Shiny Poll: Are online courses as good as the real thing?

An opinion piece in the New York Times suggests that online uni courses just aren’t as good as the real thing.

In this age of soaring tuition fees, getting your tutoring for cheap over your wifi connection seems a sensible option to be considering, saving you thousands of pounds each year.

Have you tried one? Considering it? What do you think?

PROS:
– you can do any course in the world, no need to be near the university
– much cheaper than conventional courses
– no travel costs
– it fits in around your life, you can do it when it suits you

CONS:
– hard to motivate when it’s just you and a computer – suddenly facebook gets really interesting
– less feedback from tutors
– less interaction with other students
– do you learn less with just computer interaction?