doors" pricing model we tried earlier. Spooniversity has since moved to stackable pricing — €19 per course, €59 per pathway, no subscription, you own what you buy. Current pricing lives at /pricing.
Online education has a pricing problem. Most platforms price at market rate — €500, €1,000, €3,000 — and then bolt on a scholarship application for the people who can't afford it. You have to prove your need. You have to click the button that says "I can't pay full price." The shame is built in.
We didn't want to build that. So we built something different.
Three Doors, same room
Spooniversity has one price page. It shows four options. No tiers. No labels. No "regular price" crossed out. Just: here's what it costs, and here's how you can pay.
- →Pay Once: €39. Full track, lifetime access, certificate on completion.
- →Pay at Your Pace: €5/month. Same access. Auto-stops at €39 — eight months, then done. Pause anytime.
- →Contribute: €0. Apply to exchange skills for access — beta testing, accessibility feedback, peer support, translation. Exchange, not charity.
- →Pay It Forward: €59 or €79. Same access as everyone else, plus your extra funds a Contributor's spot.
Every door leads to the same room. The same lessons. The same community. The same certificate. The price you pay doesn't change what you get.
Why €39
We looked at what disability income actually looks like. In the US, SSDI averages about $1,580 per month. UK Universal Credit limited capability is around £390. Hungarian disability support is around €340. €39 is achievable with planning on any of those. It's about one week of US SSDI. It's not painless. But it doesn't require agonising.
Market rate bootcamps charge €3,000 to €5,000 for programmes in this space. Spooniversity is 1% of that. And Code from Bed — our first track — has 120 lessons across four modules, fully built and ready.
Why the Contribute path is exchange, not charity
The zero-cost path requires an application. Not to prove hardship — we don't ask about income, and you don't have to explain anything you don't want to. You apply by saying what you'd contribute: testing the platform, giving accessibility feedback, offering peer support to other students, reviewing translations, helping with content.
Disabled people have expertise. Lived experience is not a lesser kind of knowledge. The Contribute path isn't charity. It's an exchange between people who have different resources to offer.
We cap Contributors at 20% of active students so the model stays sustainable. Monthly review. Flexible minimum — two hours, designed to work on variable-energy months.
Progress never expires
This matters more than the price. You can pay once and take four years to finish. You can pay at your pace, pause when you're crashing, come back when you're ready. There are no deadlines. A flare day is not a failure. A crash month is not a reason to start over.
We built this for people with unpredictable bodies. The structure reflects that. Not as an accommodation. As the design.
This is how pricing worked at the time. Today every course and every certificate is free (see /pricing). Start with BedCamp, free, no signup.