4 Comments
User's avatar
Contrarian and Correct's avatar

I use Duolingo daily, but honestly I don’t think it’s that good for actually learning a language. It’s great at keeping you hooked with the streak and daily habit, but not great at helping you really speak or understand the language in conversation. In that sense, Duolingo feels like a completely different use case than something like AirPods with live translation.

Livy Research's avatar

That's the thing - if you're not using it to learn a language, then you're likely not a paying subscriber. Subscriptions are DUOL's bread and butter; disruption there would represent significant downside risk. And that's what the AirPods' live translation feature will likely go after.

Contrarian and Correct's avatar

I am a paying subscriber but I canceled because I hate using it every day and feel like I’m not learning.

Livy Research's avatar

Another case in point - majority of DUOL DAUs are non-paying / non-necessity-based learners. This makes AI an increasing threat to its subscription-dependent business model - the AirPods live translation is just one of them.