The Differences Between xMOOC and cMOOC

MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses) are more and more popular in these days and it is seen as a revolution of education.Generally, MOOCs can be divided into two big categories, the first one is xMOOC, such as Edx and Coursera; the second one is cMOOC, such as Udacity. Both of them all provide a platform for people around the world who have the access to a MOOC to study online. There are different kinds of courses on MOOCs, and people can sign up for free and partly paid (Siemens,2012,MOOCs are really a platform).  Both of them give people a chance to study who may have no time or money to study in a university, or who have no access to great and top education around the world. Through MOOC, people can get a lot of valuable information and great thoughts from excellent teachers or professors.No matter where are they, if they have access to a MOOC, they will have equal rights to get higher and advanced education. Meanwhile, they can manage their time more freely than study in a university. Most of the time, they just need to complete their assignments or study before the end of a week. Because the materials, like videos and lectures are available all the time. Both of them can provide you a certificate or approval when you complete your course on MOOCs, which will help you, to some extent in finding a job.As to how great the extent will be is a good question which discussed a lot. I believe the extent won't be fixed, and it will change in the future. 
Now, let's talk about the differences between cMOOC and xMOOC. cMOOC emphasizes the concept of connectivist, or connectivist way of learning (Downes,2011,'Connectivism' and Connective Knowledge). That is to say, " that knowledge is distributed and learning is the process of navigating, growing, and pruning connections"(What is the theory that underpins our moocs?). Teachers on cMOOC will post some short videos, less than 10 minutes, and also small questions to help students. The interactions on cMOOC are distributed, multi-spaced, and it seems no a fixed center for the study network, which is unlike the course on xMOOC (What is the theory that underpins our moocs?). Teachers and students on cMOOC can be the information providers and generators, people talk with each other and sharing information and opinions. The cMOOC help them to build a social network which facilitate their study, discussion, and knowledge sharing. There are a lot of developed technical tools, like Bookmark, Facebook, Twitter, Blog and so on, to help they study on cMOOC. What is more, this tools also help to build their social network which will still exist even when the courses over. It make the network more meaningful, because people still can talk about what they all interested after the course and in their whole life. Instructors on cMOOC  unnecessarily are professors, PHDs, instead they can be just a graduates. The roles they play are a guidance to good and broad information for students more than the traditional sense of teacher who instill knowledge to students.Therefore, the key factor in cMOOC learning is that let students themselves explore, deepen, and extend the ideas (What is the theory that underpins our moocs?).Meanwhile, the way of learning on cMOOC can keep pace with the time, as we know knowledge is not fixed, and people interact frequently on cMOOC, which will be helpful to update information. Futhermore, different opinions and information can innovate students.At last, as 
Peter Norvig has said in his lecture what makes him so excited is the data they have gathered in this way of learning (Peter Norvig: The 100,000-student classroom). His words impressed me so much, it is really a big treasure which collect so much ideas and information around the world.

The xMOOC, like Edx and Coursera, they " adopt a traditional view of knowledge and learning. Instead of distributed knowledge networks, their MOOCs are based on a hub and spoke model" (What is the theory that underpins our moocs?). Courses on xMOOC seem to be more traditional, because the way of teaching and learning are mostly based on lectures and exams.They use technical grading and peer grading to deal with so many students'assignments, which is questioned for its quality, the graders'standards, but this peer grading also contributes to timely feedback, and opinion sharing. The teachers on xMOOC are mainly famous universities' famous professors, they can provide students high standard of education. The courses therefore  can be defined with elite, smart and rigorous.( While, cMOOC may be more fun.) As to its more traditional way of learning, there are some criticisms about it. Some people think the way of learning on cMOOC depends on knowledge replication and duplication, and it is not good for innovation. Sean Michael Morris think Cousera is just like a old long distance education (Broadcast Education: a Response to Coursera). As to these criticisms, I think Daphne Koller has given us some good responses in her lecture(http://www.ted.com/talks/daphne_koller_what_we_re_learning_from_online_education.html).I also shocked and impressed by her words that the amount of students which one famous professor taught in a MOOC course, will use him 250 years to reach this amount in his university. It reflect the greatness of MOOC. 

From my own opinion, I do think xMOOC and cMOOC respectively have their own advantages and audiences. They can meet the needs of different people. Actually, some people like the way of learning on xMOOC more than cMOOC, vice versa. After all, both of them are on the way of evolving. 

This video may be helpful for our understanding about MOOC.