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Letter to language programs publishers | ||
Tags: Language Program | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Programs, Books & Tapes | ( Topic Closed) |  |
| guillaume Pentaglot Groupie France Joined 7180 days ago 59 posts - 57 votes  Speaks: French*, English, German, Spanish, Japanese Studies: Mandarin | Message 9 of 44 13 April 2005 at 11:18pm | IP Logged |
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heartburn, don't worry when learning a language there are the ups and down. One day you know the verbs and then the other day in the heat of dicussion you make way too many mistakes. It's the way it is but it gets better with time.
Now as for the letter, I wholeheartedly agree with your letter but unfortunately I don't think language programs publisher will really listen to us. We don't represent a big enough share of the market because let's face it many who try to learn a language just do it to impress others around them and they soon stop once they realize that it requires hard work. An example of that is the number of pupils in the Japanese class in my university in France. First year at the beginning we were 40, we finished with 20 pupils. 12 of them continued to the second year. And in the third year only 6 remained.... And this was a class with a very good teacher. Well at least at the end we learnt much more from the class. Sometimes, I think we should just create our own language learning program. Start with a well defined form and content and do it in a wide range of language. But well I guess it would really be a huge undertaking. Yet wouldn't it be great to have quality materials made for language lovers by language lovers ? Edited by guillaume on 13 April 2005 at 11:19pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| heartburn Senior Member United States Joined 7206 days ago 355 posts - 350 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 10 of 44 13 April 2005 at 11:42pm | IP Logged |
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One of my firsts posts on this forum was about the "Dream Course." I invited everyone to share their ideas about what the perfect course would look like. I'll see if I can dig it up.
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| heartburn Senior Member United States Joined 7206 days ago 355 posts - 350 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 11 of 44 13 April 2005 at 11:43pm | IP Logged |
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Here it is! Edited by heartburn on 13 April 2005 at 11:44pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| stacey Newbie United States musicalspanish.com Joined 7163 days ago 5 posts - 3 votes | Message 12 of 44 14 April 2005 at 3:50pm | IP Logged |
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I think you people have awfully high expectations of publishers. I've published 3 unique programs - and found that what 1 person loves, another hates. To think abolishing music in all language programs would help 100% of the users is preposterous.
Your harsh reviews succeed in helping struggling authors make even less money than they already do - congrats! After spending months working alone on a product that had the fortune to be picked up by a large publisher - a product that many people find quite useful (I have scores of emails to prove that) I get to enjoy even smaller commission checks because self appointed language learning experts like you guys are out there protecting the public from people like me. I sell Learn in your Car - and consider it to be one of the worst language programs on the market. To say that Verbs 101 is worse than that is quite an insult. Have you honestly learned from LIYC? Penton's Immersion Plus is the best they have - I wonder why it's not mentioned here. And making a point to email me this post via one of my websites just shows me that whoever you are - you are quite determined to ruin my day - why you are stalking your own review on Amazon is bewildering. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| heartburn Senior Member United States Joined 7206 days ago 355 posts - 350 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 13 of 44 14 April 2005 at 6:56pm | IP Logged |
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Stacey,
I agree. I think the people on this site do expect a lot from publishers. We can probably divide language course buyers into three categories. There are those who have good intentions but very little self-discipline. There are those who have a need to learn that outweighs their desire. And there are those who simply love to learn languages. The people with little more than good intentions are the perfect customers. They buy courses and stick them in closets and drawers. These people will never complain. They just hand over their money and occasionally look upon their unwrapped purchases with quiet embarrassment. The ones who need to learn a language may actually listen to the course. For these people, the single most important feature of an audio course is its function as an excuse not to open a book. They don't even care if a course is any good. If the CD player is on, they can say they're studying. Then they'll blame themselves or their teacher when they get a D-minus. You'll find some of the people in the last category here in this forum. We are the ones who really, really want to listen to your audio course. We are the ones who are rooting for you. We want you to produce really great courses. And we want you to become filthy rich doing it with well deserved pride. But some of us (well, me anyway) are just tired of being disappointed. I didn't suggest that music should be abolished. I only said that it should never be played during the drills and should be on a separate track when used as a lead-in. I was really thinking about VocabuLearn when I wrote that. I think you are also the author of Musical Spanish, which did get a good review on this site. There is also a program called Cantemos by the author of Platiquemos. I haven't heard either of those programs, but I suspect that music is used as a teaching tool. In that case, the music would be essential. I'm sorry. I simply can't agree with you about Learn-In-Your-Car. For the price, it's a very good program. How can 111 5-minute, well-ordered, no-nonsense translation drills for less than $35 be bad? And Immersion+ has been written about here and seems to be well liked. I'm very sorry if you suffered any lost income because of my review. And I didn't mean to ruin your day, but I did have two reasons for emailing you a link to this forum. One was that I thought you deserved a chance to respond. I've deleted my Amazon review as a token of my sincerity. The other reason is a little more self serving. You see, you are a published author of audio-courses. And here, in this forum are some of the most discerning audio-course consumers the Internet has to offer. I thought, "wouldn't it be great if we could get one author, with connections, to build a Dream Course?" And I already had your attention. - mark Edited by heartburn on 15 April 2005 at 2:26pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| mtwalker Newbie United States imageray.net Joined 7183 days ago 26 posts - 26 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 14 of 44 14 April 2005 at 7:02pm | IP Logged |
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I have been learning from François' old website for over a year and have
been enjoying and learning from the posts in the forum for several months now. I had not felt the need to post until now. To the person who emailed Ms. Tipton (heartburn?), You are out of line. Why you would feel the need to intentionally seek someone out to attack is incomprehensible. I enjoyed the "letter to language program publishers" and agree with some of its points. However, whereas the snide tone of it is fine for those of us commiserating with you, it is completely inappropriate and (obviously) counter-productive to send it in its current form to a publisher or author. I don't think you are going to get anyone to change by telling them how bad they are; especially saying their product is "the worst". The worst how? For immersion? drills? to use on an iPod? For your personal style of study? What are your criteria? You could have approached Ms. Tipton in a much more mature, professional, and constructive manner. That is, if you truly wanted to improve the quality of the training materials. From reading her website she appears to run a small "mom-and-pop" company where change actually could occur quite easily (as opposed to approaching one of the larger "corporate" companies). You could have had an ally. It seems now you have quite the opposite. However it seems, unfairly, that you know her full name. She just sees a bunch a screen names on a forum; a forum that would appear to have lost credibility in the eyes of Ms. Tipton as a source of ideas for improvement. Now, that being said. If you wanted to hurt and alienate someone who has done nothing to you... I think you have succeeded. I do not know Stacey Tipton personally nor have I used any of her products. I just tend to take the side of people who are being bullied. ~Todd Walker Edited by mtwalker on 15 April 2005 at 1:19am 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| heartburn Senior Member United States Joined 7206 days ago 355 posts - 350 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 15 of 44 14 April 2005 at 7:45pm | IP Logged |
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Maybe you're right. I'm sorry. I really didn't mean to hurt anyone. That really was never my intention. I only wrote a review of the course and never expected the author to respond. But she did. I thought I was restraining myself by moving the dialog to a less public forum. Perhaps I was wrong.
But I never said that her course was the worst. In fact I conceded that it wasn't any worse than the average course. And I don't necessarily agree that constructive criticism is immature or inappropriate. I think I've been polite. And I think I have some good points. When she addressed me personally, I thought she'd like to hear those points. So, I sent her a link. I understand now that she runs a small mom & pop operation. That's one reason why I deleted my review. When I wrote it, I thought I was reviewing a product by Penton Overseas. I am sorry if I caused any hurt. Edited by heartburn on 14 April 2005 at 8:30pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| mtwalker Newbie United States imageray.net Joined 7183 days ago 26 posts - 26 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 16 of 44 14 April 2005 at 8:31pm | IP Logged |
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You must have been typing your reply to Stacey as I was typing my post.
If had seen it before I posted mine I would have toned it down. So, I apologize for that. On the subject of the letter. I wasn't saying that constructive criticism was immature or inappropriate. I feel that tone of the comments in the letter could be taken wrong by the people the letter is directed at and put them on the defensive. I think that you have some very good points. I'm not sure that the authors/producers see that some people use their products in a non-linear manner (random order, playlists,etc) or even edit them to tighten them up or remove parts they have mastered. I like your letter. I think if language program producers implemented your suggestions, the mechanical functionality of the courses would improve (content, of course, is a different matter). However, in its current form, I think it is just going to offend its target audience. Again, sorry for shooting my mouth off before seeing your response to her. ~Todd 1 person has voted this message useful |
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