I think back in the Soviet-influenced days of my country, people went to college knowing which job they'll be assigned at graduation. I guess this is the modern day PTUs? [1]
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Professional_technical_school
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Professional_technical_school
My issue is that this stuff now pretends to substitute for colleges which is totally different category. Six months of youtube videos are just professional training for office workers of the disposable type, not the creative/problem-solving variety that needs broad understanding of the field.
On the other hand, I feel like there are plenty of people who have either graduated with a humanities degree or simply do not have the ability to go to a good technical school: I would hope that this provides a new on-ramp for people like that, and it actually adds value to people’s lives. Even though as most people here have stipulated, this seems commercially motivated by Google’s interests.
Yes, such courses might be useful to fill in gaps in one's education, but it can't substitute said education. Low-quality tech graduates might profit, but humanities graduates won't become decent developers, at least not without continuous training for years which might take as long as a second degree.