I read something where the goal is to mimic the offline community of students at a real university. By having a large group of people all taking the class at th

I read something where the goal is to mimic the offline community of students at a real university. By having a large group of people all taking the class at the same time, you maximize the chances that if someone asks a question on the forum, someone else who's at the same point in the class will come across it and be able to answer it.