Hacker News Reader

"I am not able rightly to apprehend the kind of confusion of ideas that could provoke" people to enroll in a free online course that (presumably) nobody forced them to take and then submit homework done by someone else.

Rather than trying to fight cheating (which is impossible), Coursera should emphasize the point that these courses are not resume busters but for learning.

View on HN

Well, it seems that Coursera business model is either issuing meaningful certificates, or offering other companies potential hires (the latter being what I've understood of Udacity business model). In both cases, the certificate is supposed to mean something.

I've taken several Coursera classes, but I don't mention them in my resume and I only care about the certificates as an incentive to complete the course, but from the very nature on how these classes are graded, it would be very difficult to prevent cheating (or sharing), barring having the exams taken in real-life locations (something that Udacity optionaly provides for some of its courses if I recall correctly).

The point is that Coursera eventually does want their classes to be resume busters

Reply on news.ycombinator.com