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Duolingo:
all the buzz
Crowd-sourced translations via users
of a free site for language-learners:
win-win or lose-lose, asks Theo Merz

t
he business plan seems so simple it is each other’s work. Duolingo then uses an
hard to believe nobody thought of it algorithm to choose the best translation, and
earlier. Duolingo, an online language- a native-speaker editor on the BuzzFeed side
learning programme, allows people to take checks the piece before it goes live.
© iStockphoto
courses for free because they translate the articles themselves may not be
content from the web as they progress, which groundbreaking – the web could have got
the company is then paid for. the company by without ‘this Man’s chatroulette ‘People have ideas
says its courses are based on ‘100 percent Recreation of “Wrecking Ball” is pure
scientific data’, and could influence not only Genius’ being turned into the slightly blunter that translation is old-
the way we translate but how we learn ‘Un homme parodie Miley Cyrus sur
languages. But critics in the industry point to Chatroulette’ – but the translation model is. fashioned or boring.
shortcomings in Duolingo’s programmes and According to co-Founder Luis von Ahn,
say using unvetted, anonymous individuals to Duolingo is in discussion with four or five I think Duolingo
translate articles will inevitably lead to a sub- other US media outlets.
standard final product.   the company, which runs out of pittsburgh debunks those ideas.’
Whether we like it or not, with 15 million and has 27 employees, costs US$500,000 a
registered users – and 60,000-70,000 new month to run, but its owners say that with
ones joining every day – Duolingo is now a these new media partnerships it will be Von Ahn, who set up the company with
major presence in online language learning. turning a profit this year. Users are currently Severin hacker, a former student of his at
And, as of october, it has contracts to producing 60 articles a day for BuzzFeed and carnegie Mellon University in pennsylvania,
translate articles for two of the biggest media 10 for cNN, and Von Ahn says the has form when it comes to harnessing the
outlets in America: cNN and the viral news community has the capacity to translate power of the crowd. having invented
website [Link]. many more. he will not comment on how captcha – the distorted words you have to
BuzzFeed is one of the most viewed and much the new partners pay per word for the make out on online forms to prove you’re not
shared news sites on the Anglophone net, translations, saying only that it is cheaper a robot – he realised that hundreds of
with 85 million visitors in August 2013 alone. than using a top-end professional. thousands of hours were being wasted every
however, until recently, it had been restricted the site, which was only established in June day deciphering meaningless phrases. So,
to an English-speaking audience. Now it has 2012, is part of a wider move towards crowd instead of using randomly-generated content,
Spanish, French and Brazilian portuguese translation, as discussed by Nataly kelly in he updated the system to take sentences
versions because native speakers using ‘power of the crowd’ (TL52,5, p.14). And while from books and newspapers waiting to be
Duolingo to learn English are translating the interface might seem similar to Rosetta digitised, employing an unwitting online
BuzzFeed articles as part of their course.   Stone and other language-learning programs, audience to perform a necessary function.
content is quickly rendered in the Duolingo has an obvious advantage over Earning your keep on Duolingo is equally
languages through crowd translation, with paid-for courses among an internet audience painless. After selecting one of the six
dozens of the site’s users working on a single that has grown up expecting media to come languages offered – English, Spanish, French,
piece, taking individual sentences and rating free at the point of use. portuguese, German and italian (though

16 The Linguist FEBRUARY/MARCH [Link]

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FUN FOR FREE they are all likely to misinterpret things in the
Most traffic to Duolingo is via mobile (left); same way,’ explains Meyer.
and (below) the BuzzFeed homepage ‘For example, the German sentence Ich
bin blau looks quite simple and innocuous: “i
using the programme. English is currently the am blue”,’ she explains. ‘however, in
most popular language to learn on the site. German, this sentence actually means “i’m
Judith Meyer, a German computational tipsy”. Unless you have a good-hearted
linguist, has been on Duolingo since the German native speaker or advanced student
beginning: completing the Spanish tree from working on these translations – someone
scratch, brushing up her French and italian who is not part of Duolingo’s language-
and now starting on portuguese. While she lessons-for-translations deal – this kind of
finds much to praise in the programme, she mistake just won’t be caught.’
can also see flaws, and says BuzzFeed’s claim kelsey White, a researcher in German
that ‘Duolingo generates translations at the applied linguistics at the University of
accuracy level of those generated by skilled Wisconsin-Madison, who has written on
professionals’ is overblown. Duolingo, praises the way it highlights
‘the biggest advantage with the software is translation as a language skill rather than
that it adapts to you,’ she says. ‘if you find a focusing purely on communication. ‘people
grammar chapter really difficult and keep have certain ideas that translation is old-
making mistakes, Duolingo will keep coming fashioned or boring, and that it’s not a good
up with new sentences to translate. if you use way of learning,’ she says. ‘i think that
other software or textbooks, your only option Duolingo debunks those ideas.’
is to keep trying to solve the same exercise But she agrees that the translations
and eventually you know the correct answers produced, while better than those from a
‘I hope no business by heart without necessarily understanding machine, will never reach a professional level,
why they are correct.’ no matter how big the crowd becomes. ‘if
would use Duolingo She says the option of sharing progress on companies want to ensure excellent quality,
social media is good motivation: ‘if you go they should hire a professional. i would hope
to get translations back to Facebook the next day and see that no business would use this programme
those new comments, that might well to get translations for things where health or
where health or safety prompt you to study another lesson.’ safety are concerned.’
however, she adds that the focus on the Users are devoted to Duolingo, with one
are concerned’ translation of single phrases rather than posting in a forum, ‘i am crying because this
personalised dialogues is a problem for the site is what i always dreamed of – language
casual learner, who will not be able to build learning for free, in the most fun way possible.’
courses in other languages are being up reflex answers to common questions, such And the site certainly believes it has the power
developed in the site’s ‘incubator’ section) – as ‘where are you from?’, even though they to change the linguistic landscape, suggesting
you work your way through a skill tree, picking have had such phrases as ‘the girl eats the that Duolingo is the way to complete the
up vocabulary and grammatical structures. apple’ drilled in from an early stage. ‘it’s tower of Babel! But while the free courses
those who already have some knowledge of something that most other software, most are fantastic and the crowd translation model
the language can take a five-minute test textbooks and all classes get right, and impressive, they can be no substitute for
allowing them to skip ahead to the relevant Duolingo gets wrong.’ For Meyer, Duolingo immersion or for a professional translator.
branch, with learners on the later stages suffers from the same fault as all automated
doing translations. web-based programmes: it cannot offer real-
You can take a break from the course and life dialogues in the same way as classes or
dip into translations of varying difficulty at any immersive study.
stage, rating other users’ work or having a go however, her biggest concern is that
at a sentence yourself. there is an app for learners, often with less than 100 hours of
ioS and Android, which sends daily online tuition, are being used as translators.
reminders to continue with your language ‘Duolingo is hoping to make up for this by
practice – the company says the majority of having dozens of users work on the same
its traffic comes from mobile. And you are translation, but they are forgetting that these
encouraged to sign in with Facebook so you users are more likely to confirm each other’s
can share and compare progress with friends mistakes rather than correct them, because

Vol/53 No/1 2014 FEBRUARY/MARch The Linguist 17