Udemy

How sad I am to hear this news.   You are such a gifted and eloquent facilitator: measured with every word yet simultaneously full of heart.   What luck has fallen upon those who are to host you at your next port of call.   Thank you for the way you have communicated with me.   I wish you joy and success.   Paul ... View more

@ChrystieV    I understand and appreciate your response.   However, Adobe Forums meet a need by providing actionable definitive answers to software users. A contributor rarely needs to post a reply that diverts a user to Adobe Support. That is because the Forums remain highly populated with users who have in-depth knowledge of how to use Adobe Applications. We cannot meaningfully compare that to the Udemy Forum because members of this community, including the Community Managers and Champions, are, by their admission, often unable to substantively answer individual queries. Another comparison might be the Google Webmaster Forums. When I was a member of those Forums some years ago, experienced Webmasters who did not work for Google and had no access to their internal policies provided advice to those seeking to maximize their SEO. However, they also had some Google Staff who monitored the Forums and stepped in with definitive answers when non-employee contributors needed more inside knowledge to answer posts. By contrast, this Forum has absolutely no contribution from any Udemy representative knowledgeable about policies, protocols, guidelines, or technicalities. As with most life domains, the victims of this deficit are the poorest and most vulnerable. Novice instructors struggling hard to penetrate the Udemy Market come to the Forum hoping for clarity, often already frustrated by the template-based responses from Support. Community Managers often tell them this is not an escalation channel for Support. So far, I have not seen a Community Manager explain how an Instructor can escalate their inquiry. Sometimes, a Community Manager contradicts the claim by telling an Instructor they have forwarded their inquiry to the Udemy Support Team, offering to get back to the Instructor upon receiving a reply. Yet, it remains a mystery why sometimes Community Managers retort with the stock reminder that the Forum is not a channel for escalation and other times expedite a forwarding process. Furthermore, it seems equally dependent upon a pot of poorly defined luck whether or not an Instructor receives a reply following the forwarding process. Consequently, Instructors cannot come to the Forum and find threads containing a reliably definitive response on behalf of Udemy. You might argue that they can find the official line in the Support Articles. However, notwithstanding those who come here before mustering the effort to read them, the Support Articles often fail to provide answers which is why Instructors come here in the first place. I am not suggesting that this Forum or its Managers and Champions fail to meet some of the needs expressed by Instructors. I am not criticizing their work or their person. And I am grateful for the assistance I have received since joining the Forum. I am suggesting that the absence of contributions from Udemy Staff able to analyze and respond to issues of policies, protocols, guidelines, and technicalities,  in the context of individual cases, including Udemy for Business, Personal Subscription, and the Marketplace renders the Forum of very little use for those seeking to make their way through the often intimidating maze of course publication and promotion. It would make little difference if the Community Managers resigned from Udemy and joined Community Champions to start a Forum offsite on a private domain, invited Instructors to join, and sent them back to Udemy Support for answers to questions beyond their knowledge. Furthermore, it may provide a better experience because they could redefine the permissible parameters of self-expression without corporate constraint. How does it benefit the user that this Forum is Udemy owned and hosted? What is its value proposition that any Champion could not swiftly and efficiently duplicate and exceed? The answer to that question ought to be that as a Udemy-owned and hosted community, it can provide definitive and authoritative official answers to queries that help Instructors move forward with confidence. I would like to know if anyone could proffer that answer in confidence. Therefore, if you start a new section, it should be an indexed, searchable group managed by representatives of Udemy, who can respond definitively to issues. Then, instead of sending Instructors back to the Support channel that has failed to answer their queries in the first place, Community Managers and Champions could escalate them here, flagging them for an official support response, which would be transparent and available to everyone. Over time this would also reduce the load on Support and limit the repetitious circuitry that bounces Instructors from Support to Forum to Support. Unless this happens, I see little longevity in the Forum. ... View more

@ChrystieV    I think the idea of segregating Instructors by any criteria - especially one based on enrollment numbers - is antisocial and could turn the Forum from a barley used amplifier of frustration into virtual extinction. I certainly would cease to contribute on principal.   In my opinion, the team should be concentrating on expanding inclusivity, not implementing exclusivity. Furthermore, are there really enough high enrollment Instructors here to populate this exclusive section?   The  fact remains that questions often go unanswered on this Forum, while instructors consistently express dissatisfaction with the same issues, particularly the lack of connection between the Forum and the official Udemy support team. Meanwhile, a depressingly low percentage of Instructors take part.   Surely that is where your attention should be.   And if you really must create a new section of the Forum, then create one where Instructors can communicate with support staff to get definitive responses to the issues obstructing their progress.   The time spent asking us questions, and conceiving of further sections to add, could be spent responding more substantively to the questions we are asking you.   Over and over again, Instructors come here with an issue, only to be told that the Forum is not a Support Escalation channel. Yet, sometimes, a Community Manager will 'escalate' an issue, and forward it on for attention.   Other times, a Community Manager will offer to investigate an issue, but then never actually return with an answer.   Meanwhile, repeatedly, Instructors complain at the template-based responses received from support and Trust and Safety.   Meanwhile, a tiny few successful instructors, like @LawrenceMMiller,  @MichaelPog and @SharonRamel  have given significant amounts of time to posting responses. Take those people away and the Forum would be one big - or rather small - echo chamber.   @AHardinis right when he says:   With over 74k Udemy instructors, I'd say that easily less than 1% actively engage in the Udemy Instructor Community on a regular basis. I don't think adding more sub-groups will increase participation, unless Udemy is actively and regularly engaging instructors outside of the community to entice them to check it out and participate in the discussions.   ... View more

I do not understand what purpose this would serve. It would simply distribute the posts of a sparse community population across further sections. I would prefer the team to invest time in attracting participation from other Instructors, and improving the relationship between Peer-to-Peer discussion and direct official responses from Udemy Support. More sub-groups seem as irrelevant as the Rankings.   ... View more

Our Content Strategy teams have developed this list by using several factors, including Udemy Business collection strategy and current offering, market trends, industry research, competitor offerings, and customer demand (demand is measured, in part, by search demand and customer requests). What on earth does that mean? I cannot believe that I am the only person to read that as lacking any actionable information. It is just jargon that one might might use when seeking to appear helpful while actually intending to withhold information.     ... View more

@Bella  I have to agree with @Anonymous    All the risk is with the Instructors and the 'walled garden' metaphor could not be more appropriate. ... View more

@Bella    Following on from what @Anonymous asked, I have a question.   One of the topics on the list is Mindful Stress Management.   This is what I don't understand. I have a course on that subject with a Highest Rated badge. It is a long standing course. But it has not been put into the Business Catalogue. To be clear: I am not complaining. Rather, I am expanding on the point raised by @Anonymous  If I already have a highest rated course on a High Priority Business Topic that has not been selected, where do I gather the confidence to put a lot of work into new topic. The selection process seems so obfuscated to me. ... View more

@Bella    Hi Bella I have noticed the badge on some instructors' profile pages. It is very inspiring to have such a position to aspire to. However, there appears to be no way at all to search for such instructors and no list of them anywhere. So for example, it is not possible to look at their courses, or see how many there are in each subject discipline. Is there a reason for this? And if not, could you make it easier for us to see the members of the program. Thank you. ... View more

@ThomasMitchell    Do you have any sense regarding why Udemy would choose to advertise programs provided by another Platform, when they have already declined interest in acquiring accreditation for their own Instructors' programs. It seems bizarre to me. ... View more

@MichaelPog, @LawrenceMMiller @ScottDuffy @SharonRamel @Thor  Hope you don't mind me tagging you here, based on your interest in and contribution to subjects previously.   This post by @Bella about the 'partnership' with Emiritus, outlined here has seemingly either gone unnoticed, or failed to attract responses, and that seems unusual for such a development.         ... View more

@Bella  Hi Bella,   So, from the Article, it seems that this is not designed to sell students more Udemy courses, but to direct them to Emeritus Courses. Is that right? And Udemy will receive some kind of commission from Emeritus, when a student signs up as a result of an Advertisement placed on the Udemy site. Is that right? This commission will provide a further revenue stream for Udemy. Basically, click through ad revenue. But what is not so clear from the Article is where Udemy might go with this. Are you suggesting that if Students show interest, then Udemy might look to provide courses with University recognition? Or are you suggesting that Udemy may broaden their advertising to place ads for other organizations on the platform? I don't understand the 'Partnership' aspect. What makes this more than simply Udemy opening up its platform to ads for other platforms. I would like to understand this but the information in the Article seems vague. Many thanks. ... View more

@BellaI don't really have any further details. I just wanted to urge instructors to check out their accounts. ... View more

@ChrystieV  It seems you logged in to this thread. Answered a post about a logo just below my third request for the same input. Then ignored that request and logged out. One minute you offer me a Zoom call. The next you totally ignore me. So here we go for a fourth time. Please update the thread pertaining to bogus accreditation so that all the instructors who gave significant amounts of time and thought to that issue are afforded an opportunity to know where things stand. @Bella  What is your role here. Is it not appropriate for you to answer posts that clearly remain without response? Let me try you. Could you go to the Accreditation thread and provide an update regarding the status of that issue if you colleague @ChrystieV has no intention of doing so. Thank you. ... View more

@ChrystieV    1. For the third time, will you please go to the bogus Accreditation thread and explain to all those instructors who devoted considerable time to that conversation that, not only has no action been taken, but the investigation has not even been scheduled, which may take a year. To withhold that information seems to be a scorching example of how Udemy claims to care about Instructors' concerns while simultaneously ignoring them. Had I not raised this issue again, would Udemy have left the thread in its falsely tagged 'Resolved' state, perhaps in the hope that people such as @LawrenceMMiller, @ElizabethHeck, @SharonRamel, and @Anonymous would forget about it.   2. Thank you for offering to conduct a Zoom conversation with me. However, I am not comfortable with that at the moment for the following reasons. A. You are not short of feedback about Instructor experience. The forum testifies to that. The shortfall is in the substantive response to that experience from Udemy. B. If you want to ask specific questions about my experience, surely it is more respectful to the community to do that in writing here, where it can be witnessed by everyone, without risk of loss in translation. What can be said and documented on Zoom that cannot be more eloquently and incontrovertibly articulated here? Notwithstanding, I appreciate the offer.   Again, please attend to the bogus accreditation thread. Thank you. ... View more

@ChrystieV    1. What does 'hopping on a call' mean? ('...I’m 100% open to hopping on a call with you to hear your suggestions'). The phrase means nothing to me.   2. Could you please update the thread on accreditation to let Instructors know that this has not even been prioritized for investigation yet, rather than just leaving it unattended as if it does not matter.   3. Now let me get this straight. You are telling me that after one month of promising action relating to Udemy's collusion with mis-selling courses as accredited, there is ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to report because Udemy has not even deemed it worth investigating yet? If so, that is a blatant example of Udemy pretending to take Instructor concerns seriously while actually not caring about them at all. Increasing numbers of professional organizations are advising their members that Udemy is not an acceptable platform for professional development, because of this scam sham extortion, while Instructors have invested swathes of time in identifying this as a serious impediment. Yet you are telling me that your organization is of such mammoth size that you have to schedule the investigation of such an issue 6 to 12 months in advance. I never heard of such a situation anywhere else. Forgive my audacity, but it sounds like an excuse to ignore Instructors, of which there are so many examples on this forum it is disheartening in extremis.   3. So now, in addition to alienating a whole professional demographic by refusing to take the sham accreditation issue seriously enough to investigate - even though a suggested solution has been offered to you on a plate - you have alienated the entire population of those requiring basic website accessibility, such as readability. That includes me.   4. It seems to me that what Udemy does is ignore, ignore, ignore. Ignore Instructors when they express concern over serious misrepresentation of courses to gain sales. Ignore Instructors when they tell you your pool of specially selected advisory Instructors is not representative. Ignore Instructors when they ask for features that are easy to implement. Ignore Instructors when they ask you to share possible changes with them before implementing them. Ignore Instructors when they ask you to address them as sophisticated adult educators with centuries of combined experience, rather than kindergarten children.   5. Given that you are now in touch with your legal team about the use digital assets, it may be prudent to warn them of the pending storm of retribution when class action law suits start appearing on their desk as the accreditation facade comes tumbling down. And those who report on the issue will rightfully say '...and Udemy were warned about this by their own Instructors but chose to ignore it'.   No organization or individual is invincible, and Udemy's hubris may well be its undoing.         ... View more

@ChrystieV  @LawrenceMMiller  @SharonRamel    Christie, If you truly and authentically appreciate my input, rather than just saying so as part of the 'new language', I wonder if you might please express it by going over to this thread and posting an update.   https://community.udemy.com/t5/Course-Management/Standards/m-p/82738/page/6   This is not entirely unrelated to the branding issue, as I will now indicate.   I propose that there is a major fracture and fissure in the modus operandi and communication style that transcends the new branding.   The planning and implementing of change seems to bypass open discussion with Instructors, and the announcements after the event are utterly patronizing, always claiming that you have Instructors in mind while simultaneously cutting them out of decisions.   This is one reason why 'teach with Udemy' is a somewhat insulting misnomer.   Had the branding been announced and revealed a priori, your own web design instructors would have told you immediately of its shortfalls.   Furthermore, you did not announce the rebrand as work in progress for which you were still working out the kinks. You announced it as this amazing gift that was surely going to impress and excite us all.   The fact is, what you espouse and what you claim does not correlate with what you do. And I think many Instructors have indicated that in relation to a vast range of issues, most often pertaining to: 1. unrequested changes perceived as abruptly introduced without consult 2. requested changes that remain ignored   The rebrand is just the latest issue to exemplify this 'meta problem'.   In my view, Udemy should radically rethink their strategy when it comes to contemplating, developing, implementing, and announcing any changes.   For example, since the promise to investigate the bogus accreditation issue, 1 month ago, hundreds of thousands of dollars have been extracted from students through misleading advertising that claim accreditation where none exists, helping to refund this inadequate rebrand.   I do think there has been sufficient time for Udemy to have the decency to update us on progress. This would provide clear evidence that Udemy really do take the concerns of Instructors seriously, for which there is ample evidence to the contrary, including the way the rebranding has been handled.   Thank you.     ... View more

@ChrystieV     Is there anywhere else on the site that you see purple text on a black background? I think it is the obligation of your development team to identify those styles through a robust method of CSS definitions identification. I do not see that something so significant should be entrusted to an Instructor's manual browsing of an entire website. Frankly, that solution is even worse than the problem requiring a solution. If you want to extend you trust of Instructors, may I suggest consulting with them before the event next time, rather than recruiting us to spot every instance of an issue.   Sorry. I have identified the issue. But the rest of the work is yours to do.   I am posting in bold to make it readable to those for whom the faint grey is inaccessible or painful to read.   ... View more

Hello. Hello. Me again. Forgot to mention.   The faint grey forum text is inaccessible. That is hard to read. That is pointless.   Are you receiving? Thank you.   We love you Udemy. We are committed to accepting your changes like good children, even if we cannot read about them easily and have to guess some of the words because the TEXT ON THE SITE AND THE FORUM IS LESS ACCESSIBLE THAN BEFORE THE AMAZING CHANGES that you have made as an expression of your commitment and regard for us and our students.   Thanks for consulting and letting us save you thousands of dollars in fees to a development agency who clearly live in a wonderful ivory tower of perfectly sighted hipsters.   Over.     ... View more

@LawrenceMMiller    It has changed to grey. Ridiculous. I wonder how much Udemy have paid their web site development consultants.   I thought of including the issue in my post, but with so many doubts over whether the public facing readability issue will have any impact, I was loathe to stretch my hopes by pointing out how the new faint grey type of the forum is like a passive aggressive punitive poke in the eye to instructors.   But I will do that now while I on it.   ... View more

Hello. Hello. Testing. Testing. Does anyone read me? The new site is unreadable. Over.   It seems to me that the pattern of Udemy's communication to Instructors pertaining to new developments is this: 1. Udemy become absorbed in their own introspective self-affirming enthusiasm for a specific idea. 2. They then make a patronizing announcement in West coast vernacular,  informing Instructors just how wonderful they are, and just how excited they will surely be, inferring just how grateful they should be for the new changes. 3. Instructors then realize that the changes, whether later proven to be beneficial or not, are a fait accomli, implemented without any true dialogue with them. 4. Instructors are then forced to either give in, or raise objections. 5. It then becomes pot luck as to which, if any, of those objections lead to an adjustment of the implementation.   For example: my objection is - and on behalf of all those who struggle to see I am going to give myself permission to shout here:   THE VIOLET TEXT AGAINST BLACK BACKGROUND IS INACCESSIBLE TO THOSE WHO ARE NOT IN THE UPPER ECHELON OF EXCELLENT EYESIGHT.   Will this change? Does anyone care? Or will Udemy soon make another patronizing announcement like: 'We really care about our Instructors' feedback. We are committed to accessibility. Have a nice day and know that you are loved. We hear you. We see you. Even if your students cannot clearly see us'.   And so just in case pot luck is on my side, I'll shout out for all those with less than perfect vision who want to improve their lives though education   THE CURRENT REBRAND OBFUSCATES CONTENT BY USING AN INACCESSIBLE  COLOUR COMBINATION.   Have a nice day, and thanks for caring so much.   Meanwhile,  a year has gone by since the issue of bogus accreditation was raised. A month since it was raised vehemently and supposedly acknowledged. Yet not even an interim report on what is happening. And that is only one of many issues raised by Instructors which seem to just linger in the ether while Udemy has the great idea of forcing everyone to squint in order to chose a course.   And before anyone accuses me of bad or unacceptable behavior, and threatens some kind of strike, go invest in some visual impairment simulation spectacles, and spend just an hour browsing the site.   I guarantee you too will be shouting before the hour is up.   It is not fun to struggle to see, and it need not be a struggle to learn.   I mean violet on black. Really. Are you that out of touch?       ... View more

My understanding is that Udemy aims to be accessible. But the violet colour text on black background is extremely hard for many people to read. This includes the breadcrumb and author links on Course Page headers. Was an accessibility expert involved in the development process?   As an aside, to me, the colour scheme now looks similar to those sites that sell natural body products. They all seem to use this violet/purple.   Even so, it would be nice if it was readable.       ... View more

Hi @MartinEbert373    Just wondering: Why do think that: 1. Courses will have lower quality 2. Courses will be shorter   I would have hoped that courses will need to have higher quality, in order to hold student attention, otherwise they will get bored and consume other courses without paying any extra. Instructors will get paid not because a student bought their course, but because they are genuinely consuming them, minute by minute.   Also, regarding length. If you make an hour long course, the maximum you can get paid is for 60 minutes consumption. But the longer your course, the more minutes to consume, and therefore the more you get paid.   Have I misunderstood something in your rationale?   Best wishes   ... View more

@Abbie  can you answer the question raised by @JasmineBayer above.   Specifically, when the subscription model finally goes live fully: 1. Will it offer Personal Plan subscription customers only courses that are included in UFB? 2. Or will all courses across the platform be included in the new Personal Plan subscription? 3. Or will Udemy curate courses for a second catalogue that is separate from the UFB catalogue?   Thank you. ... View more