I don't want to discount the existing resources out there either. One of the first things we have students do is start out with some reading material, and Begin

I don't want to discount the existing resources out there either. One of the first things we have students do is start out with some reading material, and Beginning Ruby is one of them. We'll also be recommending Michael Hartl and Zed Shaw's materials if they're relevant to the student's goals. We move them at a much faster pace than they would push themselves, and we're also there to help if they get stuck or don't understand something. I think lots of models can work, but we tried what we saw as the holy grail of "we'll deploy on your behalf, build the editor, and structure the guide" model and keeping the user in the browser just doesn't work.