[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