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Zed Shaw writes books targeted at new programmers. From my standpoint, he has a financial incentive to not appreciate bootcamps, especially those with ISAs and
by cweagans 7y ago
Zed Shaw writes books targeted at new programmers. From my standpoint, he has a financial incentive to not appreciate bootcamps, especially those with ISAs and similar that don't require up front investment from students because they are cutting into his book sales.
Some of his points are definitely true at some schools, but it's worth taking most of them with a grain of salt.
- glangdale 7y agoDo you think that it's very likely that someone would forgo buying a relatively cheap book in favor of going to a bootcamp? This seems like two very different markets, and I would suspect that many people in the space where they overlap would do both (i.e. buy the book and go to a bootcamp).
- cweagans 7y agoPotentially. They're both marketed to the same audience and they're often sold as no upfront cost, which can be really appealing. It's completely anecdotal, but I know several people that have chosen bootcamps over books and they're much happier for it.
- glangdale 7y ago"Learn Python 3 the Hard Way" on Amazon: "68 used and new from $11.95". New it's essentially $18. I have trouble imagining that anyone who might have wanted to learn from a book would have baulked at a <$US20 purchase. There are plenty of people who don't like learning from books, which is fine, and I'm certainly not denying their existence, but those people wouldn't be in Zed's market anyhow.