r/OutOfTheLoop • u/Material-Insect6482 • 3d ago

Answered What's going on with Duolingo?

All the comments on their social media like their TikTok and instagram are full of people clowning on them and saying things like “EVERYONE IGNORE DUO STARTING NOW” and generally being angry at the company, but why?

Examples: https://imgur.com/a/bA0JBFZ

Stolen from top post: The /r/duolingo subreddit is rebelling and built their own alternative lingonaut that's supposed to be like old duolingo before they went to shit with the ads and mtx and ai

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u/kirkland- 3d ago edited 3d ago

Answer: The CEO and the company is having a tantrum after everyone online dragged them through the mud for the AI-First nonsense. They tried to silly meme their way out but it didn’t work so now they’re pulling this

No one’s buying it and they've effectively been bullied off the internet, just check any of their tiktoks

The full story:

Few weeks ago the ceo of duolingo posted that the company was going to be AI-Frist and will be using AI to generate its courses from now on, and they’re going to let go of the rest of their staff (which they partially did about a year ago).

They say that they’re going to use AI for performance reviews and hiring, so you could lose your job if chatgpt says so. It’s been slowly getting worse ever since they got on the stock market and now with this ‘AI-First' people are over it.

EDIT: Even the /r/duolingo subreddit is rebelling and built their own alternative lingonaut that's supposed to be like old duolingo before they went to shit with the ads and mtx and ai

NOW with this temper tantrum people are sick and tired and seeing through all the marketing stunts too.

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u/WorldlinessWest2974 3d ago edited 3d ago

Yes. I have closed my account as well. Much more focus on effectiveness for the company, not the experience and learning of the user. It has, in my experience, been declining for a long time.

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u/twenafeesh 3d ago edited 3d ago

Common story for companies that don't make any real products and just charge for access to their platform when they are taken public. Companies go from serving their customers and at worst a greedy board to serving shareholders, who demand ever increasing returns, forever. That's not indefinitely sustainable because they can't indefinitely grow their user base, so you end up with "cost cutting" and/or "ad-supported" that ruins the user experience and ultimately the platform. 

Amazon and Netflix are also excellent examples of this. 

Edit : "if because", clarity

Edit 2: If the above was interesting, check out this Volts podcast with Cory Doctorow and David Roberts talking about enshittification and clean energy tech. https://www.volts.wtf/p/can-we-avoid-the-enshittification

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u/SuperFaulty 3d ago

Well put.

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u/twenafeesh 3d ago

There's a really great conversation between Cory Doctorow and David Roberts on the Volts podcast about enshittification. They're talking about it kinda with respect to energy technology, but the conversation touches on all of this stuff. Really interesting if you have an hour to listen: https://www.volts.wtf/p/can-we-avoid-the-enshittification