I realize what Lynda courses are like and have done some in the past which is why I mentioned the "learn how to do x" concept in my post. Other non-traditional MOOC services offered by non-college institutions have a lot of programs mirroring or closely resembling the Lynda approach. There's also zero reason why Coursera and the like would not be able to pivot into this area.
My impression has been that Coursera is really about applying Socrate's (or is it Aristotle's) dream: free classical education for all.
Learning about Final Cut Pro is great, but getting classes on general machine learning ( at least ones that are worth more than a 2000 word blog post) generally require going to a school with a 5 digit price tag. I think Coursera and Lynda aren't trying to compete with each other on that end.
