[itmag]

What are some more... unconventional classes HNers would be interested in taking?

Internet marketing?

Better thinking? Something like this: http://news.ycombinator.org/item?id=3285535

Optimizing communications with the opposite sex if male?

Language hacking? Aka learning languages faster/smarter.

Study hacking? Ie optimizing college, or autodidactic pursuits.

Give me some tips on stuff you would like to learn via an online class.

[tryitnow]

I'd like a class on how to pick which online classes I should take.

Actually, I'm only partially joking. I am guessing that there's just going to be an explosion of these opportunities in a couple of years. I believe in lifelong learning, but this is ridiculous, there's only so many hours in the day.

A class dedicated to teaching people how to plot their own course through all of the educational opportunities that are becoming available would actually be quite valuable.

For example, which courses you take and in which sequence is hard to figure out. Some inputs might be your learning style, your existing knowledge base, your IQ, your available time, whether you're a thinker or a doer, etc, etc.

[officemonkey]

Sounds like you need a course on goal-setting.

I'm all for making an informed decision, but sometimes you just have to go on a whim based on an "I always wanted to take a class like that."

Case in point: Years ago, I was a technical bureaucrat and it was the first job where I had a little extra money. I took a jazz-singing class, primarily because it was close to the office and I liked jazz but didn't know how to play an instrument. I learned how to perform comfortably in front of an audience (if you can scat, you can certainly do a 30-min work presentation.) Best of all, I met my wife in the class.

Two years later I was married and giving presentations/teaching for a living. Not much more money, but much happier.

[itmag]

Crazy idea: a course site that is also a dating site.

Oh, and earmuffs made out of hamburgers.

[officemonkey]

>a course site that is also a dating site.

It's called college.

[itmag]

Yeah, that's a decent idea actually.

May I post it here? http://ideashower.posterous.com

[pault]

This is something that I gave a lot of thought to a few years back when the MIT OCW was a bit of a mess. It would be really cool to be able to track your progress through a "playlist" of online courses (hours of lectures watched, quizes taken, etc). I agree that the availability of these types of courses is going to quickly become unmanageable in the very near future. A site that can successfully gamify this could be fun.

[saurabh]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Systems_thinking

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Design_thinking