A retention mechanic for learning that isn't Duolingo manipulation?
i've spent the last few years shipping learning products at scale - Andrew Ng's AI upskilling platform, my MIT Media Lab spinoff focused on AI coaching. the retention problem was the same everywhere. people would engage with content once and not return. not because the content was bad - rather because there was no mechanism/motivation to make it a habit. the standard industry answer is gamification — streaks, points, badges. Duolingo has shown this works for language. but I'm skeptical it generalizes. duolingo's retention is built on a very specific anxiety loop that feels increasingly…
What it does
In the maker’s words, at launch
i've spent the last few years shipping learning products at scale - Andrew Ng's AI upskilling platform, my MIT Media Lab spinoff focused on AI coaching. the retention problem was the same everywhere. people would engage with content once and not return. not because the content was bad - rather because there was no mechanism/motivation to make it a habit. the standard industry answer is gamification — streaks, points, badges. Duolingo has shown this works for language. but I'm skeptical it generalizes. duolingo's retention is built on a very specific anxiety loop that feels increasingly manipulative and doesn't translate well to topics like astrophysics or reading dense research papers. i've been building Daily - 5 min/day structured social learning on any topic, personalized by knowledge level. Eerly and small (20 users). the interesting design question i keep running into: what actually drives someone to return to learn something they want to learn but don't need to learn? no external accountability, no credential at the end, no job pressure. pure intrinsic motivation is notoriously hard to sustain. my current hypothesis: the return trigger isn't gamification, it's social - knowing someone else is learning the same thing, or that someone will notice if you stop. testing this in month 1. has anyone built in this space or thought carefully about the retention mechanic for purely intrinsic learning? curious what the HN crowd has seen work.
Does the same job
all alternatives →- ADAnki/Duolingo-like app using educational YouTube videos2024 · platoedu.org · ▲289
Hi HN, I watch A LOT of educational YouTube videos but wasn't forgetting a good chunk of the details because I was only really passively watching. So I made a tool that generates quiz questions/flashcards from YouTube videos, and uses spaced repetition like Anki or Duolingo to keep it in memory. Let me know if you find it cool/useful (or terrible ) or if you want to know a bit about the details!
- DSDuolingo-style exercises but with real-world content like the news2025 · app.fluentsubs.com · ▲472
I've been working on a little side project that combines Duolingo-like listening comprehension exercises with real content . Every video is transcribed to get much better transcripts than the closed captions. I filter on high quality transcripts, and afterwards a LLM selects only plausible segments for the exercises. This seems to work well for quality control and seems to be reliable enough for these short exercises. Would love your thoughts!
- PDPersonalized Duolingo (kind of) for vocabulary building2025 · github.com · ▲161
Hi! Wanted to share the project I really wanted to have. TLDR; this app lets you create your own list of words and you get a Duolingo-like experience (kind of, still needs a lot of features) practicing those words in their context. My English is not the best but not the worst either. But I realized I can't boost it up after a certain level! In my belief, in order to truly learn a language, you need to be exposed to that language often. Vocabulary is the key factor here if you really want to improve in any language. My experience is that when I read a book to improve my English vocabulary, I…
- LALearn a language quickly by practising speaking with AI2023 · prettypolly.app · ▲325
Hi guys, Hope everyone is well. This app was borne out of my own frustration. I thought that I was terrible at learning languages at school, since I didn't become conversational in French after 5 years of study. However, I later traveled with some French friends and, in just under 3 weeks, I was able to hold a reasonable conversation. I realized that there's no substitute for speaking to native speakers. I tried to adopt this approach for other languages, but it's much harder to find people to practise with when you aren't travelling. I started using iTalki to meet people from different…
- LCLearnLingo – Converse with an AI-powered language tutor2023 · learnlingo.dev · ▲157
Hey folks! I'm Callum, and I'm working on a way to practice a new language with an AI powered tutor. I've always found that the hardest part of learning a new language is finding someone to actually converse with. Even if a partner can be found, the pressure can mean that you are more focused on not making mistakes than on actually learning new grammar or vocabulary. The service that I have been working on allows you to practice with a language tutor via online chat messages, or you can have a turn-based voice conversation. I'm working on a number of other features that will be coming out…
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