I rarely do a Japanese update so close together, but something discouraging happened yesterday and my last update seems inaccurate to what I wrote now. When I began my language learning journey (to learn German), back in 2016 I chose Duolingo and it was a fantastic free option. Yes, the 5 heart health system was frustrating but they reloaded in a few hours and the amount of ads was limited. There were few bugs and it was an easy interface to use. Fast forward to 2024, when I returned to Duolingo to pick up my Japanese learning because I was stuck in a rut from the move, things were very different.
My experience this time lasted a week. A whole week, that’s it. The ads between lessons were 1-3 mins depending on how long you used the app. The more you progressed the longer the ads between lessons. The ability to practice mistakes fully moved behind the paywall. The AI voices were normal at first but then I began to notice pronunciations that seemed incorrect to what I learned other places, and a quick reddit check and I am not alone in that experience.
But then, the nail in the coffin happened. Yesterday I was taking a final lesson review to move on to the next section in Japanese, and the app and AI format truly sabotaged the learning process. I was working on a listening exercise where you have to select words from a word bank based on what the voice says. I listened, listened again, listened on slow-mo, added some words from the word bank, checked my work, added a few more, checked my work, listened again, and submitted my answer. My answer was declared wrong and I lost a heart, although my “incorrect” answer matched the correct answer they showed.
I flagged it and submitted feedback and carried on with my lesson. No big deal. I went through the lesson, this was a review to move on to a new level, so you have to complete it to keep learning, well Duolingo presented the exercise again that I “missed” to do it again. I listened again, reviewed my work, and submitted. The same thing happened and I lost another heart. I flagged it again and moved on.
But I can’t, because this is the last obstacle to finishing the review. So I try again, maybe it will be fixed now? Nope, 3 hearts down. So I back out hoping it will reset the error and I forgot it would reset instead my progress, but not my hearts. I can pay for more hearts or pay for the Super Duolingo service for 99 USD a year for unlimited hearts. I was incredibly frustrated. I didn’t have enough hearts left to practice Korean too.
The hearts now reset after 24 hours. Plus, I can’t progress in Japanese nor can I go back and review previous lessons now because the app is gamified and you need gems to practice anything not just to convert your practice to “legendary” which means they go gold and your “practice streak” is frozen for a while.
Honestly, what the heck? They’ve made it unusable unless you pay money and I’d say that the current app is questionable enough to not justify a subscription even if you have 99 USD that you can spare because this is not even the equivalent of a virtual tutor anymore. I’m pretty disappointed. Having a free app that learning and language practice at its focus was such a good idea. It was accessible regardless of your financial status and it felt authentic.
This is a sham now. The language learning app are all expensive whether its Babbel, LingoDeer, Rosetta, etc. That’s why I would try Duolingo here and there because it was free and it kept you limited by hearts but it wasn’t unusable. That is no longer true.
Now I’m back at square one. I need to figure out a way to practice vocabulary and listening exercises, which I will it was just nice to have those practice sessions at the ready. I’ll go back to my books and flashcards and develop something. I’ll also keep watching Haikyu and Coupy Camper channel.
For Korean this will be a full new adventure. I’ll obviously continue to listen to Kpop and watch Kcontent but I’m going to make some Hangul flashcards and find some Korean language learning books. It will be fine. I’m sorry this post was a bit of a downer but I didn’t want to let my previous Japanese update stand as it was. It’s no longer accurate to my learning process.
One Rabbit Riot 