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Steve S

@fullfathomfive
I'm not proficient enough in any other language to have donated labor. Lucky me. But I contributed a lot to pre-Amazon IMDB (and even pre-enshittification Amazon era IMDB), so I know the feeling. Now IMDB is so clogged with ads that it's barely usable. If I want to look up movies, I use Wikipedia (and contribute), and IMDB only in desperation.

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8 January at 22:02 | Wall-to-wall | Open on dice.camp
2 comments
Steve S

@fullfathomfive
Duolingo has stiffed its labor donors, which stinks. It's gamified, but hasn't it always been gamified? That's its basic learning model: keep users learning by bringing them back every day with the game, even if that means users don't learn as much per hour. The philosophy is better to do fun lessons every day, even if they teach less, than to provide really strong lessons that users abandon. Great for weakly motivated users, but wasteful for highly motivated users.

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@fullfathomfive
Duolingo has stiffed its labor donors, which stinks. It's gamified, but hasn't it always been gamified? That's its basic learning model: keep users learning by bringing them back every day with the game, even if that means users don't learn as much per hour. The philosophy is better to do fun lessons every day, even if they teach less, than to provide really strong lessons that users abandon. Great for weakly motivated users, but wasteful for highly motivated users.

8 January at 22:03 | Open on dice.camp
Steve S

@fullfathomfive
My observation is that Duolingo works really well for refreshing stale language skills, but pretty poorly for a new language. It works well for keeping my Spanish and Norwegian fresh, it's not bad for learning Latin with knowledge of Spanish, and it's very slow going for Mandarin.

I don't resent Duolingo for commercializing volunteer labor. But I think it's bad practice that they don't reward volunteers in some way, such as free "Super Duolingo"

3/3

@fullfathomfive
My observation is that Duolingo works really well for refreshing stale language skills, but pretty poorly for a new language. It works well for keeping my Spanish and Norwegian fresh, it's not bad for learning Latin with knowledge of Spanish, and it's very slow going for Mandarin.

I don't resent Duolingo for commercializing volunteer labor. But I think it's bad practice that they don't reward volunteers in some way, such as free "Super Duolingo"

8 January at 22:03 | Open on dice.camp
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