Well put. There are a multitude of segments within enterprise and it's important to understand which one your startup is targeting.

There's also an API behind the scenes

Love the line:

"LOOK AT THAT CODE! It’s absurd, asinine, just plain awful! …however, it worked!"

It's 6 months of intensive training, where students work 60 hours a week during the training. Total immersion, basically.

be original! While I don't run the program, I know Jim Deters well, and if you email me: bart@fullcontact.com, I can put in a good word.

The guys at gSchool believe strongly that truly learning everything online is really hard. The instructors are world class - IMO that will make all the difference.

I've never heard of gSchool. Maybe I'm out of the loop, but what evidence is there that the instructors are world class?

Also, there are people who have learned everything online. They are out there - thousands- heck- tens of thousands of them on the web. Granted, maybe gSchool will help educate some people who can't learn themselves. To those people the 20k will be worth it.

Nothing will speak more clearly than the results, so I can understand some skepticism.

I'm the lead instructor for gSchool, Jeff Casimir. I've been teaching Ruby since 2005 and started Jumpstart Lab in 2009. I have both more classroom experience (total) and more hours spent teaching these technologies than anyone in the world.

I wish there were dozens or hundreds of people learning these skills by themselves on the web, but it's just not happening fast enough. The talent shortage is the #1 problem facing most small software businesses, and there's no fix in sight. This is just our little contribution.

agree!!!

gSchool is run by Jumpstart Lab (my employer), and we did Hungry Academy for LivingSocial a few months ago. Our client list includes Nasa, Boeing, Sony, BlueBox, LivingSocial, Accenture, and a host of other companies.

I personally am #50 on the Rails Contributors list all-time, so I know a thing or two about Rails. ;).

> To those people the 20k will be worth it.

While there are many people who are able to learn online, there are many that are not. Also, our schedule is just a tad more intense than most autodidacts go for. And the money isn't worth it just for money: it's for cred. I once had a funded startup, and the fact that we went through a YC-like program opened many doors, simply due to social proof. Those who teach themselves have to gain this proof some other way.

It's guaranteed to be at least $60K, but lots of people will likely end up at around $80K. Plus, you can defer a big chunk of the $20K into $199/mo payments.

I suppose that really depends on the screening process to determine how well and prepared, ready for learning, a person is entering the program. There's no guarantee a person will learn how to program as a language, where they may not be able to become fluent in it. This is where the risk is. And sometimes people take longer to learn than others. A program like this would be best IMHO to split into a condensed version and a longer variation.

Yep. The real thing here is the quality of instruction. Really top-notch.

it's treated as a bonus and taxed as such.

yep. we're totally fine with whatever. as long as you disconnect from work.