I have recently found out about the online courses on data science, but I`m not really sure about the usefulness of them - therefore I wanted to know thoughts of others, presumably those who have taken one or the other. I wonder if it is worth the time/effort to take such courses - maybe it`s more helpful (in terms of self-education) just to buy an e-book or some other study materials and study in my own pace?

All in all - I would very much appreciate every insight on the matter!

Thanks!

p.s. the courses I reckon about : MIT`s http://web.mit.edu/professional/onlinex-programs/courses/tackling_the_challenges_of_big_data.html Indian Institute of Technology Delhi https://class.coursera.org/bigdata-003 and University of Washington https://class.coursera.org/datasci-001