diff options
| -rw-r--r-- | content/posts/2022-11-06-against-duolingo.md | 94 |
1 files changed, 94 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/content/posts/2022-11-06-against-duolingo.md b/content/posts/2022-11-06-against-duolingo.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d7f6f4e --- /dev/null +++ b/content/posts/2022-11-06-against-duolingo.md @@ -0,0 +1,94 @@ +--- +title: "Against Duolingo as a language learning platform" +date: 2022-11-06 +lang: en +categories: [ blog, language ] +tags: [duolingo, language, learning, software, rant] +translationKey: "2022-11-06-against-duolingo" +--- + +Up until last week, I would still have recommended Duolingo for language +learners for beginner's material, but now I can no longer do so. + +It is undeniable that Duolingo is a great source if you want to learn a +language (well, great in terms of quantity at least). If you want to start +learning a language and don't know where to start, just select a Duolingo +course and you will learn from greeting and introduction to political and +scientific vocabulary, from alphabet to relative clauses or conditional +phrases. + +People often criticize Duolingo for having nonsensical sentences you would +never use in real life or having only one sentence rather than a conversation, +or doesn't have grammar notes. I would even defend Duolingo here, and say they +are using it wrongly. Whatever common phrases you would expect to say, +"hello", "sorry", "thank you",... are all taught just fine, and the silly ones +are actually only a few to let the learners have some fun. Grammar notes +~~are~~ were provided for each lesson, and the silly sentences help you +remember the grammar very well. Monologous sentences... well, they solved that, +I suppose, with a side effect, but let's leave that for later. The claim that +you can't learn a language from solely Duolingo is moot, since you're not +supposed to do that; you can't learn from your textbook alone even; you should +use it in conjunction with other resources. + +Duolingo added ads and ad-free premium tier. It's business as usual; I didn't +bat an eye. + +Duolingo gamifies the thing further with a leaderboard and ranks? Another silly +decision I could ignore. + +Duolingo removed discussions. Okay, that's a rather backwards move. Maybe they +didn't have enough moderators to handle it, which I doubt since they're +expanding their business, but discussion was a very nice feature that allow +learners and native speakers to discuss and ask questions on their grammar +mistakes or ask for extra learning materials. This was a serious downgrade. + +Duolingo made a [huge redesign] and you can't say no to it. They said you +wouldn't lose your progress, but this is a lie: my French and German course +progresses which was completed 100% returned to zero (not that I use it for +those anymore, but those are on the contrary to what they claimed). Questions +now are often dialogues (if you could call 2 sentences so), which probably +caused it. Grammar notes are removed, and in their place are these "guide +books", which consists of nothing but mere "phrases you will learn in this +unit". This is not only an immense downgrade for the learners, but also a huge +disrespect to the contributors. They spent time to write those grammar notes, +but now they're all gone. + +It's not like this happened before. One or two years ago, they added some kind +of changes to this, which lost me some progress also, but they didn't go this +far. Either way, I should have known better that you cannot trust proprietary +platforms to respect you (see: a similar story from someone [whose Twitter +account is deleted without clear reason][data-del]). If you don't own it, it +will fall out of your hands in one way or another. + +So in short, I advises against Duolingo for learning languages because: + +- it has become terribly broken as a language learning platforms, and +- it is proprietary, it does not respect you + +Of course, this extends to online services run on free software as well. Let's +say, my Mastodon or Akkoma instance admin can just stop running that server at +any moment, intentionally or not, and my data will be lost. The developers can +decide to add a new feature that will breaks old data, and I will also lost +access to old data. The only solution to this is run the server yourself or +back up your data regularly[^0]. However, with a free platform, that data backup +can be useful, as it can be used for an another instance of the software. With +a proprietary platform, that data will probably just be a big <abbr>JSON</abbr> +that's very hard to read without a piece of software that no longer exists. + +So, my advices to language learners (and to myself as well): + +- use free software, such as Anki, to assist your learning +- keep local copies of your learning materials, and make sure it's not + DRM-encumbered. This includes not only movies, books, music, but also + notes and tips from online forums, though the latter might be less + valuable. +- avoid online services which don't allow export/import your data, even if it's + run on free software + +Basically: own your software, own your data. + +[duo-redesign]: https://blog.duolingo.com/new-duolingo-home-screen-design/ +[data-del]: https://www.matuzo.at/blog/2022/your-account-is-permanently-suspended/ + +[^0]: I don't do this, though, as I consider social network ephemeral + interactions, but for this website it is the case. |