How MOOC Faculty Exploit People's Desire To Learn 115
RichDiesal writes "Just as businesses try to make something off of massively online open courses (MOOCs), so do the faculty running them. But instead of seeking money, MOOC faculty seek something far more valuable: a cheap source of data for social science research. Unfortunately, the rights of research participants are sometimes ignored in MOOCs, and successful completion of courses are sometimes held hostage in exchange for mandatory participation in research, as in this case study of a Coursera MOOC. Such behavior is not tolerated in "real" college courses, so why is it tolerated in MOOCs taught by the same faculty?"
Re:Happens in real classes too (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Sounds . . . (Score:4, Informative)
Sounds like somebody has an axe to grind
He writes and sells books - http://www.amazon.com/Step-Step-Introduction-Statistics-Business/dp/1446208214
MOOC's bypass the need for the books he sells.
Re:Sounds . . . (Score:5, Informative)
Good. Grind it to a fine edge and cut these fraudulent mofos down. MOOCs in general are 90% scam, nothing more than taking the old idea of a correspondence course and adding the phrase "...on the inernet!", and this one specifically is clearly engaging in unethical behavior: