[anigbrowl]

Actually I'm a bit confused by this one, because this looks nothing different from 100 books you can find at Guitar center (or your local music store) or any of the many introductory lessons to various instruments on YouTube. In fact, there's quite a few excellent private courses on YT with an abundance of free material to get you started, so I'm having difficulty seeing the rationale for this course.

[dombili]

I don't know much about this class, so I can't really say what's the difference between this class and watching a video on YouTube, but I took a couple of courses on Coursera and I have to say, there's a big difference (generally speaking). I'm not an MOOC expert, but some differences that I've noticed from my experiences:

- You can engage with people who want to learn the same thing as you do via discussion forums. Those people are basically your class mates. You have the same teacher, same assignments, you get to watch the same lectures etc. If you have a question you'd like to ask, you get to ask those questions to your class mates and you can have discussions on that very subject. Sometimes teachers get involved too and if they don't, you can ask them to get involved.

- Teachers provide course materials. Some of them are transcripts of video lectures but some of them contain some really good information that you probably can't find anywhere else, because they're mostly written by your teacher specifically for that class.

- Sense of accomplishment. Now this may differ from person to person, but it's nice to get some acknowledgment once you finish your course.

- Quizzes. You actually get to test your knowledge. If the course requires an assignment for you to finish the course, that's even better. For example, you take a class on International Law, you may be required to write an essay on the subject with X amount of word limit. They give you a hard deadline and that becomes your homework. You actually feel like you're a student. Plus, teachers actually read what you've written and some of them even give notes.

- You can get verified certificate, but I believe they announced that fairly early and I'm not exactly sure how that works. But seems self-explanatory.

- And the best thing is, I get to have all these things for free. I'm thousands of miles away from the US or the UK, but I can still take classes from Princeton University or University of Edinburgh, and that's just so cool. I realize the quality of education is not the same as taking an actual class by attending the school, but who cares? You watch the same lectures from the same professors (most of the time) and it's for free, in the comfort of my home and at my own convenience.

[DrewDev]

I'm sorry, but by that logic there would seem to be little rationale for any of the courses on Coursera. As someone who has dabbled in myriad mooc offerings let me point out that signing up for a multi-week course that follows a syllabus that's been thought through by someone who actually makes a living teaching at an institutional level with regular assignments and quizzes as reinforcement tools, it's a format of learning that's proved to be pretty successful. Is it the only way to learn something? No. But I for one think it's great that Coursera is branching into other subject areas.

And by the way, can you please explain how a video on youtube is a "private course"? I'm also having trouble understanding the relevance of this abundance of free material you speak of - last I checked, Coursera courses don't cost money...

[anigbrowl]

I meant private courses that also publish some free material to YouTube. Just go to that site and search for 'guitar lessons' and you'll see many videos that link to structured offerings, both free and paid-for.

I know perfectly well what MOOCs are and what the attraction is. I'm pointing out that I don't see anything especially distinctive or valuable about this particular offering; rather it seems to lower the bar somewhat, by offering rather less than existing alternatives.

Put another way, enrolling in a MOOC is an excellent way to participate in a course that might not otherwise be accessible for reasons of cost or geography. There's great value in learning about Machine Learning from professors at Stanford or economics from the University of Chicago or (fill in your own example here). But it's not hard to find lessons in things like playing the guitar. And because playing music is so interactive and performance-oriented as opposed to abstract and cerebral, I actually think most people would be rather better off studying it with a real person than by enrolling in a MOOC. Even if one doesn't want to do that, this particular Coursera offering looks worse than existing internet resources for musical instruction.

[DrewDev]

Well, I tried that. I had to click through four videos before finding one that actually linked to any external site of "lessons". Once I did find it, it linked me here: http://www.guitarjamz.com/ytblues/

You've got to be kidding me. Surely, you actually have some real examples of learning guitar online that actually do compete, even a little, with what Coursera is offering.

[oblique63]

There are some rather poor 'lessons' out there, but the best ones I've found anywhere, have been from Pebber Brown's youtube channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/pebberbrown/videos?view=0

and his site, which has all the materials and lessons organized, albeit straight from 1995: http://www.pbguitarstudio.com/GuitarVideoLessons.html

(Also note, that this guy is the very instructor that taught Buckethead. If that doesn't serve as a legit teaching credential, I don't know what does.)

[anigbrowl]

Wow, that's pretty awesome.

[rimantas]

Take a look at http://justinguitar.com/ Justin offers a lot.

[anigbrowl]

I have a very hard time believing that you're not able to find any kind of structured guitar lessons via YouTube. I play bass* and I've found it to be awash in quality resources, but I'll take your word for it that it's a complete wasteland for guitar players.

Well, I don't want to seem to be promoting any commercial courses, but here's a good free one - which, incidentally, was the top web result for a search on 'guitar lessons'. http://youtubeguitarlessons.net/

* very very badly