Codecademy Surges To 200,000 Users, 2.1 Million Lessons Completed In 72 Hours

I pointed my younger sister at this the other night. She's 17, and I'd tried to interest her in programming before with no avail. She seems to have caught on to this, though, and it's something I'm extremely happy about. It's not that I think that she'll ever become a hardcode graphics programmer, but I think it's fantastic that she even has a basic understanding now.<p>The only criticism I've had from her is that she doesn't know what to do with what she's learned. Maybe some suggestions on some basic examples might be good? (say, "Try writing a loop that averages these numbers," or a grade calculator).<p>Thanks so much for this - I believe that everyone should know how to program in the same way that I believe everyone should know how to read or do arithmetic. It's another form of literacy, and codecademy is definitely a big step towards much better understanding of programming (edit: that is, for the general public), and hopefully less social stigma and the like as a result of that.

&#62; Sims also says that the company is actually a part of the latest Y Combinator batch (something they hadn’t previously disclosed).<p>I love them for that. Having their product loved (here and elsewhere) based on the product <i>not</i> the connections they have. Awesome.

Thanks to everyone in the Hacker News community for being so supportive and providing feedback on our launch. We really appreciate it! As always, if you have any issues, shoot me an email - contact (at) codecademy (dot) com. -Zach<p>EDIT: I'll be back on HN in a bit to answer questions but the next few hours are a little busy. Thanks again.

I've been around programming pretty much all of my life as an spectator (my brother can code and well I'm a product guy so I'm around coders every day). I never quite got the grasp of it and programming seem like this huge abstract thing. Never got myself to take action in learning because frankly I just dismissed it as being to complicated but deep down I always wanted to be able to code.<p>I completed code academy in one hour. WOW. Now I'm hooked.<p>I'm actually so hooked that I looked more resources on learning JavaScript. I'm reading this: <a href="http://eloquentjavascript.net/index.html" rel="nofollow">http://eloquentjavascript.net/index.html</a> (found it via a Google Search in StackOverflow)<p>I can't wait for more lessons. Thanks so much for this!<p>Note: there were a couple of lessons were I did need to ask my devs for help because there were some concepts that were missing. Once explained to me, I was able to complete the lessons.

Not that i don't like this approach, it think it's a good way to give regular people a impression what programming is.<p>I did the fist Chapter of programming books in over 10 different languages and it always felt good. What comes after that is the problem, the ones where you have to really think and it just doesn't work on the second try.<p>I know this from college, the first two lessons nobody is complaining and then it starts to really freak out the people who didn't know before what programming really is.<p>When you find a way to let people deal with this phase, than you really did accomplish something that makes a difference.

As a non-programmer, I absolutely love this. I was able to complete two courses within 10 minutes.<p>More than anything, this makes programming seem like FUN.<p>Well done and kudos to the Codecademy team!

"it clearly has loads of potential for one key reason: it actually feels fun."<p>This is an excellent example of Programmed Instruction. Most of us probably learned typing the same way, and maybe even Logo. The reason this approach is good is because, in addition to being fun, it's also compatible with the Keller Plan:<p><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keller_Plan" rel="nofollow">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keller_Plan</a><p>Granted you can get only so far with this approach, but it's still terribly underused in the current scheme of things.

I'm interested in Codecademy's marketing; how did they accumulate so many active users in 72 hours?

Great App! I thought the lessons were well commented and laid out. One trick, instead of bulking up with more features, it to lay out more lessons and publish a system for letting us know when they're available. For me it would be more useful if the lessons came in similar large blocks/iterations with a predefined goal of "by taking these lessons you will learn X". Anyhow, great work!

When I saw Codecademy I was quite impressed and I truly enjoyed it, even though it was extremely basic for me. It was actually really fun, remembering what it was like when I first started learning I WISH there was a site like this. I am so happy that this site was released and that I was turned on to it.<p>My question is when will we start to see more lessons/courses? Will they stay at a beginner level or get more advanced? Will there be some sort of discussion/forum section to the site? And lastly, do you feel there will ever be an article/paper section to the site (Such as a section where submitted papers, tutorials, articles, etc are posted when approved by the main staff at Codecademy)?<p>All in all, great job guys! Love the site.

<i>Sims also says that the company is actually a part of the latest Y Combinator batch (something they hadn’t previously disclosed).</i><p>I was hoping they would be picked up by YC... looks like it already happened :~)

Is that web site strictly for absolute beginners? I find it a petty that I can't skip the beginner lessons to try to learn something more advanced.

Alright, loaded question. Can/will this work with other languages? I guess a related question is, does it have to? The only thing the YC note tells me is this wants to be a real business, so the big question is, what's the model?<p>Edit: By the way, love the site. For JavaScript, this is a huge leap forward. I'd love it to be the same for other languages, I'm just curious if that's possible.

The "_why" post led me over to TryRuby.org which looks like it may have been inspiration. The thing I noticed was how much I prferred TryRuby's layout. It seems like the CodeAcademy instructions are overwhelmed by other screen elements and awkwardly placed lower left of the console.<p>I also think you could let people type more a la Learn * The Hard Way.<p>But really like where you're going.

I showed this go my colleagues at work yesterday. They want me to teach them how to program (well, write VBA) but I kind of feared for them since they have very little free time to devote. And it took me a massive investment of time upfront to get into programming, although I didn't have access to a resource like codecademy.

I wonder if this service will become more of a business or a non-profit. I feel that this site is providing a great public good, akin to Khan Academy, and it would be great if donations could cover the costs of further developing the site. That way, price is not a deterrent to any users getting started with learning to code.

Non-technical people looking for technical cofounders no longer have an excuse not to learn how to code ;)

10 minutes in and I can say this is a great website! I hope it has the depth to match. Great work Zach!

At first I only took it as a "me-too" to Khan Academy, but it really isn't. It definitely takes away some great features in KA, but it's defined differently in the sense that the design reflects the web industry rather than how a typical course would teach.

What where you guys working on before this and how did this idea start from?

I actually started working on an idea like this back in January but never went anywhere with it. These guys have made something very tough look incredibly easy.<p>Honestly, very well done!

Weird. Several portions I'd completed before displayed "in progress" today. I just went back and re-did them to see if they were new. I don't think the were.

I can see this fitting really well with Khan Academy. I wonder if the two have talked at all.<p>Congrats on the success guys, the site is awesome.

Brilliant but weak. Doesn't belong on Hacker News, should be on n00b news.

Very nicely done. I enjoyed going through the exercises and it was fun.

Congratulations! It's a great site, you deserve the praise.

Seriously, WOW!

Now that's impressive.