In principle, you can get all of your class participation (or "quiz") credit by participating in the online discussion forum. You can also get most of the course material that is presented in class by going to the course website. Each semester we have a few students who choose to do the entire course that way and sometimes it works.

The lectures do provide benefits that cannot be gotten by working only online. For one thing, you get a constant sense of whether or not you are keeping up with the material. You also get more detailed explanations than are available from the web site alone. You also get to hear me laugh at my own terrible jokes.

A word of caution: In general class attendance does not translate very well into grades (which is exactly why I do not require attendance). However there is one very strong connection between attendance and grades. Almost all of the students who flunk this course have attended less than half the lectures and most have attended none.