Don't worry, he explicitly says this at the top.
> Don’t get me wrong, I love MOOCs. They’re great for trying to learn a new programming language (e.g., Python, Scala) or framework (e.g., Spark, TensorFlow) or subject (e.g., statistics, machine learning). The structured learning environment, excellent teaching, and exercises (and solutions) guide us through the best way to learn new concepts. > >But most of the time, we don’t really need it. If we already know machine learning, taking that shiny new MOOC won’t help with applying it more effectively.
Students not understanding "why" something is done a certain way is the downfall of countless courses. But unfortunately, more often than not, you're not in a position to understand why people tell you to do X until you've personally done Y.
That's exactly my feeling when I was watching Jon Gjengset's Rust tutorials. I like his real reactions to unexpected problems. Really learned a lot from this kind of lengthy but realistic videos. https://www.youtube.com/c/JonGjengset/featured
For me at least, there is an over-abundance of thickly-accented English-speaking Indian people playing specifically trap music in the background, when it comes to 'good tutorials'. Not by any means a majority, but they punch well above their weight-class. It's so very odd, but they really do know how to guide me on what it is that I need a hand with.
What do I mean? Years ago, I learned to program iOS from the Big Nerd Ranch book. The most important thing I got out of that was learning enough about the Cocoa-Touch framework that I didn't try to fight the framework. You don't get that from JIT learning. How could you?
That said, at the end of the book the authors urged the reader to go and write programs — that that was the only way to learn, after mastering the fundamentals.
A beginner should place his or trust in an expert. The reason is that the big mistake beginners make, not knowing the fundamentals, is convincing themselves way too early that they have now grasped the fundamentals.
I don't think the author and I are at odds. I agree a person can get too comfortable with MOOCs, YouTube courses, etc. But at the start, there is no substitute. And the start lasts longer than you may think.