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...yes. I think it sort of undermines his point. Because people might not care about drinking Coke or Pepsi, but lots of people would pick a brand name cola above a generic one.

The same with colleges: you could go to Harvard, Yale, Penn, MIT...one of dozens of highly respected colleges and have a fantastic time. Like Coke and Pepsi, it's much of a muchness. But the next tier down - the 'generic colas' of university education, if you will - that's a little different. Not bad, per se - just different.

The analogy doesn't really help the argument, either. "Here are two companies that are massively successful primarily because of branding. So, clearly, the even more significant branding of higher education will be unsuccessful."

Yeah it's a little odd to compare them considering universities vary so widely from one another in a variety of facets whereas Coke and Pepsi have significant similarities. Furthermore, the implications of which university one attends is vastly different than choosing a soft drink.