![]() In the case of Duolingo, the original goal of the NSF-driven research was to harness the knowledge of bilingual people to supplement translation software on internet sites.Ĭredit: Courtesy of Duolingo Severin Hacker and Luis von Ahnĭuolingo was founded in 2011 by von Ahn, and Duolingo Chief Technology Officer Severin Hacker, who was a Carnegie Mellon graduate student supported by NSF at the time. ![]() When people typed the letters and numbers of difficult-to-read curvy and blurred text, this information was used to help digitize old, printed media that computers couldn't decipher yet. CAPTCHA, for example, had an added benefit beyond protecting websites from automated activities. Luis von Ahn's research centered on human computation systems, a method of improving computational models by collecting data as a byproduct of someone doing something else, like playing a game. ITR awards were meant to encourage and stimulate innovative, high-risk and high-return multidisciplinary research that would help prepare Americans for the information age by extending the frontiers of information technology and improving our understanding of its impacts on society.įrom this research, von Ahn helped create reCAPTCHA, a system that anyone who uses the internet has encountered as it distinguishes between human and automated web domain access (i.e., the "Are you a robot?" question). The program was a funding priority established in the early 2000s in response to a report created by the president's Information Technology Advisory Committee. NSF supported Duolingo CEO Luis von Ahn from graduate school through his early career research as a professor at Carnegie Mellon University.Īs a doctoral student in computer science and postdoctoral researcher at Carnegie Mellon, von Ahn was supported by the Information Technology Research, or ITR, program. Von Ahn said that for this reason, the company strategically rolled out the new update to new users first, gauging their engagement with the app and getting early input into areas for improvement.Credit: Courtesy of Duolingo A user on the Duolingo app "The two goals that we had were decreasing confusion and increasing learning outcomes," von Ahn said.Īccording to von Ahn, the company anticipated backlash over the update because they experienced similar pushback over their last big changes. In press materials about the update, the company explained that the single learning path integrates strategically timed reviews of certain content that it said are optimized for learning and memory - something that was previously at the user's discretion. Now, he said, he's worried he'll become demotivated, noting that currently the Greek lessons are lacking informational functionalities like lesson guides that were included with some of the other languages in the update and have been touted by the company. Wilson said he has been using the app to learn Greek in anticipation of his wedding, where he'll be marrying into a Greek family. "I think I will be less engaged, and that's mainly because sometimes you just want to do some easy lessons because you're tired," he said. Tobi Fondse, 50, who lives in the Netherlands, started a dedicated Twitter account called Duo Is Sad in an attempt to get the company's attention.įondse, who said he had used the app daily for 449 days before the update, said he was caught off guard by the update and is upset that his choices of lessons were being limited. It currently offers lessons in more than 30 languages. The app, which is free to use, says it has built up a user base of more than 500 million people since it launched in 2011. The backlash also highlights just how successful Duolingo has become. Some users have even taken to campaigning against the update, attempting to get the company's attention with one-star reviews in the Apple App Store and social media posts tagging the company. ![]() A Twitter search for content related to the update brings up dozens of tweets from users who have called it "the worst update ever" and compared the new style to the mobile game Candy Crush.
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