Social: IRC, message boards, facebook, google+, skype, mumble, news groups, facetime, instant messenger, etc.
Try to teach someone something: Stack Overflow, reddit, hacker news, your own blog, also, all of the above under social.
Collaboration: google docs, drop box, ftp, gliffy.
Despite being a programmer my whole life, I'm taking the Udacity 101 course because you never know how another person's experience with the basics might change your understanding.
Also, is programming a skill that really requires a social element for learning? I've definitely had a lot of fun programming in social settings and in groups, but a lot of the skill is built in the hours of isolation with your fingers on the keyboard.
Secondly, I think reducing my point to 'argle bargle...social' is a little unfair.
This may just be coming from my psyche as someone who has been in a fairly lonely job with few peers, but one of the best things about going to college was getting to know smart and interesting people.(On the other hand, learning to deal with people who have difficult personalities was also useful).
To really get to know someone you have to be in a community with them. I'm not sure that 'social solutions' on the internet would really fulfill this need. They are all the things that you do to kind of numb yourself at the end of the day so you can sleep... there isn't really an intention to engage.
It's not like he's popular for being snooki's best friend or something .. I feel Peter Norvig is a celebrity for the right reasons here.. there are two types of teachers - those who get you to see the world in interesting ways, and those who illuminate targets that one wouldn't hit normally on one's own. I'm guessing Norvig's course might be more of the latter type..
> .. but one of the best things about going to college was getting to know smart and interesting people personally, I feel 'getting to know' is not enough. As math ematicians/scientists or techies or programmers, our peer group /culture is our identity, and pretty much the main reason we wake up in the morning and check email for patch updates or stay up till 5 running code and what not. yep, online courses don't give that. And I too badly feel the need for it
tl;dr first point - disagree, second point - agree edit:formatting
Regarding your need for community or social learning, there is nothing preventing you from watching these lectures with a group of actual people.
Perter Norvig is a celebrity because of his technical accomplishments and teaching prowess. He is the author of PAIP which is regarded as one of the best books on programming. If you haven't already, check out his articles:
http://norvig.com/lispy.html http://norvig.com/spell-correct.html http://norvig.com/sudoku.html
So yes, when someone of Norvig's caliber wants to teach me something, social be fucked, I settle down and listen.