Hey Sam, thank you for the feedback.

I'll address each of your points.

"1. You are not an expert in this field, you are self taught, with intermediate skills at best. Unable to teach best practice."

I agree. I am not an expert in this field, nor do I claim to be. I don't trust anyone who self-proclaims expertise.

I consider myself a permanent student.

At this stage, 3-years into learning machine learning, my skills are intermediate at best. However, I now know a lot more than when I started. That's what I teach. For someone who is just starting the in the field, I give them a hand up.

"2. This lack of expertise makes you unqualified to teach machine learning. Not that you can't provide anecdotal experiences and resources but in my opinion until you get formal education in this field, you have no right to teach in it!!!!"

What defines formal education?

If you're talking about a University degree, you're right again, I have no official university degree in machine learning. I created my own AI Masters Degree instead.

Speaking of anecdotes, I have a friend who knows cars inside and out. He's never had any formal education in cars, only discovered his skills through tinkering and years of experimentation.

When I have a question about cars, I ask him.

As the "Skills before certificates" point argues, formal education is typically negative knowledge plus degrees so it balances out.

When I seek knowledge, I look for someone who knows more than me.

"3. You are clearly doing all this to become a "youtube star" and build a personal brand which will hopefully dig you out of the unemployed hole a nutrition degree left you in but can't you just go get a formal education, spend some years in a career to become an expert, and then start teaching?"

Ho ho, you're right again. I did begin all of this to become a "YouTube star" and build a personal brand. To productize myself.

I studied nutrition not seeking employment but to learn about how I could influence my athletic and mental performance. Have you ever tried to tell someone what to eat? It's like telling them what God(s) to believe in…

I switched to code and math because you can't argue with it. It works or it doesn't.

In fact, I'm actively seeking unemployment. I prefer to work for myself.

As for the "go get a formal education, spend some years in a career to become an expert, and then start teaching?"...

You may have missed the timeline at the start of the article:

2017 - 2018: started studying machine learning online through world-class courses.

2018 - 2019: worked as a machine learning engineer at one of Australia's best machine learning companies.

2019 - 2020: started my own business teaching and creating machine learning related materials online.

"I believe you are a net negative on society, teaching people the wrong way to do data science and machine learning."

Net negative hey?

Good gosh, I don't want that. If you have any ideas on how I could improve, I'm listening. You can email me anytime (daniel@mrdbourke.com).

"Also, this market is so congested. We do not need another MOOC or generic half baked course on Data Science. It will potentially just be a massive waste of your time as well because eventually people will not see value in your unqualified videos."

You're right again. The market is congested. There's a lot of materials out there. I've been through many of them.

If my videos have any qualification, it's their filtering effect. To separate the signal from the noise.

I take the best from others, combine it with my knowledge in the field and break down barriers for those looking to get involved.

My goal as a teacher is not as much to tell a student what to do but to get them excited enough to go out and figure it out for themselves. Because after all, that's where the best learning happens.

Again, if you think I can improve in anyway, I'm open for a conversation. Feel free to email me (daniel@mrdbourke.com) or contact me on Telegram (https://t.me/mrdbourke).