Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Coursera to combine with Udemy

investor.coursera.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

151–160 of 395 posts

Re: Coursera to combine with Udemy

#151

Post by dijit »

oceansky wrote: post #148
ravenstine wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Modern society totally devalues anything considered even slightly old. I used to notice it as a real lack of intergenerational knowledge transfer, but it's gotten so bad that it seems like more and more people react with "how do you know so much?" and "why would you do that?" over very basic knowledge that isn't even that old. For all the reading the average person claims to do, they sure don't seem to know very much…

Can you give specific examples on lost knowledge?

“why is I/O in docker slow, and how would you improve it” is pretty esoteric knowledge now, but would have been considered basic knowledge (for other applications, not specifically just docker) only 12 years ago.

I have had people working who don’t in the slightest understand how a filesystem works, so taking it a step further is impossible.

When I tune things I am asked how I know, but everything is just built from the basics, and the basics don’t make you feel productive, so they’re always skipped when possible.

Re: Coursera to combine with Udemy

#152

Post by bigstrat2003 »

sharadov wrote: post #35

Both have garbage content at this point - Coursera was great when they launched, top quality material and university-level instruction. Now it's just bottom of the barrel scraps. YT has tons of quality instruction - hell nowadays I just ask an LLM to make me a course for whatever I wanna learn.

> nowadays I just ask an LLM to make me a course for whatever I wanna learn.

That is an excellent way to trick yourself into thinking that you learned, when really you got fed bad information. LLMs are nowhere near reliable enough to use for this topic and probably never will be.

Re: Coursera to combine with Udemy

#153

Post by bigstrat2003 »

IshKebab wrote: post #141
shaky-carrousel wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep, now there are way more sophisticated. Same amount, though.

Nah they have definitely reduced massively. I suspect that's just because as models get more powerful their answers are just more likely to be true rather than hallucinations. I don't think anyone has found any new techniques to prevent them. But maybe we don't need that anyway if models just get so good that they naturally don't hallucinate much.

They haven't reduced one bit in my experience.

Re: Coursera to combine with Udemy

#154

Post by breadsniffer »

XenophileJKO wrote: post #48
cheriot wrote: post #23

Udemy figured out that selling to enterprise is way more profitable than individuals. Coursera figured out that University/Company brand is more valuable than Joe's Ultimate Course. But in the last couple years both have been horribly run. Hopefully the AI threat lights a fire. I suspect a well designed course with some context engineering can become far better than ChatGPT by itself.

I think that window is closing pretty fast. Models can currently construct pretty good learning material by themselves. I setup a project using claude code as the agent that researches and constructs learning material and lessons. The primary limitation right now is "time".. it takes time to do all the research, so it kind of has to be an async process.

can you expand on your workflow?

Re: Coursera to combine with Udemy

#155

Post by bigstrat2003 »

zhyder wrote: post #122

End of an era: video (with broadband Internet penetration) was the best tool we had for 15+ years. But LLMs are now good enough, including in image+infographic generation and factuality (especially when grounding resources are provided... which is where human experts still matter). I think video is now better only for learning physical hands-on skills... and those videos tend to be on YouTube rather than on Udemy or…

LLMs are not remotely good enough to use as a learning tool. They still make shit up a ton of the time, and you can only catch it if you already know the material (so, not useful for learning). They probably never will be useful for learning, since even after all this time hallucinations are still just as bad as they ever were.

Re: Coursera to combine with Udemy

#156

Post by bossyTeacher »

p-e-w wrote: post #11
zigman1 wrote: post #5

Interesting, can this be an expected outcome of AI adoption? Mergers of big competitors?

Seems to be the expected outcome of everything, in every industry, for the past 10 years or so.

Makes you wonder what happens when all that is left is a single national company and a couple of ever struggling businesses

Re: Coursera to combine with Udemy

#157

Post by okibry »

dijit wrote: post #151
oceansky wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you give specific examples on lost knowledge?

“why is I/O in docker slow, and how would you improve it” is pretty esoteric knowledge now, but would have been considered basic knowledge (for other applications, not specifically just docker) only 12 years ago. I have had people working who don’t in the slightest understand how a filesystem works, so taking it a step further is impossible. When I tune things I am asked how I know, but everything is just built from…

Maybe in today, it has too many wrapper layer so the basic become deeper.

Re: Coursera to combine with Udemy

#158

Post by johnwheeler »

ziml77 wrote: post #137
nkmnz wrote: post #114

Udemy never sold knowledge. They are selling that feeling of a new beginning, of a better future, of FINALLY doing (buying!!!) that course you always wanted to finish. 50% of buyers don't even finish the first video.

It's so true. Buying them is an easy way to feel good in the moment and it's easy to tell yourself that you'll do the courses later. I bought a handful before realizing what was happening. I haven't done it since then and I definitely need to consciously override any temptations. I'm sure some people are disciplined enough to learn from it, but there's no way that's the norm.

Sounds like my bookshelf

Re: Coursera to combine with Udemy

#159

Post by bpt3 »

bdangubic wrote: post #109
bpt3 wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are faster, but I don't see how they are vastly superior to a course designed and offered by a subject matter expert in the field.

they have been trained on material not just by single subject matter expert but all of them :)

They have not, because a large portion of the knowledge obtained by subject matter experts in any given field has never been published.

Also, hallucinations are still a thing, and there's a reason why LLMs do not outperform subject matter experts in nearly every field.

Re: Coursera to combine with Udemy

#160

Post by bpt3 »

moralestapia wrote: post #125
bpt3 wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are faster, but I don't see how they are vastly superior to a course designed and offered by a subject matter expert in the field.

You can't beat a Caltech-tier lecture, for sure. But you know many people have access to that? You do know. Thousands, and I'm being generous. LLMs level the playing field for the other 8 billion people. Reminds of this article[1] that was featured yesterday and which I think was great! 1: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46254794

In addition to the content available on the platforms we're discussing here (Coursera and Udemy), you have things like:

https://ocw.mit.edu/

https://onlineeducation.caltech.edu/courses/certificate-gran...

Post reply on HN