Why I chose to learn on Java 8 is because of all the latest buzz around it. Turns out the rumours on the demise of Java have been greatly exacerbated. So Learning Java 8 could, and I trust indeed, be a very good investment into your career.
I need to start by saying I like Mike Kelly is a great lecturer. Yet Mike is what every teacher should be: have a clear, well paced voice, and deliver the material in a non-rush ahead manner.
The course the author teaches is quite basic, but you will be able to accomplish a near real life Java desktop console application. If you already have some basic knowledge on how to write in any other procedural language then you will mostly gain insight on how to utilize Eclipse to be productive coding in Java.
Some basics get repeated at times a few more times then to my liking, but repetition is a good for learning. Like I hinted, you will not learn here any CRUD database operations nor RESTFULL or Web applications are covered, but regardless, Mike teaches enough to wrestle these specifics yourself, after all since Java is very much alive there is a huge user community that is always willing to help you on forums or IRC chats.
If I were eligible to provide advice in material preparations, I would suggest to re-arrange some sections so for example the For Loops or If statements would be covered before the classes or Unit Test.
Another advice to Mike would be hinting on stopping more often allowing for exercises on my own machine.
All in all, it is great teaching material, let me stress that, to the newcomers to the Java World.
4 out of 5 is what I think it should be rated at.
Disclaimer: I received a free version of this video for review purposes as part of the O'Reilly Reader Reviewer program.