There's a lot of criticism here, but as someone who has never done algorithmic trading before - it's very exciting. I don't believe Quantopian's intention was to target veterans, since I'm sure you vets have your own system for testing and trading already worked out.

As a newbies with no experience in the field at all, it is unlikely that I would've even tried without a platform such as this. If Quantopian's intention is to bring more people into the field and get them exposure, even now, it's quite an impressive stepping stone.