I think SW planned on people following his instructions at the same time as he was showing/explaining them. So that everyone is able to do the steps at the same time, and so that he can answer to questions all at once, more easily ...
Just giving written lessons is also quite different in a way, since you need to be able to motivate yourself and do things on your own, instead of with the group. And if you have questions, you'll have to contact the teacher on your own, sometimes have to wait a long time, etc ... All of those damaging your motivation meter. .-.
I understand if some people can't attend all classes and wish to just get tutorials, but the interest of the class is that ... it's a class. .-.
Well, you make some good points but getting every single student together at the same time is just too inconvenient, and I've noticed a lot of posts saying "I really want this, but I can't attend every class".
Sure, you can ask questions live during a chatroom lecture, but I'm sure most students will have questions only once they've started working on their "homework". They're going to have to wait either way. This is a straightforward subject, so I don't see too many questions being asked anyway. Students with questions can simply ask around the forums (or use the search function if it's already been asked). Other students can help too, so it's not like there's only one person you can ask.
During lectures, I imagine Starwaffle will copy/paste bits of a pre-written lesson, wait about 2 minutes for questions to be asked, and then move on. This forces everyone to comprehend at the same speed; someone could easily get way behind. Students could just log in, not pay attention, and copy the entire lesson to read later. With this being the case, you may as well just give everyone the entire written lecture before or after each session.
What do you think, Starwaffle? The goal here should be to help out as much of the community as possible. If anything, why not just copy/record the entire chatroom session and give it to all students present and absent so that they can review it?. Why punish users (who really want to learn), just because they don't have flexible schedules?