Why don’t people here like Rosetta Stone? (Language Programs, Books & Tapes) Language Learning Forum

Why don’t people here like Rosetta Stone?
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Language Learning Forum : Language Programs, Books & Tapes

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hobbitofny
Senior Member
United States
Joined 6262 days ago
280 posts - 408 votes

Speaks: English*
Studies: Russian

Message 73 of 93

12 July 2010 at 6:56pm | IP Logged

cm006j wrote:

Ocius wrote:

They essentially re-use the same images and phrases for every language.
Whoever came up with the idea in the
first place was the one with the great idea. Marketing it this way and making the price
nearly that of a college level
course (which, if you have a small class size and a good teacher, you will get
more out of) seems silly. Even if I
did like the Rosetta Stone "method" more than, say, Assimil's or even Teach Yourself's
(which I don't), how can I
justify spending over $600 more for something which will, at best, teach me just as
much? I used levels 1-3 for
German and, frankly, I wish I hadn't spent the money. While it certainly does help you
learn a language, it's not
good enough to justify the cost compared to other methods.

Unfortunately, RS's marketing team is incredible and, despite the current economy, they
don't seem to lack the
ability to find people with $600 to spare. Nevertheless, I'm sure their sales would go
up (and perhaps their profits,
as well, though I don't know how much it costs for manufacturing purposes on their end)
if they lowered the price.

I figure it would cost more than twice what it does now if the images were reshot for
every single language.

I know that I personally have never regretted spending the money for it. I'm extremely
happy with what I learned, even as I've now moved on to more advanced material.

Certainly not everyone will want to spend that, which is fine. I just don't understand
why people are so hateful about it.

I put most of the negative to the marketing, price and knowing (based on RS paid for study) the poor return on 60+ hours of study.

The best RS versions I saw were the level 3 English of v2, and the old Russian Traveler edition.
1 person has voted this message useful

cm006j
Newbie
United States
whitehindu.blogspot.
Joined 5323 days ago
23 posts - 28 votes
Studies: Mandarin, Hindi, Sign Language

Message 74 of 93

12 July 2010 at 6:58pm | IP Logged

hobbitofny wrote:

cm006j wrote:

Ocius wrote:

They essentially re-use the same
images and phrases for every language.
Whoever came up with the idea in the
first place was the one with the great idea. Marketing it this way and making the price
nearly that of a college level
course (which, if you have a small class size and a good teacher, you will get
more out of) seems silly. Even if I
did like the Rosetta Stone "method" more than, say, Assimil's or even Teach Yourself's
(which I don't), how can I
justify spending over $600 more for something which will, at best, teach me just as
much? I used levels 1-3 for
German and, frankly, I wish I hadn't spent the money. While it certainly does help you
learn a language, it's not
good enough to justify the cost compared to other methods.

Unfortunately, RS's marketing team is incredible and, despite the current economy, they
don't seem to lack the
ability to find people with $600 to spare. Nevertheless, I'm sure their sales would go
up (and perhaps their profits,
as well, though I don't know how much it costs for manufacturing purposes on their end)
if they lowered the price.

I put most of the negative to the marketing, price and knowing (based on RS paid for
study) the poor return on 60+ hours of study.

The best RS versions I saw were the level 3 English of v2, and the old Russian Traveler
edition.

Well, I will admit that I would love for them to be priced less. I'd buy it for every
language they have :) But I don't expect them to ever change that and so I'll save up
and buy whichever ones are the most important to me.
1 person has voted this message useful

Ocius
Triglot
Senior Member
United States
Joined 5619 days ago
48 posts - 77 votes

Speaks: English*, German, Ancient Greek
Studies: French, Latin, Sanskrit

Message 75 of 93

12 July 2010 at 7:18pm | IP Logged

Right, the issue for most of us, as far as I can tell, is the price vs returns. The program in-itself is certainly not
"bad," but when you compare the return on investment in comparison with other methods, for those of us who
don't have that kind of money to spare it suddenly seems like a terrible product. Instead of buying a single Rosetta
Stone Levels 1-5 course, I could not only buy both Assimil and Teach Yourself, but also a huge array of audio books
and bilingual texts for four or more languages. That's where it really gets me.
9 persons have voted this message useful

cm006j
Newbie
United States
whitehindu.blogspot.
Joined 5323 days ago
23 posts - 28 votes
Studies: Mandarin, Hindi, Sign Language

Message 76 of 93

12 July 2010 at 7:39pm | IP Logged

Ocius wrote:

Right, the issue for most of us, as far as I can tell, is the price vs
returns. The program in-itself is certainly not
"bad," but when you compare the return on investment in comparison with other
methods, for those of us who
don't have that kind of money to spare it suddenly seems like a terrible product.
Instead of buying a single Rosetta
Stone Levels 1-5 course, I could not only buy both Assimil and Teach Yourself, but also
a huge array of audio books
and bilingual texts for four or more languages. That's where it really gets
me.

Okay, I guess I can see that. I'll be curious to try out other methods as I learn new
languages. So far Hindi is all I've really done, though I've made a start on a few
more.

By the way, how long have you studied Sanskrit? I took a semester in college and it
was the hardest thing I ever tried. My parents have both been studying it for about
thirty years now.
1 person has voted this message useful

mrhenrik
Triglot
Moderator
Norway
Joined 6108 days ago
482 posts - 658 votes

Speaks: Norwegian*, English, French
Personal Language Map

Message 77 of 93

12 July 2010 at 7:59pm | IP Logged

For me, there's a lot of reasons why I would want to rain on the Rosetta Stone parade:
- It's a completely and utterly ridiculous price. I have never in my life seen a product as overpriced as Rosetta Stone. It's a slightly advanced flashcard program with good photographs and a nice design, but you'd probably buy it for the teachings and not for the looks. As one of my tutors always repeats on the subject of post processing in photograhy - "You can't polish a turd".
- It's not very tailored (if at all) to the individual languages. French and Japanese is taught exactly the same.
- Learning like you did as a child is an alluring concept, but it takes children ten years of continuous exposure to learn their language properly.
- It's only marketing. Rosetta Stone is in some places regarded as "the" way of learning a language thanks to their very effective advertising campaigns. This is simply bad from the perspective of someone who loves language learning as it lets the "masses" pay an arm and a half for the "perfect" language learning product which they enjoy and then learn very little from.

I was talking to an American friend of mine who studies in Cornwall, and we somehow came on to the subject of language learning. Once I said I was learning French, his immediate response was "Rosetta Stone, dude." He was studying Italian with it and loved it (although he mentioned little of his results. I recommended Assimil to him, but he was very unsure of it's quality once he heard it was so cheap compared to RS. That's another reason why I happily rain on Rosetta Stone's parade. Will the other courses have to get on the same price level to be taken seriously?

I don't think people should be paid for their work. I think people should be paid for their good work, and in fair amounts. That much money for little and in my opinion poor quality work is a very bad deal.

Edited by mrhenrik on 12 July 2010 at 8:00pm
6 persons have voted this message useful

cm006j
Newbie
United States
whitehindu.blogspot.
Joined 5323 days ago
23 posts - 28 votes
Studies: Mandarin, Hindi, Sign Language

Message 78 of 93

12 July 2010 at 8:21pm | IP Logged

mrhenrik wrote:

For me, there's a lot of reasons why I would want to rain on the
Rosetta Stone parade:
- It's a completely and utterly ridiculous price. I have never in my life seen a
product as overpriced as Rosetta Stone. It's a slightly advanced flashcard program with
good photographs and a nice design, but you'd probably buy it for the teachings and not
for the looks. As one of my tutors always repeats on the subject of post processing in
photograhy - "You can't polish a turd".
- It's not very tailored (if at all) to the individual languages. French and Japanese
is taught exactly the same.
- Learning like you did as a child is an alluring concept, but it takes children ten
years of continuous exposure to learn their language properly.
- It's only marketing. Rosetta Stone is in some places regarded as "the" way of
learning a language thanks to their very effective advertising campaigns. This is
simply bad from the perspective of someone who loves language learning as it lets the
"masses" pay an arm and a half for the "perfect" language learning product which they
enjoy and then learn very little from.

I was talking to an American friend of mine who studies in Cornwall, and we somehow
came on to the subject of language learning. Once I said I was learning French, his
immediate response was "Rosetta Stone, dude." He was studying Italian with it and loved
it (although he mentioned little of his results. I recommended Assimil to him, but he
was very unsure of it's quality once he heard it was so cheap compared to RS. That's
another reason why I happily rain on Rosetta Stone's parade. Will the other courses
have to get on the same price level to be taken seriously?

I don't think people should be paid for their work. I think people should be paid for
their good work, and in fair amounts. That much money for little and in my opinion poor
quality work is a very bad deal.

Fine. I'm done.

I am obviously not going to convince anyone that RS isn't evil or out to get anyone.

No one cares that I went from knowing nothing about Hindi to being intermediate and
conversational using only RS. I am totally satisfied and happy with what I have gotten
from them.
1 person has voted this message useful

mrhenrik
Triglot
Moderator
Norway
Joined 6108 days ago
482 posts - 658 votes

Speaks: Norwegian*, English, French
Personal Language Map

Message 79 of 93

12 July 2010 at 8:34pm | IP Logged

I'm not saying they're evil or out to get anyone, but they definitely seem interested in earning a lot of money.

For a language like Hindi I can see that a program like RS would be very helpful, seeing as there are few good programs for the language with an English base. RS as a program is a decent program, and if they charged £30 for it I'd happily recommend it to anyone learning any language they offer, but I simply can't find any justification for charging such an enormous amount of money for it.
3 persons have voted this message useful

Volte
Tetraglot
Senior Member
Switzerland
Joined 6468 days ago
4474 posts - 6726 votes

Speaks: English*, Esperanto, German, Italian
Studies: French, Finnish, Mandarin, Japanese

Message 80 of 93

12 July 2010 at 8:58pm | IP Logged

cm006j wrote:

First: congratulations on your progress in Hindi, and in your contentment with that.

Secondly: you are not RS. RS is not you. Emotional arguments in favor of it, or emotionally lashing out whenever it is criticized, are unlikely to lead anywhere positive.

RS is, objectively, not a particularly efficient way to learn languages. It is also, as you correctly point out, something which can be used to make some progress by someone who really likes it. This doesn't reflect on you, or your purchasing decisions, or economic theories or pricing debates. Also, objectively, they are a company which invests heavily in marketing; some people like them more as a result, some people like them less, but again, it does not reflect on you.

Good luck, both with your Hindi and with your future languages.

4 persons have voted this message useful

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