Duolingo. What is so great about it anyway? I remember people being obsessed with it at one point. It might even be one of the best examples of storytelling & branding working well and making a useful product. This also included the people I admire, so I always wondered what made it so good?
I don’t actually remember trying to understand the obsession back then. I also possibly jumped to conclusion that everyone loved it because it was pretty. It would not be too far from the truth to say that considering how most design or products are appreciated only for how pretty they look. Or how fun the interactions are. Or the illustrations!
Considering I never actually used it consistently, I did not have the same experience. Few years ago, I tried to learn Japanese using duolingo. I barely was active and lost my streaks quite easily. I was obsessed with the idea of finding the best way to learn the language, so I explored books, another digital tool called memrise. I wanted to learn this because of upcoming travels and also to add to my interest of japanese media consumption. I am a bit of a japanophile, so maybe it would have made my experiences richer.
I moved to Memrise eventually. I enjoyed that they also focused on making you remember characters, including how you’d write them in script. And guess what, I gave up on this too.
This was probably my first attempt at learning a new language after schooling, where languages like sanskrit were forced down your throat. Second attempt was to learn Kannada after being in Karnataka for 12 odd years. And this was an in-person class. I dropped out of that one too. I could not keep up. And more than keeping up, I did not like feeling stupid. I felt left out in a class where others were able to pickup faster than I was. I guess I have always been a bit competitive. So much so, that if I don’t get things at a decent enough level at my first attempt, I give up. I am noticing it now more, after I am a few years wiser that this has always been my pattern.
This year, I tried to learn Korean. I had been consuming a lot of k-dramas and picked up a few words/phrases. I am about to hit a month of learning korean now. This is the longest I have stuck to learning a language. And also stuck to using one tool for the same i.e, Duolingo.
To my surprise I have actually been able to learn. I think I’d be going too far to say that I love Duolingo. If I really think of it, I kind of have a love-hate relationship with it. But whatever I feel about that overly-excited annoying bird, I was able to learn. I made plenty of mistakes, and fixed them. I grew in levels, I was also quite high in the leaderboards multiple times(except for the first positions, because they are always taken over by people who are learning English!). I almost also lost my streaks, made too many mistakes to lose lives(hearts), but I never really felt like I lost it all. I loved that the next day or within a few hours, I’d have my hearts back and I could start fresh. I often felt that duo represented my state of mind. Not the excitement- I don’t think I have ever been that excited about anything in my life without substance abuse. But the frustration, of not being perfect at learning that language. It sounds quite counterintuitive to expect yourself to be perfect at something while you are learning, but unfortunately my mind makes me obsess over this more. Somehow through duolingo, I have been able to fight this inner critic that stops me from moving forward. Ofcourse, there are days when it takes over. But the forgiving aspect of it makes me stick to it. Which for me is a huge achievement!
There as obviously parts that I haven’t enjoyed as well. The Social push gamification that uses game mechanics to motivate user engagement and a shared sense of achievement in this case, did not work for me at all. As an individual, I do not enjoy forced interactions, even if it is to my favorite person on the planet. So the push from certain friends to cheer, add others to your circles, or share streaks with them just felt downright annoying. I tried to do it a few times, but was not able to. For me, learning is an individual process. So, I would like to focus on the learning and have whatever streak maintained, but I will not do it to maintain a streak with someone. It does not give me intrinsic motivation, which they are trying to solve for by giving you social push.
The slow processing of voice learning modes that eventually reduces my time in timer based exercises, is especially frustrating.
Maybe I am just a stubborn individual who does not like this method of engagement, but rather the quiet & often loud frustration of duo seems more relatable and a reminder for me to want to get back to it. I just upgraded to a paid version of duolingo for now, lets see how this goes. I clearly have more to say about the product now that I am using it.