Stephen Downes

Curt Bonk summarizes some of the work from a journal article on the subject (unfortunately he doesn't offer a link or even a title for the article) about whether people make friends in MOOCs. He seems to focus on whether instructors make friends, which seems to me to be totally beside the point - I would be looking for MOOC participants to make friends with each other. Anyhow, here is the line of thinking: "Giving away one's writing is one way to generate new friendships. Giving course design feedback is another. So is offering a free massive course. In terms of MOOCs, I think that the number of friendships made relate to the type or form of MOOC that you design. Is it an xMOOC (more traditional instructor led) or a cMOOC (more community and participant driven) or pMOOC (more project or product based) or some other type?"